Behavior

On the heels of Chase's bad note that came home from school today:
Chase did not have a good day at school.  He refused to follow our routine and directions.

I've been thinking a lot about what our expectations should be for his behavior (not just because of the note, just in general over the last 6 months), and how we can change it.  One of the focuses on his IEP for next year is to improve his attention on task.  Read: get him to focus for more than 2 minutes.

For the longest time, I've just chalked this up to 'developmental delay', but in talking with some other Ds mommies, I'm noticing that this isn't the norm.  Their kids can sit at circle time.  Their kids will follow directions.  Theirs will complete an activity without having to be redirected a trillion times.  Wha..whaaat?!?

I've also talked with some moms who have seen the same behavior in their kids (who are a couple years older than Chase) and have recently been diagnosed with ADD in addition to Ds.  Awesome.  More letters!  But, they've also said that once diagnosed and properly medicated, the treatment has been spectacular, and is largely responsible for their children's success in inclusion classrooms.

Now, I don't want to immediately jump on the ADD bandwagon.  I don't think that Chase needs to be drugged out to make my life easier...but I want to begin to look harder at this.  Is it?  Isn't it?  What else can we try to fix the problem behaviors?

I talked with our pediatrician today about getting a referral to see a pediatrician/psychologist who specializes in behavior modification.  It sounds like dog training to me.  BUT maybe they can give us some advice, some new tricks, or even just help us to document where we are and what we try so that later, if we hit Kindergarten time and there are still big issues, we won't be starting at square one.

Other than that, Chase's 4 year appointment was uneventful, if you don't count the fact that the entire time I was talking to the doctor, Chase and Gavin were taking turns leaping from the exam table into my arms, and Chase was yelling at Gavin every time he "budged" in line.  Dr G scored big points, though, as she said, "I can really tell he's making big strides in speech!"