First Day of school!!

YAHOO!! The first day of school was Monday and it is going GREAT!! Cooper LOOOOOOVES his new school! Each day he asks me "Mommy can I go back to my X______ School tomorrow??" He always calls it "his X_______ school" and I find that super cute! His teacher is really sweet but not in that over the top annoying way. I am a Yankee through and through so I tend to not like the over the top sweet. Kind of gets on my nerves because it seems fake. Anyway, she is from Boston so she is my kind of peeps;)

Cooper has been doing so great! He has had some potty accidents but yesterday and today he was accident free! YEAH! Man that is the best thing about this school if you ask me! They can help special needs kids potty train! He still does not get the poop in the potty thing but you know I finally got the place where I just don't care. Not that I like it mind you but I just roll with it. It is not his fault and he can't help it so I need to be okay with it. Once I got there I did heaps better with it! Once I do better with it he did better with it.

Oh another cute thing is that on meet the teacher day I bought Cooper a new shirt with his school name on it. Now, when I buy Coop new clothing it is hit and miss on weather or not he will wear it. The school mascot made me wonder if he would wear it. Well, he was very excited about his shirt but when I asked him if he wanted to wear it he said no I want to put it in my drawer. Okay, so we got home and he put it in his drawer. Well, he did decide he wanted to wear it that night to sleep in so we did that. Then I had to wash it (he mega pees at night TMI sorry) and he wanted to wear it to school yesterday "because my teacher likes the mascot and I want to show her." Okay cool! So he wore it... then when it was time for bed he threw a fit. I decided it was not worth it so if you want to sleep in your clothes who cares right?? Well, I set out clothes for this morning but NO he pitched a holy fit that he wanted to wear that shirt again. I had to think and I decided you know what who cares if my almost 4 year old wears his shirt two days in a row???? So he did and he was so proud and happy. Who am I to take that away?

So that is the news about school! He loves it and even with all his food allergies and diet he can buy lunch there which is super. The bus is going to start getting him on Monday and that will be so exciting for him also!

Oh the other thing is that we have decided to stop OT for a while. Cooper qualifies for OT services through school which really just means the teacher meets with the OT once a month to come up with a plan for him. The teacher is the one who implements the OT plan. We want to see how he does with this and if he is not progressing like we expect he will we will start OT with a different therapist. I have never been totally thrilled with his therapist honestly and had planned on changing anyway. She just was not super personable and she would ask me questions all the time which sounds okay except it was always the same questions! I was thinking can you not note this in his chart?? Do we really need to have the same conversation every week?? Then to cement my thoughts she called me this week to see what we were going to do about OT (we told her we were cancelling the am apt because school was starting) and she called me Mrs. Cooper. Really lady? I know you have tons of patients but you have seen him for months and you are HOLDING the chart to get my number! For pete's sake I don't think I am asking too much here. So if we need formal OT again we are going to someone else even if at the same place;)

Meet the teacher day!

Today was Cooper's meet the teacher day! We went over to his school and turned in all the rest of his paperwork. We also bought him a t-shirt with his new school name and mascot on it which is VERY excited about! I talked to the cafeteria manager also and she was asking me what kinds of things Cooper likes and what we give him with his allergies and diet. The school is a special needs school so there are a number of kids on a gluten/casein free diet and then they will also make sure that things are okay for him with his allergies! They are great about the allergies!! It is so nice to be able to send him and not have to worry!!!

So, today we met the teacher and Cooper got to look around the classroom and play some. It is an inclusion class so there are 9 typical kids and then 5 special needs kids with the possibility of getting once more. There is the head teacher, a parapro and another teacher of some description.

Yesterday was Cooper's IEP (Individual Education Plan) meeting. I went over the IEP and the goals that were set in it with his teacher. I agreed with them because I think they are important it was things like willingly take turns with one verbal prompt 80% of the time and put his things away 80% of the time. I did have them add one goal and that was to initiate and engage in play with another student. Basically I want Cooper to walk over to some kid and say "Hey, want to play dinos?" and when the kid says yes actually do it. Also when that kid comes to Cooper and says "Hey, want to play dinos?" Cooper says yes and does it. His social skills are severely lacking so that is a big thing he needs to work on.

After that part of it the school nurse came down to talk to me. Apparently the word went out about Cooper's allergies because each person I talk to tells me "Oh I heard about Cooper!" I had actually met the nurse when I was there for Cooper evaluation so this was just the formal he is coming to school now (Monday) talk. I gave her the food allergy form the pediatrician had to fill out, all the forms for his medications and a form for permission to administer the Epi Pen and one to administer his inhaler. It was A LOT of forms! I have to go get his meds filled tomorrow so once I do that I will go and drop them off and he is all set! She was also talking to me about the cafeteria and the table he will sit at. They have two tables for kids with food allergies and the kids all sit there. I am not thrilled about that but since they have open containers of milk I don't really know what else they can do. If milk spills on Cooper he WILL get hives so it is probably best to not chance it!

Cooper is going to ride the bus to school! He is really excited about it and we are excited for him. I am not sure if the bus is going to be all set for Monday or not so if it is not I will drive him until it is ready to go for him. It is a short bus with only kids going to that school so I think it will come to the front of the house.

So that is the news! We are getting everything together for school to start on MONDAY! We are so excited for him to go to this school because we know that it really is going to be the best thing for him. I however am going to cry and cry and cry once he gets on that bus!