After one year on the program Paige reached the level where she was given 'mental tasks'......the latter phase of the program designed to occupy the thinking brain while doing exercises to allow the cerebellum to fully do its job alone. We had done 'mentals' for about 4 days when she fell off a fast moving horse, breaking her elbow. She is now in a cast for approximately 5 weeks and cannot do the Dore exercises until the cast is removed. I am concerned about regression and have been told that kids do tend to regress some when they have to take a break in the exercises but they also tend to catch up quickly when exercises are resumed. Until then, I guess there is not much else to do but enjoy the break!
Paige has continued to improve with school work and social relationships.

Tuesday Feb. 26,2008

We have been going through some frustrations with Dore and school lately. It has been hard on both of us. She seemed to be struggling a lot with school work and with some of the exercises as well. After seeing Dr. Sue, our new chiropractor, about her recent run in illnesses, Dr. Sue picked up that Paige is feeling afraid to succeed as this might bring along with it, higher expectations. She has her saying, "I am happy....I do well" and "I am happy...I do great!"

Our last assesment showed some regression which could be a part of the frustration issue. Regression is really just the brain attempting to use new pathways, and struggling to do so.

So two steps forward and one back. But all in all, she is doing well. Socially, life is much better for her. Her reading is constantly improving too. I have noticed that she understands things better and is better able to express herself verbally. She understands jokes better and is able to play some clever ones on her brother! The only place I do not see some improvement is in math. We can only hope the future will brighter here too!

Progress

We had our last assesment on January 9. After the past three showing minimal progress, we finally saw a big jump. It was so satisfying to see!! We now have more difficult exercises but I am happy to see them.
Her reading keeps coming along. When she reads aloud to me I am pleased with her steady progress. She continues to get good grades each week in her spelling and language tests. However, she continues to have little understanding of math. She just does not see it. Also, her frustration level is still very high with her homework.
Socially, she has some very sweet friends and is quite busy with them. She sometimes sees herself as left out and as a victim at times, which may just be part of her personality.
We have also noticed that she is not quite as clumbsy anymore.

Jan. 1. 2008

It has now been 9 months since we began the Dore Program. The biggest testiment to her progress came late in September. We had a 'student support meeting' at school. It was a follow up from the meetings we had last year and was designed to find out just how far behind she was and how much she was struggling and whether or not she qualified for the 'alpha phonics' dyslexic program. Mrs. T., her teacher this year, was astounded to hear the report read from last year. She said she could not believe the child in the report and Paige were the same child!! As she put it, Paige is 'holding her own' in second grade.

I am thrilled with this but still tend to notice where she still struggles. I see that any work she brings home as homework like spelling words, worksheets or grammer, that we work on with her, she learns fine. She usually gets an 'A' on things she is tested on, that she brings home. Where she is falling down is on things they work on in class only. She seems to miss some of the instruction or even get it down wrong. Math is an area where this is happening. She will begin small group help once school begins after this holiday time. I think that will help her a lot.

I do see that she still struggles with attention and focus. She is reading much better but still has an issue with fluency. I see her skipping words or endings of words. We have seen a developmental optometrist and she has special glasses that should help with her reading. He says she has an eye that sways outward and that her eyes quiver when focusing up close.

Our next Dore assesment is next week. Oh, and Paige was featured on a local Fox News story about the Dore program!!