May 2012 Updates: Hahgoot’s progress report Hahgoot lost a top tooth!

Hahgoot got a lovely package of gifts for her birthday from my brother and his family in Boston and both girls wrote thank you cards back.

Hahgoot spent a lot of time on creative project this month: making up games, props, costumes, leaf rings and felt pictures.

Hahgoot is always making up complex plots for her felt pictures and recently was interested in new ways of creating clothes and costumes.

I read two very useful books that helped me with my understanding and communication with Barak and Hahgoot (top) and watched a fascinating DVD about Floortime, which is our OT’s method.

We now see Carly, our Occupational Therapist, once a month, but she also gets a detailed report from me, so she is constantly in the loop. After a rigorous OT session we enjoyed lunch in Burwood. Hahgoot brought Israeli memorabilia to her OT session

I keep up the daily brushing, wrestling, deep pressure and other techniques to keep Hahgoot balanced, connected and unstressed. Tiring, but essential and fun most of the time! Alma joins in with everything so that helps as well to keep the energies up.

One of Hahgoot’s habits that she uses for organizing and de-stressing herself is lining up objects, sorting them (usually by colour) and making a plot to justify the action.

Wearing the weighted vest has became a second nature to us and Alma even makes up jokes about it...

This term we again focused on Empathy and have had significant progress with Hahgoot internalising empathic behaviours, showing empathy and understanding others. Fritzi the puppet has been very important in this process of learning. Alma is especially a big fan of the spunky doll!

Rough and tumble games, crashing, bouncing and negotiating with space and “heavy work” is a daily part of Hahgoot’s “sensory diet”. This helps to regulate her mood and energy levels, especially at the end of the day, when her nervous system is at overload point. In the next presentation: Learning Adventures Outside School