Elise's Eval

Elise's 1508 eval for the EBR school system went very well today. Tiffanie wasn't able to keep Audrey and Lydia because Mason had fever (we hope he's feeling better!), but it all worked out. Audrey was a big help with Elise, and all three girls were a big hit! While I sat with Lydia and answered some questions from a few of the therapists and evaluators, some of the other therapists took Audrey and Elise to do some testing with Elise. They felt like Elise was much more uninhibited with Audrey there...she didn't clam up at all, so they got a pretty accurate feel for her skills. All of the evaluators were very complimentary of the girls...one even said how much fun she had with them...she said, "Bring them back again...come every other day...I might come to your house just to play with them." It was fun.

Elise will probably qualify for speech services within the school system.
[Just to clarify for everyone: Elise now receives speech therapy once a week in our home with an Early Steps speech therapist (Suzanne). The Early Steps program is only for kids 0-3 years, so Elise will age out of the program in August. After they age out of Early Steps, they move on to therapy provided by the school system. We will have an IEP to discuss how those needs will be met...in a school or at home, etc.]
Elise will probably not qualify for OT with the school system. Requirements are that a child must score 6 mos. below their cognitive skills (not chronological age) to qualify for OT services within the school system...the reason is a lack of therapists...they make the requirements more stringent so that they serve only the more severe cases. Elise scored at 31 months for self-care and 27 mos. for fine motor. She is about 32 mos. now, so she is not too far behind. We will continue to pursue evaluation for OT services through Early steps for the summer...then we'll decide in the fall if we want to get private OT services or not (probably with Laura from Neurotherapy....she has worked with her for the past year) . The therapist today also gave me some ideas for activities to help Elise with hand strength and coordination...that is helpful...we'll try to incorporate some activities at home.
The speech therapist also referred Elise for a communication board...a board with pictures for her to push a button to enunciate words for her. This is something that has been suggested to us by all of her therapists, and Martin and I have always declined...feeling like it was limiting...spoken words and signs seemed much better to us. But, I do admit that I've never even seen a board...to make a true judgement about if it would be good for Elise or not. And the the therapist today gave me a new take on it...some different ways of using it instead of using it as a primary form of communication: building vocabulary, strengthening articulation, etc. She said that a team from pupil appraisal would come to our house to evaluate Elise with the boards to see which one might be of the most benefit to her....then we have the option to decline if we so wish. The therapist just felt like Elise's articulation gets in the way...maybe not as much for us (our family) because we can pretty much figure out what she's saying (most of the time)...but, the rest of the world (especially in a school setting) would have a harder time, which would limit what Elise could do. She felt like Elise really could answer some of the questions that she asked of her today, but she did not understand her speech enough to be sure. Since we're not losing anything to do this eval for the communication board and we're not tied to it...I thought we could give it a try.

Lydia's sickness:
She feels absolutely awful again today....a little fever: 100 degrees, nose congestion starting to turn yellow-green...we have an appt with Dr Wood for 3:15. Hopefully we can get some kind of medicine to help her to feel better. Her appetite is really dwindling now...I can barely get her to take 1 oz at a time...she's just miserable. Please pray that she feels better soon. :)