I keep thinking about all this stuff I want to write about the boys, but I haven't had the time to sit down and do it, and now I've forgotten a lot that I intended to write.
I do remember that we took them for haircuts on Saturday morning, and I'm still blown away by how well they both do now. Gabe is so cute - he sits and chats with the hairdresser the whole time, and it's just so adorable. Dante is still a bit squirmy, but he's not screaming and crying, so he's come a long way. They both look very handsome, too : )
We had soccer Saturday morning, too, and Gabe has really improved a lot. He's doing better following directions and waiting his turn. We still have to give him a lot of reminders - he'd love to do nothing more than run around the gymnasium kicking the soccer ball around - but with some guidance, he's doing great. And he's all signed up for T-Ball for the spring. I imagine that's going to present a whole new set of challenges, since it's going to involve a lot more waiting, and learning a lot more patience, since it's just a much slower-paced game, but I think it'll be good for him - he needs all the practice he can get at those types of skills.
Dante, in retrospect, was probably a little too young for soccer this time around. I thought he'd do really well, since he did such a great job with karate. But he flat out refuses to listen to the coach, and just runs around the whole time. It's fine - as long as he's having fun, I'm happy - but if I had known he'd be that uninterested in it, I wouldn't have bothered to sign him up and pay the $50, considering that he can go run around in the gym any day of the week for free!
It was a great weekend, though. The weather was nice enough on Sunday that Scott took the boys outside and they ran around and played for nearly two hours. It's snowing right now, but the forecast is calling for temps in the high 40s for the weekend, so I'm fine with the snow. I can handle the cold and snow as long as we get a few nicer, warmer days thrown in here and there.
The boys all came down to see the race on Sunday, too, which was nice. I saw them right before the start, but I was concentrating so hard as I came into the chute that I didn't even see them cheering me on at the finish. But I knew they were there : )
The biggest thing on our minds right now, though, is Gabe. We had his preschool conference last Friday, and cognitively, he's doing great - he knows all the things he should know at this point, and is a very bright little boy.
However, he's got some behavioral issues that could potentially make Kindergarten a tough experience for him. This was not news to us, and we fully expected to hear it, but it was still a little upsetting.
The issues center around his difficulty sitting still and focusing on the task at hand, and rushing through everything so that he can move on to whatever's next. He's also very impulsive, and very emotionally immature, and as his teacher put it, his mind is just constantly racing, and it's very hard for him to concentrate on anything.
Like I said, nothing we weren't expecting to hear, but it left me with a heavy heart.
Initially she suggested the idea of maybe keeping him in preschool for another year, instead of sending him onto Kindergarten. But, given that his birthday is in March, that would mean he'd be 6 1/2 when he started Kindergarten - and on top of that, he's very big for his age, and already towers over most of the kids in his class. Those factors combined make me think that holding him back a year is just a recipe for a lot of social anxiety. I'm not ruling anything out, but I am really leaning towards not holding him back.
So the plan is to have him screened, to get a professional evaluation of all of these things his teachers (and we) have noted, and to take the results of that screening to the principal and Kindergarten teachers at his school next year, to try to come up with a program to ensure that he gets some extra help where and when he needs it.
In all honesty, I'll be surprised if they don't diagnose him as ADD. He's got all the symptoms, and I've suspected in the past that that was a diagnosis that would crop up at some point. Frankly, I think I'd be diagnosed with ADD if someone evaluated me, because I'm the one Gabe has inherited all these traits from.
And let me say right now that I am vehemently opposed to putting a 5-year-old on medication, and will not even consider it. I am trying to find information on various dietary changes that have been purported to help ADD symptoms, and that's something I'd be much more open to trying. But I think that the most important thing is going to be for his teachers - and us - to use the right approach and the right methods for reigning him in and helping him learn how to act more appropriately in school and other social settings.
It's hard for me to describe how I feel. No parent ever wants to be told that their child has any kind of problem - be it medical or behavioral. But I also know that in the grand scheme of things, this is something very manageable, and we just have to find the right approach to helping him along.
And I think mostly at this point, I feel relieved that we are taking steps to help ensure that he starts school off on the right foot. I'm not obsessed with him becoming a straight-A student - I just want him to enjoy school and enjoy learning - hopefully we're doing what we need to do to make sure he continues on that path.
One of the most satisfying periods of my "soccer life" was coaching the smidgets. We played three kids per side with small goals, no goalie. At that age, the ONLY thing that is important is to get the kids excited about soccer. That means kicking the ball, running, and scoring goals. The only "direction" the kids need is being pointed towards the right goal, and even then, that ain't no big deal. We all cheered anyways :-)
Posted by: Wes | February 04, 2009 at 08:56 AM