sensory surprises

brown bear, brown bear

my husband and i were both english majors.

we have so many books in our house that we have vowed never to move again simply so that we don’t have to move them or the numerous, heavy book shelves we own to house them.

i have tried for nearly three years to get my son to sit still for an entire book.  (even a very small board book).

above all of our other various parenting challenges, this is perhaps one that has been the hardest for us to deal with over the last few years.  it’s hard not to take it personally when your child won’t sit still for goodnight moon or green eggs and ham.

up until very recently, book reading would involve me sitting the kidbot down (him opposite me, rather than snuggled next to me or on my lap, at his adamant insistence), and getting through about 3 pages. at that point he would stand up and his attention redirected to something (ANYTHING!) else in the room.

at first i figured that he was just a high-spirited toddler, and as he got older, he’d be able to focus better.  but month after month, his ability or desire to sit still for more than a couple pages never got better.  neither bribery or reprimands seemed to work. every book reading session (once or twice a day for nearly three years) was pulling teeth, for both of us.

after awhile i began to have fears of a child who did not like to read. (imagine, the horror!)  these gave way to fears about an illiterate child, who would always struggle in school and fall behind his classmates.  finally i became overwhelmed and wondered if he was truly ADD or ADHD, and that i would have to medicate my dear little boy.

i will find another post to recount our efforts to get him referrals to see specialists for these behaviours -  but needless to say, we finally found ourselves with a referral for one-on-one speech therapy. (again, he was seeing a speech therapist in a group setting through the local school district, but had seen very little progress).

on our first visit to the speech therapist, she commented on his distractibility, and asked a few prodding questions about his need for sensory stimulation.  on the second visit (a week later) she read him a book, which resulted in his usual mixture of apparent boredom and irritation.  not 10 minutes later, she asked that i hold him on my lap and rock with her as she read a book that had a sing-song rhythm to it.

we read the entirety of “Brown Bear, Brown Bear” in one sitting.  cover to cover.  rocking together.

i almost cried.

she left us with the assignment to get our hands on one (or three) of the bear books from the local library - or focus on any other book that could be read while rocking.  she also handed us a sensory questionnaire to be filled out for the next session.  it seems that with some vestibular stimulation, for the first time the kidbot could actually focus on and enjoy a book.

this thursday (just 3 weeks later, and 2 days after we started the brushing protocol) my husbot IM’d me and let me know that the kidbot was sitting and “reading” brown bear to himself.

again, i almost cried.