Red day !

We met DS's psychologist during our visit to India in Dec-Jan. She was very pleased with DS's progress and said that the next step for us to get him do things independently. Since then we have been modeling some stories via his alter-ego. We bought a mobile for him and also seeing if he can describe the sorroundings around him. He now can say right-ahead, right-adjacent, right-behind, left-ahead etc, in describing what he sees...

In any case, one of the things we have been thinking about, given his age, that he needs to sleep alone. He has slept with one of us all the time, and lately sleeping in the same room but not in the same bed. He had agreed to sleep in a different room recently... However, I think I was the one who was resisting the idea, perhaps given his fear of darkness and general anxiety. DW was saying it was not DS, but me who was making all the excuses as to why he cant sleep alone. DW was cool, she just moved on quickly... I was the one who wasn't letting go easily. I felt as though I wasn't looking after his safety, although intellectually, I know by doing this, i probably look after his safety more... Stepping back, I think DS is really growing up in his own mind and perhaps really wants to be treated so.

Anyways, as I had said earlier, there is a time to hold on to and there is a time let go - not just mentally, but also physically !

Directional Sense !

DS just amazed us yesterday.

DW was going for a lecture last night and us boys were to have a night-out on our own (which we did and a bit of that in the 'ps').

As we get out of our residential area, in a complex maze of roads, we need to hit a freeway to head to the destination.  From Steven's Creek, we get on to the ramp as an entry into free-way for 3 of them - 85 North, I-280 North and I-280 South. That entrance is quite complex and you kind of go around, that its easy to lose your bearings directionally (atleast for someone like me who is directionally challenged).

So the two key roads to this post are, Steven's Creek Boulevard and I-280. We had to get of SCB and then enter I-280 and travel South. 

As soon as we said thats the way we are going, DS remarked that Steven's Creek boulevard goes in the same direction as I-280; but SCB is called SCB east and SCB West; where I-280 is called North and South. If you see the picture below you'd see what he means (although I-280 takes a turn towards South-East, much further out)... I was quite amazed that he got it - he is not into maps much. I thought it was a remarkable observation or mapping in his own mind !! The two roads are circled in red in the map...

We later on tested if he understood the directions - and asked him what happens if we travel North and take a right-turn or travel west and take a left turn. He got those... jujeebee !

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ps: After dropping DW off at the venue, we went to a mall covering the 1.5miles in about 4miles (I did tell you I'm directionally challenged and I'm the only person on the face of the earth, who could lose the way with GPS showing you the way !!). At the foodcourt, DS was all eager to eat McDonald stuff and fries. As we went to the food court, he saw Panda Express (Chinese fast food) and switched over. A few years ago, such a change could not have been imagined !

History, Geography and Comprehension !

We somehow think that DS would do well in descriptive subjects because of his memory retention. The belief is that he would do well in history, geography, life sciences and not that well in math.

So we are setting out to teach him history. But we are starting small. We have a white-board where, we have drawn a timeline. Starting from 1950 (when Rajnikanth was born and for some reason he is a big fan of Rajnikanth - if you ask him, he'd say because Rajnikanth ate Chillies in the movie Sivaji and he finds that funny), we drew a timeline uptil 2009. And started 

mapping out various events, as to who were born at what date etc and other events. And

 then we told him, if we are at 2009, looking back uptil 1950 is history. Then we drew the map of South India and mapped where each of those events took place - i.e the name of places - and termed it Geography. The picture that you see on the whiteboard on the left top corner is that of Rajnikanth (in the movie Sivaji - thats yet another way of getting him to accept the white-board)...

So far good; so we knew he would retain the information. But because of the articulation challenges, I was doubtful if he comprehended the "history" part.

Two days later, he was talking to DW. He has been struggling with the fact as to what would happen to the HAL airport since the new airport in Bangalore had come up ! In his talk to DW, he said, "Amma, I know what they can do with the old HAL airport. We could leave it as is. It would be the history for Bangalore"...

Comprehended. Articulated. QED.

Questions, questions...

DS has been asking tons of questions these days ! Here are some of them:

1) Why do we sleep at night and be awake during the day ? What happens to people in the night shift ?

2) Why can't we eat breakfast, lunch and dinner together ?

3) Did the fruit "orange" get the name from the color (orange) or did the color orange come from the fruit ?

Emotional Intelligence... (or whatever) !

DS has been throwing up surprises as usual.

That day, DW was cutting vegetables and DS was elsewhere. He heard DW gasp and came and asked her what happened. DW told him that she had cut 

herself in a very very small way. Immediately, he wanted to fix it. DW told him that it was ok, but he looked up the "injury" and wanted to "take care of it".  He asked for the "first aid" box (his words - schooling process, I guess), picked it up; looked for a band-aid and then asked DW if she wanted a big one or a smaller one.

On the choice, picked one himself, peeled it off and put it on DW's fingers. DW was over the moon. She said it was her "appalam" experience !

(DS has been a fount of such suprises of late and he has been asking so many other things too... Would blog that a bit later)