Homemade Homework
by
Jeff Stimpson © 2006
Alex has been waiting for homework that engages
him. A lot of the photocopied worksheets he brings home have to do
with identifying pictures, then coloring them, based on the first
letter of the word that names the picture, such as "jet" or "jump
rope" in the J weeks. If I prompt him, he'll say the word matching
the picture. Then he bears down with one washable marker and colors
the whole area of the picture, taking no care to stay within any
lines and not letting the marker up until he has a blotch of color.
I don't know what he thinks of it.
"I think Alex's sees his homework as kind of a
mish-mash," says Jill. "I think sometimes he doesn't know what to
make of it, so it doesn't hold his concentration."
Then his teacher sent home a sheet of paper ruled
horizontally. Down the left margin were such words as kite, kitten,
kit (it was K week). "Alex, homework!" I call/
Alex's desk sits four feet from our dining room
table and maybe 20 feet from the TV, where Ned was broadcasting
"Sponge Bob." "Ned," I said with sudden inspiration, "shut the TV
off for a few minutes, please." I'd read somewhere that autistic
kids do much better with homework when the TV's off. You'd think
such a tip would be commonsense fathering to me by this time, but
still I had to read it somewhere.
Ned shuts off "Bob," especially when informed that
Alex is about to do homework. Ned is mad for homework, and can't
wait to get it assigned next year in first grade (I will remind Ned
of this in about 10 years).
I've been working with Alex on handwriting by
holding his hand in mine and guiding it gently through the letters
(the "hand-over-hand" technique). After quieting Ned with one of
Alex's coloring-centered worksheets, I get Alex to take the pen in
his fingers and start on Kite. "Kite, Alex. K-I-T-E. Kite."
I feel Alex's hand start through the letters,
pausing moment to moment but generally moving with featherweight
force through the letters. The pen used to slip in his fingers; now
I feel them tightening around the shaft of the pen this time, and my
grip on his hand can loosen.
He does about three copies of the word, then
starts the next line. His eyes leave the paper. I touch his cheek
and steer his face back toward the paper. "Alex, concentrate."
He watches the paper, saying each word after he
writes it. The tip of his tongue emerges pink between the right side
of his lips. I lessen the pressure of my hand through Kitten and
Kit.
I never thought I'd be a dad who'd inflict his
work philosophy on his sons, but in my day the only way to learn to
write was to fill up a blank sheet of paper over and over and over
until the words came. So over the next few days, I hit Staples for
horizontally-rule writing paper, and find some. On it, in clear
black letters down the left side I write Elmo, Daddy, Mommy, and
Ned. I figure to do many of these sheets, using words of and about
people he knows. As he brings home two or three homework sheets a
night and we usually have a backlog of sheets clipped to the easel
by the door, it's probably not the optimum time to consider extra
credit work, but I feel that engaging Alex is priority one.
Alex does the first sheet, tongue out, whispering
the words, Ned's impatient bare feet propped the blank TV screen,
and when Alex is done I slip the homemade homework into his folder
for school, along with a note to his teacher.
On the night Alex is to tackle Jet and January and
Job, his teacher sends back an encouraging note - we don't exactly
tackle that clipped pile on the easel in order - saying she's
delighted he's writing like this, and will continue to send such
homework. I notice that Alex's tongue comes out most prominently
over the longest word, "January." Next night, teacher sends home a
list of his classmates' names, and I plow ahead on my sheets to
Toast, Cat, and Grandpa. Gradually, I follow the advice of something
else I read that says that when teaching handwriting to the
autistic, start with hand-over-hand, and gradually start holding
only their wrist, then their forearm, then elbow, and finally,
shoulder. Maybe by Zebra and Zoo he won't need me to hold anything.
We'll both stick at it, which is the only rule I know for writing
anything.
Copyright 2006 Jeff Stimpson, all rights reserved
