Report card and grades

First quarter report card

A couple of days ago, my wife and I met with our son’s teacher for a parent-teacher conference. Like all of these meetings, we reviewed some of his in-class work, discussed the good grades (and the bad), his progress, his attitude, his class participation and so on. After complimenting my son – who has autism…

Learning digital animation with Scratch

Day one of grade five

As I walked through the door after a typical, grinding, hot commute, my wife approached me. After the usual, “Hi honey! How was your day?” small-talk, she paused and whispered: “Are you ready to cry?” That’s rarely a good sign so I mentally braced myself for whatever she had to say. Instead, she showed me…

Martial Arts class and beginning weapons training

Taking Taekwondo

A couple of months ago, we enrolled Matt and his twin brother in Taekwondo. It was a way to help keep them active, provide some discipline and focus, and to learn a little self-defense a long the way. (Truth be told, I think they just wanted it to be all about weapons training so they…

4th grade science fair chart and results

Magnets and a 4th Grade Science Fair

In his continued journey to leave his special needs classroom in the proverbial rear-view mirror and to better integrate into a mainstream class, my now 10-year old son with autism was recently assigned a science fair project at school which – just as all the other fourth graders – included the same expectations to follow…

70/70 points, 100% school paper

Fourth grade’s home stretch

My kid is a smart kid. Though his autism might make you believe otherwise. And trust me, I have made the mistake of doubting him before. Many times actually. Yet many times, he has stepped up, proven me wrong and provided plenty of reminders to anyone who questions his academic abilities only needs a bit…

Learning digital animation with Scratch

Special Needs vs. Mainstream

Years ago I remember having a conversation with my uncle regarding my then-four year old son with autism. The talk focused on education and Matt’s potential – or perhaps ceiling – in terms of expectations. How far could he go? How soon would he get there? What’s the best way of teaching him? How difficult…