Saturday, February 9, 2013

Wing dinger days

Some days are wing dingers when you're homeschooling a sizzler
Before I go on I must give credit to Carol Barnier for the term "sizzler". She came up with this title for her son after he spit on a hot lightbulb and it exploded. When she asked him why he spit on the lightbulb he replied "I like the sizzle". Oh can I relate!
Carol decided to homeschool this child with ADHD. She wrote some excellent books about homeschooling these amazing kids. My favorite is "How to Get Your Child Off the Refrigerator and on to Learning". In her books you will find ideas that work with these kiddos. They learn differently. They need to move. Many of them are visual spatial learners. My sizzler loves to do math her way. Tossing the bean bag back and forth or jumping on his mini trampoline while reciting his math facts are top picks for him!
Carol also has an awesome website called Sizzle Bop. I have referred to it many a time. She reminds me to enjoy this child and keep a sense of humor. To remember that these kids are extra special and we need to handle them in positive, creative ways. To not expect them to be "normal", whatever that is.

Some days it's hard to enjoy the sizzle. Like when mama's tired or low on patience and admiration for the Darlin'. Yesterday was one of those days.
Usually I can tell from the get go if it's going to be one of those days. Not This time. He was happily playing with Legos when I came out to greet him. But then he didn't want to eat breakfast. Or get dressed. Then he started bouncing off the walls, literally. Along with that there is this verbal nonsense that comes spewing forth with uncontrollable force. Oh dear, fasten your seatbelts ladies and gentlemen we're in for a bumpy ride. It's like trying to control a tornado or a vapor. It just keeps slipping through your fingers. Now, I'm an experienced mom and classroom teacher, but they don't train teachers to control elusive things like vapors!
The scary thing is they know when you can't control them and it adds more fuel to the fire. At that point I have to go make a cup of tea or visit grandma next door or schedule a retreat at a day spa. But when he comes to give me a "huggie" (a run and grab you very tight bear hug), I soften and see the wonderfulness in my boy again.
Now, wing dinger days are not all horrible. There was a bright spot when it was time to give our pet rats a bath. Oh how he loves the rattie tatties! He can be so sweet with the little critters. He was the dryer after I bathed them.
He did, eventually, read his book, do his math and work on his train lapbook. But each one of those took a lot of convincing, cajoling and general frustration (for both of us!)
I guess he was not in his element today.

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