Rock of Hope

Rewinding back to Saturday, I picked up a few cool items from my bro's moving sale. I got an ecko hoodie (too bad I can't wear it to school b/c whenever I dress down, I get mistaken for a kid...at least from a distance!). I also quickly snagged a tabletop zen fountain before it hit the selling floor. I thought it would be really nice to have in the Speech Room...just to create an aura of zen in the midst of all the craziness.

Yesterday, I called my High-Functioning Autism Group in. I'm just now working on social skill training now that I have an inkling of an idea on what to do. The session began pretty well; when HFA-V and HFA-R came in at separate times, they greeted me immediately and enthusiastically. It was pretty funny (and awesome); I think they made it a loud point because last week, I told them that I expected them to greet me and their group mates properly, when they walked in. They settled down and then I put all of them on the spot except TD (the only non-autism kid in the group). All 3 of the HFAs "failed" their one-week assignment -- to greet me outside of the Speech Room. I was bummed b/c I know that I saw 2 of them; two of them looked at me out of the corner of their eye during their lunch break! I asked them, "Are you afraid of me or something?" They said defensively, "No! I'm not afraid! I was just [enter excuse -- 'busy,' 'doing homework,' etc.]." So we spent a few minutes setting up a reward system ("Can you buy us a video game or give us money?!" NO!), and then I extended the assignment but also broadened it; they could greet each other, a peer, or a teacher outside of a classroom. They liked that idea. Of course they had to ask, "Well, can't I just say hello to my sister/brother? That's easy!" "No! The idea is for you to work on socializing." HFA-D actually said, "But I don't want to socialize! I hate socializing!" Poor guys. It's so agonizing for them.

The funny/sad thing is that these kids are perfectly fine talking up a storm with their SLPs, but when it comes to peers, they're totally off of it. What does that say about me???

Anywho, we did our activity of reading and demonstrating body language, facial expressions, intonations, and gestures and then the HFAs left. I had TD stay until the end of the period. He noticed my zen fountain and commented, "cool thingy!" I said, "yeah, I call it a fountain. What would you call it?"

TD: I think it's more like a rock.
Me: Well, it's more like a fountain b/c even though it's made of rocks, there's water trickling down so it's more like a fountain...It's kind of peaceful. It's like a fountain of peace.
TD totally disregarding my logic: I think you should call it the Rock.
Me: Um, how about the Fountain of Peace?
TD: How about Rock of Peace? No! The Rock of Hope!

I think our conversation was never settled. He is dead set on calling it the Rock of Hope despite my many prompts to keep it as the Fountain of Peace.

Oh well. Can't win every semantic war.