12/22/08

Take up your cars and follow me.

Even though Orangeboy has been known to ask many questions in long strings held together with why?s, if he is ASKED too many questions at a time, he tends to freeze up or become rather reluctant to talk. I imagine it is hard to try and remember the facts, come up with the words, and mentally double-check that the answers are not likely to make anyone get mad or laugh at him, before speaking the answer out loud and using the correct pronunciations, verb tense, prefixes, suffixes, facial expression, and the correct volume. When all this has to be done carefully and consciously, it can be rather challenging. If only he could put himself in someone else's figurative shoes (like mine) and understand why I get annoyed when HE asks ME endless questions.

That said, I recently attempted to interview Orangeboy to find out how he is getting along with his peers at school and to see if I could gauge any social progress. I started out with a couple of easy questions that he is often asked about school.

Mom: "What is your favorite part of the day at school?"
O: "I'm not sure. Maybe recess."
Mom: "Really? Recess? What do you usually do at recess?"
O: "Play cars."
Mom: "Do you mean that you play cars during indoor recess?"
O: "Yes."

We slowly uncovered that he likes indoor recess best and that he likes P.E. the least. Unlike playing cars all the time at indoor recess, playing ball at P.E. is "boring" for some reason. I asked if maybe it was "boring" because he didn't like to play ball, but cars didn't get "boring" because he liked playing cars with his friends. He didn't want to admit that for some reason. He just said,
"P.E. is just boring, OK?!"

I asked if he always played cars with the same two friends and he said he did. I tried to get him to tell me how this came about or how he and these two friends determined that they would get together over cars each time, but he couldn't really tell me. He said that usually his friend, Brad, would get to the cars first.

Mom: "So he always goes to the cars and you and Chad just follow him?"
O: "Well, he just goes first." (ducking his chin)
Mom: "Do you ever go first or do you or Brad or Chad say, "Let's play cars again!""
O: "Not really"
Mom: "What do you do? You just follow Brad without saying anything to each other?"
O: "Brad just gets there first usually, OK?"
Mom: "You don't like that I'm saying you follow Brad?"
O: "Yes, kinda." (ducked chin, eyes closed, mouth puckered)
Mom: "What do you do with the cars when you are playing cars?"
O: (chin ducked, sheepish grin) "We play a dinosaur game that Brad made up. He makes dinosaurs with his hands and we crash into them."
Mom: "So Brad made up the game and you play that game pretty much every time?"
O: "Yes."
Mom: "But you aren't just following Brad?"
O: "Well, I don't know, but not really, OK?"

So I determined that he does have a couple of friends to play with at school, that he does not seem to initiate anything, but that he does seem to know that for some reason always being a follower is not good.
I supposed this is progress.

4 comments:

  1. This...
    "Even though Orangeboy has been known to ask many questions in long strings held together with why?s, if he is ASKED too many questions at a time, he tends to freeze up or become rather reluctant to talk."
    ...is very familiar.

    I think it does sound like good progress for O. I wonder whether you could come up with a new car game at home, practice it, and send him back to school to teach it to Brad and Chad. Do you think that would work?

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  2. Hey, Quirky Mom, that's a great idea! Thanks.

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  3. Both of my older boys have trouble with too many questions. They also say things are "BORING" when they really don't want/like to do them. Interesting, these children, you know, if you're into the game "Clue."

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  4. It's like detective work, isn't it.

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