Day 21:
On Monday, we had 6 preschool boys. I made a chart to rate each preschooler on their participation for each activity. I rated them on a scale of 1 to 5; 1 being sad or not talking, and 5 being happy or talking a lot. I played "I'm a Little Teapot" and "If You're Happy and You Know It" on the piano for them. The session was good today, but there were a lot of copycat responses. For example, the first boy may say he is sad, and 4 boys after him say they're sad as well, but will act happy during the session. This makes it difficult to tell what their actual moods are.
Day 22:
I worked on a few visual aid projects on Thursday, but I hope to do more next week. The main one included making a folder saying "I want to.....please" which will make it easier for non-verbal clients to choose the activity they want to do.
Day 23:
On Friday, I recorded data for all of the participants in the group for elderly people with Alzheimer's. I recorded: What amount of lyrics they sang correctly (estimated), whether they maintained a steady beat or not, and whether they provided lyrics in the activities that required it (or needed a little, to complete assistance from their caretakers). Everyone sang and participated a lot.
The boys who have Autism had pretty typical sessions, so I don't have a lot to say about them today. Client 1 kept putting all of the instruments in his mouth though, so they had to change activities a few times before finishing.
Hi Liz! I hope you are having a great time in your SRP. How do you plan to handle the issues with the little kids copying each other? Do you have any other measurements to prevent the results from being skewed like that?
ReplyDeleteHey Jared! I really am enjoying a lot of the time working with my clients. We can't really prevent them from copying each other, but we can gage about what their actual feelings may be based on their behavior during the session. The only real form of measurement is watching their behaviors and not taking their verbal answers as how they actually feel. They also don't just copy each other verbally. This week, one boy had me help him put his shoe back on, and 2 other boys took their shoes off and came up to me and wanted me to fix theirs, too. So they copy each other with anything they can, and it's just something we have to deal with because they are only 3 years old.
DeleteI'm reading your last couple of blog entries backwards. After reading about the reactions of the boys in Week Nine, I'm noticing now that in Week Nine you played some of the same songs you did in Week 8. It sounds like the range of reactions of the boys has broadened and deepened a bit (more variety and greater response), or that you are noticing more and more and getting good notes about what you're seeing.
ReplyDeleteThey definitely responded more positively to certain songs and activities!
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