Parents as Teachers: 15 Month Appointment

Shannon, our Parents as Teachers rep, just left after meeting with Isaac and I for a little while this morning. She is fabulous. If you're familiar with the Parents as Teachers program, you know what I'm talking about. If you're not familiar then here's the basics:

Basically, this program is set up through our school district and you are assigned a teacher that comes to your home every few months to interact with your child to determine their developmental level, new activities and games you can play to help cultivate their development and see if there are any signs of any sort of learning disability that should be checked into further.

Unfortunately, this program is one of the first being cut from school districts because of the education cuts that are effecting Missouri. Shannon said she wasn't sure what is going to happen to the Valley Park District program and she wouldn't know until July sometime. She hopes that they will only have to cut the play groups and meetings but will be able to keep the home visits available. Let's hope.

Anyway, Shannon played with Isaac for a while, read him a story and gave me a new packet of developments to be on the lookout for. Isaac loves her and is all over her from the second she walks in the door. She always brings a new bag of toys for him to play and learn with. This time was focused a lot on animals and their sounds. She had a little farm set with the barn, a farmer girl, tractor and an array of animals. Isaac LOVED it! I'll have to hit up Once Upon a Child to see if they have anything like that.

The only thing that we discussed that I should be working on (which I have been since... forever ago) is Isaac's speech. He just doesn't talk! I talk to him all the time! I tell him what I'm doing, what he's doing, prompt him with questions, have conversations, sing, make animal sounds... you name it, I probably have or will do it. He's just quiet. He sometimes says "Mama" or "Dada" but that's about it. The rest of his communication is him pointing and signing "Please". Maybe it's because I'm home with him all the time that I know what he wants most of the time so he hasn't NEEDED to tell me. I don't know... he's just quiet.

I'm not worried about it. He doesn't throw tantrums or anything, so he's not frustrated by his lack of oral communication. He's had a history of being a perfectionist, so he's probably just waiting until he knows he can say something before he will. He did that with walking for sure. I saw him on the monitor walking back and forth in his crib before he ever did it in front of me.

I'm sure he'll start talking soon enough. At least the house is quiet until the day he busts out in full sentences... which will probably happen before simple words at his rate! Ha!