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I knew how to handle this during my son's rad days and my instincts tell me to use the same approach now. My son has difficulty retaining his academic skills over the summer. We have always worked on reading, and academic workbooks, handwriting. This summer I added flash cards for the multiplication tables. He forgot then in less than a month after knowing them cold. I have since realized that he has also forgotten how to recite the months of the year, days of the week, time telling.
The battle over working on this stuff has heightened as the summer has gone on. I have appealed to the logic - that he'll do much better in 4th grade if he enters it still knowing times tables, and by getting a better handle on handwriting. That worked initially, but he is resisting that more. I have asked his outpatient OT (for sensory integration) to focus on handwriting over the summer. Yesterday, he was highly resistive in OT and I had to put on my seargents hat to gain compliance. Generally I take the tone, that it's his responsibility but that I'm willing to help him. But I realize now that I am taking on more and more of the responsibilty onto my shoulders.
My question is - do I dump all the units of concern back onto his shoulders. It's likely he'll be set up for great difficulty in 4th grade if I do that. Knowing my son, I anticipate that he will totally blow off all hints of schoolwork for the rest of the summer if it's left up to him. What served me well during the school year, was to make it all his problem. My only contingency was - that he was more then welcome to go outside, watch tv, play with friends if his school work was done. Other than that, I did not nag at all.
4th grade is going to place a lot of new demands on my son. So I'm really worried about him adjusting to this, plus the strain of being behind academically. He'll have 4 different teacher, he'll be expected to take notes, to be organized - all things he does poorly at. I fear that his sensory integration and central auditory issues are going to really become more dominant this year. This could be a pivital year for him and I hate to see him start the year already behind.
I'm wondering about establishing a quota of school work that I expect per week. Since I work full time, the weekend is my only time to really spend much time on academics with him. He's pretty tired during the week after a full day of camp. I'm wondering if I should go back to my school year policies of no electronics. etc until school work is done (on the weekends only). Or wondering if I should just drop it for now, unless he iniates and let him learn for himself when he starts back to school.
Any advise and ideas gratefully appreciated.
DimasMom
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At the beginning of the summer, I re-did Hannah's chore list so that it included about 1/2 an hour of academics per day. All of the chores, including academics, had to be done before play time. It worked until she started day camp. Then, I pretty much let it slide. My inclination is to tell you to let it slide. I know it's hard to do that re: school, but for your own sake, it would probably be nice to not have to think about it. Or, here's a sneaky idea! What about you and he playing school for a little while each weekend. Part of the time Dima's the teacher and part of the time you're the teacher and you could slide in some flash cards, etc.
This is a tough one...
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Thanks for the reply Susan. Basically I gave up for the rest of July. I needed the break. Told my son that I expected him to know his times tables by 8/1. If he did not master them by that date, then I would expect him to go over the cards 1 time per day. He has 1/2 hour ride to day camp - could use that time wisely in the AM. He's tired inthe PM, so I really don't expect much then. and of course, he did not touch them for the balance of the month.
Well, he's pretty much blown off study them in the AM (he goes to camp with TSS - so I just remind, put the cards in his backpack and leave it up to him). But my policy is - if you don't study during the week, then you have to go over the full deck of cards 2 times per day on the weekends. By today he was pretty tired of times tables. Only 2 more weeks till school is back, and he's still pretty week on the times tables - so guess we'll just continue as is and let him suffer the consequences.
Only 1 more OT session before school resumes, handwriting is still a major battle. His TSS has made some wonderful observations that she documented over the summer - about how providing him with gum, suck candy etc, greatly improves his attention to task, concentration and ability to sit still. School still does not buy the oral stim stuff, and not sure they'll pay much attention to the notes of a 23 y/o kid - but will try one more time. OT has provided us with a "noise buster" - it's a headset that creates white noise so subtle that you really don't hear it, but it really tones down the background noise. Hopefully it won't be a battle to get this into the school. They continue to refuse the sound field system, so we figured this might be the next best thing.
DimasMom