Blue

I mentioned last week that we are doing "compliance training" with a kinder kid who is having a tough time following directions in class. Well, I can't recall if I mentioned that the kid pretty much refuses to speak - to anyone. Some actually wondered if he was mute or at least a selective mute. Well, last week I met him, and yesterday I attempted to work with him. He pretty much refused to acknowledge me so I kind of just guided him about the room forcing him to do everything he was attempting to escape. He would cover his ears and although he looked in my direction if I was to lock eyes with him he'd quickly look away. Today I seemed to make a lot more progress. I would give directives and then walk away, come back and praise for whatever minute progress he had made or prompt again and then walk away again. He didn't get much of his work done still, and he still ripped apart his workbook, but he stayed in his seat (one of our goals) and did do some of his assignment. The big progress came in working with him one-on-one. He actually came with me today to walk down to our little room to play video games. Sure, he got side tracked a bit, but I didn't have to use any muscle to get him where I needed him to be - so that was a huge improvement. Once we reached out little room I let him pick out a video game and play for 5 minutes. Then I let him know we needed to take a break and do some of the classwork he hadn't got to while we were in class. AND he actually stopped playing the game without tantruming/shutting down on me/acting out agressively and did the work. I, of course, continued to lavish him with praise for every little thing he did. Gotta feed this new it's ok to do my work mentality. My biggest excitment of the day was when I asked him what a color was and he actually replied back,

"Blue"

After that he even said a couple of short phrases to me! I was shocked and completely tickled pink. He was compliant the rest of the time together, even put away the video games without being asked. We made a deal that he would win a toy if he walked (I specified this meant no running, skipping, or hopping) back to the class with me. He shook my hand in agreement and we had a pleasant walk back to the classroom. Who is this kid? I am amazed. Guess that compliance training stuff actually works.
I've got another behavior modification kid that I just started working with yesterday. We have a Direct Behavior Rating (DBR) sheet that is passed back in forth between the teacher who fills it out and my supervisor and I who talk with the kid. Yesterday I met with this little 2nd grade girl for the first time and explained to her the system. She has 2 goals: stay in her seat AND raise her hand and not call out. I made her say them to me at LEAST 10 times until I knew she had the memorized. Then, we practiced them. I said silly questions that I knew she knew the answer for and she practiced raising her hand and waiting for me to call on her. After all that she got to pick out the prize from the prize wall that she wanted to work towards getting: colored pencils. This morning, on a whim, I decided to go sit in her classroom. She got all wiggly and excited to see me so I squatted down next to her and made her tell me, again, what she was going to be working on. She told me and then I stayed in the classroom and watched her for a half hour. That kid cracked me up. She kept checking back to see if I was watching her and occasionally, when she needed to get out of her chair to throw away a paper or something she would bolt out and bolt back, like if she did it quick enough I wouldn't see her. Too funny. Anyway on my way out I stopped by and told her what an awesome job she had done and that she should keep up her great work so she could get those pencils. She told me her goals one more time and I left. When she came and met with me at the end of the day she had done what was asked of her 2/3's of the day. pretty awesome improvement considering she didn't do it at all the day before! So she won her pencils and we played go fish to reward her for her good behavior. She said to me as she was leaving my little room "this was fantastic!"
Don't tell anybody, but some days, this internship thing is pretty fun.

Round One - FIGHT!

I didn't expect to need to be aggressive as a school psychologist. But today, I was taken down, hard, by a teacher. An angry teacher. The lady literally belittled my attempt at helping her. She has been complaining for two weeks about a kid who just moved into the school. So last week I did some academic sceenings with him (he is pretty darn average in math and reading) and then did some behavioral observations in class and out of class. I learned very quickly that the kid doesn't stop talking while in the class. I mean seriously, he was off task 70+ percent of the time I was in his classroom and almost ALL of that was talking. So, since grumpy teacher has been complaining about the kid I approached her at recess and offer my services to help him with his behavior in the classroom which seems like it should help his ability to stay on task and complete classwork. She scoffed at my program with "the stickers and the giftcards" and then walked away from me, continuing to lament about how bad she had it with this kid. I literally just stood there, mouth agape, staring at her. What the heck? Grumpy lady, I just tried to make your life easier! That was not the reaction I had expected. I told my supervisor about it later and he seemed only slightly shocked which made me think that this may be a common problem with this teacher. I feel so terrible for that kid. He is adorable and wants to learn. I am afraid he is going to have a terrible year with that teacher. Heck, I am afraid I am going to have a terrible year with that teacher.

Today's word is brought to you by the letter: B

Behavior Modification!

Isn't is grand? Today was full of it. I hung out in the kindergarten classroom this morning assisting my supervisor in doing "Compliance Training" with a little dude in there. My sup wore a necklace that had a green smiley face on one side and a red frowny face on the other. When the kid was following directions/staying at his center Mr. H would wear it with the green happy face showing, but if the kid wasn't complying with directions, it was switched to the red sad face. I, doing my best Vanna White impression, kept "score" on a white board that was displayed for the kid to see. Every five minutes I would draw either a happy or sad face, depending on  the kids behavior at the moment. The kid really wanted NOTHING to do with us when we came into the classroom. Mr. H attempted to explain to him what we were doing and the kid covered his face to block him out. But we kept at it. And after an hour and a half the kid was actually looking at both of us. He got lots of happy faces and won his cookie for the day, so he was a happy camper.

I really liked the technique as the kid got constant observable feedback on his behavior. And he got a tangible reward. I asked Mr. H if it was a technique that could be used with older kids and he shot that down pretty quick saying it was really just classroom training. I see his point, but I have also seen some older kids who could still use some classroom training. Maybe, someday, when I am a big bad School Psychologist at a school of my own, I will try it with an older kid and see how it works. :)

After hanging with the kindergartner I met with my other behavior mod kid. She is amazingly ADHD and  has three daily behavior goals (stay near work station, get half of work done, no rolling on the floor) and if she gets one goal met for the day she gets to play video games, two or three goals, she wins a prize. It seems like a pretty effective system for her. Token Economy for the win! She is a silly girl though. Today she popped in at her lunch recess and felt the need to sing for me. So I let her do it and she ate up the attention. Maybe she really doesn't even need the prize, she may do well with just an "atta girl!" here and there.

Never works according to plans...

Today's life lesson:

 Always have a Plan B

Lately, I make plans. Beautiful plans. Thoughtfully organized plans that tell me what I need to get done and when it can be accomplished. But I am learning they rarely work out. :)

Take today for example. I got to internship and organized my schedule. I need to write a report, finish testing a kid, meet with a kid on a behavior modification plan, meet with a teacher on a behavioral consultation, AND find a 5th grade teacher who is apparently avoiding me and deliver her a behavior rating scale.

So, after my schedule was all worked out I got started. First things first, score some protocols and start writing a report. I did that. It worked out swell. I even got to meet with my behavior mod kid during her recess and remind her of her goals for the day. But then it all stops going according to plan. I got an email from the teacher I was supposed to be meeting with, canceling for today and asking if I can do it on Friday (which I probably can, but technically, I am under another supervisor that day so it gets a little hairy), and then I attempted to track down my kid to test from RSP and they have changed his time so he isn't available to work with.

I haven't yet tried to track down the avoiding-me teacher, but at the moment I am 2 for 4 items on the list today. So I guess I will work on those other things tomorrow, time to make a new schedule! :)

An almost independent week

Last week I was only under the watchful care of a supervisor for about a day and a half. By far the most independent week I have had yet. And you know what? I survived! Nothing traumatic happened and I didn't screw anything up! SCORE!

I had a boring Monday - but you should know - they are always boring. I have yet to figure out what to work on at my Monday school site. I progress monitor 4 kiddos and occasionally have a student to assess, but that's about it. I tend to just get homework done, so I really can't complain about that!

Tuesday I got to the school site to discover a list of things to do waiting for me. So I jumped on that. Observed in a kindergarten class and got asked by a couple of them if I was one of the students moms. Then I tested a kid, observed another kid, and then interviewed a mom using the Vineland.

Wednesday I tested two kids (one of those testing sessions was half counseling), interviewed a one-on-one aide in a first graders class, progress monitored some intervention kids, and met with a teacher about some students she feels need counseling.

Thursday I did a couple of student observations, did more progress monitoring, tracked down a kid who we'd missed during benchmarks for ORF, and met with one of my supervisors.

Friday, I did lots of progress monitoring, two behavioral observations, tested two kids, interviewed a teacher, finished a report, a did a bit of counseling.

Busy busy week, but I enjoyed it! I can actually say I felt more competent than I have ever felt before. Now, mind you, I still don't feel ready to go it alone by any means, but I actually do feel like I am sort of getting the hang of some of it.

Adventures in Autism

Started working on my first autism assessment. The kid is completely adorable. He is verbal however there is pretty much zero reciprocal communication and lots of echolalia. I've now done about 3 different observations on him, a time on task in the gen ed classroom, and two play ground ones. It is interesting to see that he has no problem hanging out with a ton of other kids, bumping into them or being touched by them, but he never speaks to them. I gave him some select parts of the WISC and that was a big adventure. He was tough to keep on task because one thing you would show him would set him off on a story or tangent of some sort. He kept repeating things that he had done during the testing the previous day which he really seemed to enjoy. There is something amazingly endearing about the kid. Couldn't really tell you what it was. I also got to give a couple of portions of the ADOS. That is a completely rad assessment. I love how it is set up with all toys of different sorts in order to attempt to evoke an interaction with the student. My supervisor obtained consent from the parent to video tape the whole test which was really cool. It made it so you didn't have to scramble around and take notes while trying to pay attention to every minute detail of what the kid is doing. The kiddo definitely has difficulties in speech and reciprocal communication, but we really didn't observe any stereotyped behaviors during the testing. However, according to his aide he does finger flap in front of his eyes. I just haven't seen it yet. Working with this little dude has been really awesome, I am so glad I've had the opportunity so early on in my internship!

1st Conference

Yesterday was a meeting of the minds... well, sort of. My internship advisory-person from the University came to meet my two internship supervisors. I was surprisingly nervous. All three of the guys who overseeing my hours in order to grow me up into a bonafide School Psychologist all sitting around discussing me, in front of me. It was a pretty awkward 30 minutes for me. Every time I did say something, I felt scrutinized. Now, that probably wasn't actually happening, but that's how it felt inside my head. Overall no one said anything too scary about me, nor were there any real complaints. My supervisors really didn't have anything that they felt I needed to work on specifically, simply said  I was catching on quickly and he was pleased with how I was progressing. *phew* Let's hope I can keep it up!

Quarter of the way done and still clueless!

*Downer Moment Alert*
I was tallying up my internship hours today and realized I have already passed the 300 hour mark, so I am a quarter of the way done with the hours requirement. That is so crazy that is is going so quickly. I can't say that I am remotely feeling secure in the position yet though. I honestly still feel like I am clueless. Shouldn't I have got a bit more of a handle on this by now? I thought I was starting to figure out one of my supervisors report writing styles, but then (after emailing it out to everyone and making all the copies) I discovered that I had screwed up and left out an entire test from the report. Ooops. So I asked if I should just re-do it quickly and add in the missing stuff and I wasn't given the opportunity which frustrated me beyond belief! Today I floundered my way through trying to explain to a kid who really liked working with me that we were done testing. He was so sad, which was completely endearing, but just another thing that I need to work on. There are just SO many things to learn and to see! I can't seem to keep track of it. And at times it is really tough to keep up with having two supervisors at 3-4 schools. I can't remember which one wants it which way at which site! Can you tell I'm kinda whiny today? Sorry about that. I will try and chipper back up before next week.