Day 4...

Today's amazing fact...  Individuals with Down syndrome benefit from loving homes, early intervention, inclusive education, appropriate medical care and positive public attitudes.
To me, that sounds pretty close to what every other child in the world benefits from. And some of you may ask what early intervention is. Well, it is therapies that include occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech therapy, etc. Many parents feel that this sort of thing at a very young age is extremely important. Other parents, like myself, chose to do alot of "therapies" with their children themselves. In my opinion there probably is no right or wrong answers here. For our family our choice has worked great. We sort of took the stance to meet our boy where he was/is. We let him lead. It has allowed us to enjoy every phase of his development without the frustrations of constantly wondering when he will meet a certain goal or milestone (that WE would have set for him, whether he was ready or not). And we don't judge him based on what his peer's are doing. Instead we celebrate what he is doing, and where he is at. No matter what, we want him to know that he is enough, just as he is. He doesn't have to "measure up" to anything, or anyone else, because he is an individual.

Now that our boy is 3 he has shown us that he is ready for more than what we can give him. So he is getting "therapy" through his public preschool. Our biggest frustration is that it is not an inclusive education though, which means that he is not "included" with typically developing children, instead he is segregated. So we have had to seek additional private preschool, where he can get the inclusion enviornment. Tonight at "back to school" night at the private school we were told what we already knew, which was... our boy acts just like the rest of his peers. Now if the publics school system in our town would get a clue :) At this age they are all finding their way. And at his public preschool we are told that he is the "peer model" for his class. That might sound great, but that means that he is at the top. He has no models for himself in his class. He is not being challenged.

I'll be back tomorrow with more amazing facts...

Thanks for stopping by. God bless you.

The boy loved these pumpkins...