Today's session began with stretching to calf muscles, followed by heel to toe walking in the hallways and outside on the playground with added distractions. Session also incorporated sensory processing and balance exercises through play with other students on the playground. Session incorporated running and balancing on playground. Student required increased verbal cues to walk with heel contact.
In Chapter 5, lesson 5, we learned about the actions of Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass and Richard discussed how they were similar. Richard was encouraged to add new information to a graphic organizer on page 231 in his Inquiry Journal. We noted that African Americans have not been treated equally even after slavery ended. We read about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and how he worked to bring equality to African Americans by leading peaceful protest marches and how he refused to use violence to meet his goals. We also read about Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, both of whom worked to bring equal rights to women, and read about Dennis Banks, who helped found the American Indian movement with the goal of bringing civil rights to native Americans. We discussed the common goals of these people and Richard was encouraged to reflect about whether they earned their status, standing, and recognition as American heroes.
Richard completed his interactive calendar. He read all his vocabulary words and discussed their meanings. We discussed the different layers of the atmosphere. He read a reading comprehension article about space and answered written questions pertaining to the article.
I worked with Richard to come up with a theme for his bookbinding project. Richard decided on One Piece. Richard came up with a list of 16 different characters to illustrate for his book.
Richard was seen in his room for a 45-minute treatment session. His session focuses on improving his postural control, integration of retained reflexes, visual motor skills and integration, fine motor skills, dexterity, manipulation, ocular motor development and graphomotor development/keyboarding as an alternative means to written communication. Began session with cursive writing instruction. Continued learning and was instructed on the lower case letter "z". When he was provided with a visual example he began writing words with like "zebra". Richard is very slow when writing in cursive at this time but with practice this skill can become faster and more efficient. We continued to review each letter for quicker recall. Good session.
