Quiet Reading Time with Dr. Suess AND Our Decision

Today as I was running around trying to get everything ready to head out the door for our weekly outpatient Speech Therapy and Occupational Therapy sessions, I noticed that the house seemed awful quite for having 5 year old twins on the loose.. This makes me nervous!!  I give a quick look around the "usual spots" and I didn't see them.  I head towards their bedroom to find a closed door... uh oh, this is usually never good.....

I was pleasantly surprised and impressed to see this:

What a happy mama I am :o)

As the morning went on I had several things on my plate to take care of.  One that I am glad to finally have off my shoulders was making the FINAL DECISION to NOT send them to kindergarten this year.  We have been praying about this and seeking advice from other parents, providers, and educators.  Many of them suggested we send them.  Many of them said ultimately its our decision.  And some said its a tough decision and one they would not have an answer for.

The boys turned 5 in October of 2010.  They are eligible to begin kindergarten in the Fall 2010 session.  They are doing so many wonderful things that I feel makes them entirely ready.  Writing their names, drawing stick figures, identifying all the letters in the alphabet, reading more than 50 words, signing over 300 words, identifying colors, shapes, and finally playing appropriately with toys and other kids.

What they do not have is verbal communication.  This is the biggest reason we have decided to keep them home with us another year.  I'm not saying that in this year we will have verbal communication, but I am saying that the intensive Speech Therapy we have them in seems to be doing something.  We started in September with a new speech therapist who uses Prompt Therapy.  She is physically moving their faces according to the sounds she wants to see come out of them and they are responding.  There are no words yet, but we have heard many many new sounds out of them and it seems as though they are aware that they are sounding different.  They are saying PaPa to Tom's dad.. They ask for bubbles by saying BaBa.  And Caleb plays a game that he puts us to sleep and the only way we wake up is by him saying UP.  Its small but in our books its BIG that they are making sounds.

Another point that really helped make up our decision was the fact that if they were typical children, they would just be entering into kindergarten this year due to their October birthday.  So since they are obviously delayed, why not delay their entry into school as well.  The outpatient therapies we are currently receiving far out weigh what we feel they will get out of the first year of school.  Once they are in a full day school schedule I will no longer be able to transport them to the Punxsutawney Hospital for therapy. 

It feels like a huge weight off my shoulders.. Should We?  Should we not?.. as of today its official We Are Not.      ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh