First Week of School

We've finished our first week of Kindergarten 2.0!  After a good experience with general education inclusion last year, I decided to take advantage of the LACK of educational gap between Isaac and his peers and let him be King of the Kindergarten this school year while we focus on communication strategies and working out the balance of general education inclusion vs. special education. It's been a process that's involved moving schools and starting from scratch and trusting the Lord to guide me in very unfamiliar territory. Finding your child's educational success sweet spot within the unique framework of communication delay, down syndrome and attachment issues is a battle--fighting for equity within the education system often feels like a full time job. Thankfully, Isaac enjoys learning (when he thinks it's his idea!) and is emotionally prime for academics: his favorite letter right now is R--I've found it written about 2,000 times on various pieces of paper around the house. *wink* 

It's going to be a good year!  Full of growth, new learning, partnership, some failures and A LOT of successes!  

Reading his own sign. We've been practicing hard over the summer!

Like last year, I got to spend some time with Isaac and his new classmates during jump start. It was good to see him in the environment that he'll spend his time away from home. Although this is a new school, teachers & routine, he figured things out pretty quickly. The benefit of a 2.0 year is having the foundational skills like gluing and cutting DOWN.

His new teacher is quickly learning sign language and integrating it into the class so all of his new friends can understand my little boy. We are blessed to have a special education support that is fluent in ASL. Yeah for hand talking!