final days

Whit had math homework tonight for the first time since my school hissy in mid February.  He knocked out 14 conversion problems (simple stuff, sure, but some multi-step) in under 10 minutes.  –Like a normal person.  I was scared initially because he promptly started singing and whistling when the paper was put in front of him, but after one (1) (ONLY ONE) reminder, he got to work.  Ok, Brain Balance, you win that round.

Last night, however, I sent Whit back to his room for a shower, and after reminding him 3 times over 20 minutes, finally had to threaten to strip him myself and turn on the water.  Where was BB then?

It’s hard to assess over-all improvement in the day-to-day stuff.  I had written the list of accomplishments we wanted to see at the beginning of this program.  We have only 5 sessions left until final judgment. ;-)

Progress report

I got Whitman’s second progress report on Monday.  The BB lady was very excited for him.  He is now at age-level or above for everything they measure, with the one notable exception of upper body strength.  Since the last progress report on February 6^th:

Whit has gone up 3 levels in Visual Ocular Reflex (not moving his head with his eyes). 

He’s up two age levels in Visual Processing (meaning he should now be able to find something particular in a junk drawer, or do Where’s Waldo pages), Proprioception (knowing where his body is in space—I never realized he had an issue with that.  He’s not particularly clumsy), Gait/Aerobics and Interactive Metronome (keeping a rhythm).

He gained a level in Balance Beam, Supine Core (face up), Prone Core (face down—like superman exercises), Upper Body (he’s still far behind) and Brachiation (like a chin-up—still far behind)

My 4^th grader (Mom brag alert) is working at a 7^th grade level for Getting the Main Idea and Drawing Conclusions, and a 6^th grade level for Making Inferences.  In Math, he’s doing 5^th grade level Fractions, Decimals, and Multi-step word problems.

So what does this mean at school and home?

So I told you how he turned his U’s in Miss Miller’s class to S-.  She has told him that he is doing much better in her class and that she’s impressed.  In fact, when the kids of the reading class got out of hand last week to the point she had to bring in the head of lower school to yell at them, Whitman was told it didn’t concern him and he didn’t have to stay in for recess with the rest of them.  I attribute BB 100% for that breakthrough.  It has always been Whitman who would be the leader in such class-room hijacking shenanigans.  The fact that he wasn’t a part of it at all is mind-blowing.

We’re still not getting any math homework, but any writing assignments remain next to impossible.  I told that to BB lady and she promised to work on writing with him for his last month at BB.  She told me that she is very excited to see what he accomplishes in this last trimester.  Me too!  I hope he can put his thoughts on paper by the end of this.

fail

Eight weeks into Brain Balance, and I have sat here watching Whit avoid his homework diligently for over an hour now.  He is supposed to be writing down key words regarding activities he did over the weekend--not even whole sentences.  But my dear Space Cadet has wasted an hour talking to cats, talking to me, going to the bathroom, walking around, doodling on his paper, laying his head on the table, eating some food, closing his eyes, staring unfocused at the ceiling...  an hour plus.  And now he's getting frustrated with himself.  I'm betting by the end of the night, we'll see tears.  Thanks, Brain Balance! You suck.

8th Week

The time just flies.  Only four more weeks of Brain Balance left.


There's nothing much to report.  I will mention that Whit's progress report came home on Wednesday.  He managed to turn all his U's for unsatisfactory behavior into happy S-'s for "needs improvement" in Miss Miller's class.  She's always given him U's in Self-Control and Following Directions.  One time he even received N's for those, which wasn't explained in the key, but I took to mean "so much worse than a U that I had to use a new letter."  Any way, perhaps that's Brain Balance at work.