BlimE Song.. - "Join Us"

Weeks of practicing for a dance with all other schools in Norway.
Finding the son.. practicing the dance.... excellent.

   

And in the end it came all together to the day the whole school performed it... All over Norway.
Great initiative..

Good signs...

It's been a long time... again... I should improve on keeping the blog update more.
Because.. lot of stuff is happening... Lotte's days - and therefore her experiences - are mainly at school and the "SFO".. the organisation that takes care of the kids after school. (from about 13:30... )

Of course a lot is happening at home as well, but when you think of it, she starts fresh at school, and gets more and more tired during the day. When she comes home, she wants to play with friends, cycle do homework, talk to us... but she already had a long day...
But it's at school where she's doing the hard stuff. Interacting with other children. Paying attention in class. Mastering the subjects... Quite a challenge for a girl that was born deaf, and started hearing 2 years after she was born. There's a lot of catching up to do.
At times, we can see how well she's doing. Some times we can see how well she's doing despite her situation. Some times we can see how things are not in place.
For example, cognitively she is not at the level of a 7-year old. This became painfully clear last week when they had a performance on stage, organised by the "SFO". Lotte had mentioned that there was going to be a show. The show was late in the afternoon. Lotte's mother came to pick her up later so that Lotte could see the whole show.

Think of the surprise when she entered the school, to find Lotte on stage taking the second price.!!!

She and 3 boys had practised an act with hoola-hoops, but Lotte never mentioned that to us. She never told us to be there...

Another mother had seen Lotte perform and told what happened. What Lotte and the boys had done, so when Lotte came from the stage, full with pride, Lotte's mum could pretend that she had seen the show.

But it was such a painful moment. The first show - in front of public - of your deaf daughter that is working hard to keep up with her friends and you miss it.. (btw.. Someone made a video, so we will see her.. I'll post it here.. )

It just shows that as parents we have to make sure that the adults around Lotte know that not everything that is communicated to Lotte is understood. Lotte is great at pretending that she understands, but there's a lot that she doesn't get. This was one of those situations. It showed us that communication between SFO and us has to be done on paper. Actual, we know that, but the people at the SFO didn't realise it..

So, room for improvement..
(And... looking for a "hoola-hoop" picture... until then, the diabolo will have to do..)

Just some brainstorming....

Social or academic... ? .. Where to put the focus...???
Lotte needs a lot of support in order to keep up with school-work. Reading is going well, and improves with the amount of time we spend on it. Math, adding and substracting so far, requires help as well. Fortunately, she loves doing homework. She loves reading and she's OK with being corrected - gramatically. (That said.. the sentence "I know that.!" is used often by her.. :-) )
BUT.... she loves to get the bike and just go back to school... interact with the other children that are still there. Cycling from one place to another... Being with others....
How to combine this.??
An advantage is that.. this is Norway. We have no problem with her cycling off. She has a watch, and even though she can't tell time, she understands how the dials have to be for her to be home. She's very punctual...
A disadvantage is that.. this is Norway. Days are getting shorter quickly, and cycling in the dark is a No-No for Lotte. Also dusk is too dangerous.... so this leaves little time between getting home from school, and being back inside.

So... there's the dilemma. She needs exposure to both social interaction and the academic... The social part is obvious when friends come home with her. To her it's great, because she can interact 1 on 1. Put another 7-year old in the equation, and Lotte will not be able to keep up.
A couple of days ago this happened when she had a friend over, and the two played along fine. When a third child came at the scene the interaction, or attention is not distributely equally. Lotte will fall behind in the conversation and games, and will get frustrated about that. Lotte came to us and informed us that the latter had to go. She wanted the friend to herself.
For us it's interesting to watch the difference between a 7-year old that has heard all her life, and Lotte, who has been deaf for the first 2 years.
We can see that there is still a lot to catch up.
Lotte is doing really well, but she is only slowly catching up on the 2 years lost. It seems as if she caught up 1 year since she got CI, meaning that she's mentally a year behind the rest of the class..
Realising that can hurt.... or you can look at the other side... CI helped her to catch up.
Because, when she had had signlanguage from the start and because of that had not had a delay in cognitive development, she would still not be able to interact with all the children she's interacting with right now. She would have had just a couple of other friends that would speak sign. And they would only see each other during schooltime, and sporadic visits.
Now, CI has made her in a very social girl, attending the school as her brother and sister - close to home, outgoing, determined to say what she wants to say. Sure.... she could be that deaf/Deaf as well, but not in the hearing world.
She would not have been able to communicate with her grandparents. Even thought they could have learned sign, they would have been surpassed by Lotte in no time. Now, she talks to them on the phone when in Norway, directly when in Holland.
In a way we cannot imagine how Lotte's, and for that matter, ours, and our other childrens life would have looked like had Lotte not been able to hear...
It would have been completely different. Can't say if it would have been better, or worse... but very different.

Btw... she's allowed to cycle to school for 1/2 an hour.. then homework.. :-)

One on one...

Today, Lotte has been with a friend from school almost the entire day.. Away from our house..

It went well. She's been with friends before, but never this long. At the end of the day she was tired...

And that's no surprise.

Think of it.. In a situation with many children, it is easy for her to camouflage that she doesn't understand. She watches the other children and whatever she hasn't understood will be filled in by the action of other children.

Playing 1 on 1 - like today - changes that completely. Any communication from her friend is towards her. So, Lotte will have to be more alert. Will have to focus if she doesn't want to ask too often to have a question repeated.

Apparently, it went very well. They played for a very long time, and at the end of the day they were still friends.

Lotte' s mum called the girl's house, and got the girl on the phone.

On my wife's question as to how it was going, the girl said "It is going very well. But we did fight a bit just now, but that is over now.."

Lovely !!!

"I have to talk to you.."

Problem....??
Early this morning, a recurring subject came up again.
Sanne, Lotte's sister, same school, 3 classes ahead, complained that Lotte was playing with her and her friends, and not with her own friends...
Lotte was confronted with this, and said that sometimes the girls from her class told her she could not play with them...
Ouch...!!! that hurt.... so we contacted the teacher and asked her to check out the situation..

Several things are happening.
One thing is that Sanne is visiting Lotte's class as well. Paying a social visit, but obviously Lotte can do the same. So we had a little talk to Sanne and agreed that she would not visit Lotte's class for the time being.
Lotte was also confronted with her behavior of going to Sanne to play and leaving her own friends behind.
We called Lotte: "Lotte, come here, I have to talk to you.."
She was told that she shouldn't do this any more. Lotte listened, repeated, and went straight out the door to the trampoline..
A bit later she came in again, and said to her mother: "Mummy, I have to talk to you....
Why can I not play with Sanne??"
We gave the sophisticated answer "Because the teacher had said so..." (More authority than we.. :-) )
"Oh... OK" was the reply... and life continued...

Another thing that was observed is that actually kids did ask her to play, but Lotte chose not to participate..
This can have different reasons. Perhaps she really doesn't want to play with them, but more likely, she anticipated that she will not be able to follow the games the children play and therefore doesn't start..
With the delay she has - cognitive - I can imagine that this creates a problem sometimes. A lot of things that are second nature to those children are new to Lotte. And it will take time before that gap is closed.. She will catch up but it will take time....

Patience - I guess...

Trampoline time..

Well... we finally have one.... and the effect is there.... From 0 to 1 kids in the garden it grew to 9 in the first days.. slowing down to 2-3... Our own...But the appeal is there.. Even straight out of bed, before they got dressed they went out... That was reason for one of the many rules... Not before 11:00...

For Lotte it is wonderful, not just for her physically, like all kids, but because her classmates now come to Lotte's trampoline.. Visiting Lotte. A great experience..

For those that are wondering about the pouches on the shoulder, I attatched a video of Lotte on it. (.. well, pouches, these are "bags" really... These are pouches..)
Just wanted to show how Lotte is not thinking about being careful with her CI... They hang on the shoulder, and will be fine while playing. The coils stay on the head.. OK, helped by the hair keeping it there... but even without the hair they will stay on, or Lotte will have them on there in no time..
The wire will sometimes get around the ear-hook. Thought about just removing the complete hook, but putting the wire through the safetypin works as well..

Lotte's dollshouse

As allways, each morning Lotte is up before anyone else. Not being allowed to wake up the others, she will play in her room. Reading her books, playing with the duplo, putting on her clothes... plenty to do before the rest wakes up.

Yesterday she went out of her room, and started playing with the dolls-house.
It's right outside all the bedrooms, so we can hear her.

Complete role-plays are performed. Dolls are instructed what to do... by Lotte and by the other dolls... and remember, she's deaf as she is doing all this.
Her CI is not on !!

In addition, she speaks Norwegian as she does all this. All other conversations in the house are in Dutch, but by herself she'll use Norwegian.

We have seen this before with the other children. They learn - or duplicate - these games in the kindergarten and they will use the language that is used at the time. In fact, they will even use the appropriate dialect. Not the raw, local dialect, but the sofisticated dialect that one hears in Oslo and a lot on TV....

It's all explainable, but still.... our girl... completely deaf, and playing in Norwegian.....

It's great!!

A new friend.. continuing story..

Today Lotte went to her new friend.
It's wonderful to see her take the initiative to get all dressed up and trodd out of the house, along the road, and to the neighbours hour......
And they were not at home.
Lotte checked all around the house. A little troll with a big blue "hat" on...

Later on, her friend was at home and they picked up where they left it yesterday.
Playing over there, over here, showing oof their rooms, sharing candy. It was just magic.

Playing - Alone!!

Another milestone.
Until 3 weeks ago, Lotte would not be secure enough to play alone with someone she doesn't know well. For example, babysitters were relatively safe when we had put Lotte to bed. Otherwise, the "going-to-bed" routine could be a disaster.

3 Weeks ago, she joined her sister in playing at a neighbour, 4 houses up the road (not down..) and Lotte had a great time. The children over there are known from the kindergarten, but is was still a first that she was out half a day and enjoyed herself.

Today she went a step further. She loves riding the bike outside. She was OK for her mum to leave her alone outside, and played with the daughter of the neighbour down the road.
After a while, the neighbour called and said that the girl wanted to play inside... if that was OK.
OF COURSE !!!
First time that Lotte was secure enough to do this. She can make herself understand, and feels confident enough to handle the situation...

When finished she made it very clear that tomorrow she would play with her little friend again...
(Jeezzz it's not easy not to use names.... )

WOW, our little girl is growing.... and it goes so fast !!

Little update..

Yesterday we were at a museum with an excellent playground.
Lotte wanted to go straight in, so that was fine. She quickly picked up a little friend who she guided through the maze. They had great fun. It was one of the first times we would see her spontanious interact with children that do not use sign. Being in the hearing pre-school/kindergarten, she is more used to making contact with these kids. It's great to see.

When the girl had to leave, Lotte even had a conversation with the mother of the child. It was great to see the selfconfidence of Lotte.
The exposure to hearing-only environment is showing now.
Decisions we make regarding her upbringing are allways made with the correct "gut"-feeling but even so it's allways good to see the effects.
It's sometimes difficult because like with all major changes in children, it gets a bit worse before it turns around and almost explodes into good..

Yes !!!!!
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