Thursday, September 4, 2008

Early Interventions




Sophie had an evaluation through early intervention services today. This program serves children from birth to age three in all developmental areas. We scheduled the eval due to some concerns that I had regarding how Sophie chews her food, well she chews then sucks on the food before she swallows. If she is really hungry there isn't a lot of chewing going on! Although the sucking on her food has decreased since she has been home, she still does it on occasion. Three different therapist came to the house, an OT, SLP and a developmental specialist. The OT watched her eat french fries ( the one thing I know she will ALWAYS eat) and then they had her stack blocks, say some words, point to pictures etc. She was pretty good, but she is two years old so she said "no" quite a bit, or just kind of snuggled in to my chest. All in all the test went well. Sophie did not qualify for services but there are somethings I need to watch and work on. Sophie is 28 months old, she came to us at sixteen months old, not quite walking and on a restricted diet due to her SN. Here is the quick results that they gave me today, I should get a full report in a few weeks.

Language age equivalent - 24 months old
Cognitive- 30 month old
Self Help- 22 months old * more on this*
Social Skills- 36 month old
Fine Motor- 30 month old

Not bad considering that Sophie was 16 months old when we first met her, she was not yet walking and was on a restricted diet due to her SN. In the year she has been with us she has had two major surgeries, learned to walk, adjusted well to a new home, bonded with mommy, daddy, brother and sister, went from babbling in Chinese (pretty funny to hear all those non-English sounds),to babbling with more English language sounds, and now saying new words every day and working on two word phrases. I am pretty proud of our girl. She is a trooper!

Now the self help age equivalent, really not worried about it at all. When we first met Sophie she did LOTS of things herself. But, knowing WHY she was doing these things, I TOOK these skills away from her so to speak. I put her shoes on for her ( she can do that still, but I initially did it for her), I dressed her, I put her things away, I fed her and held her bottle. We all know WHY I did these things....I needed to TEACH her that I was mommy (daddy did this too) and that I would love and take care of her. One of the questions was could she pull her pants up, which I promptly "tested" when the therapist all left....and which Sophia June XuCan passed with flying colors:)

15 comments:

Susan said...

that is great maryellen!
you have yourself a social butterfly it looks like! :)

Special K said...

Of course she passed. She's a genius! And a cute one at that.
:)

C's Mom said...

GO Sophie! There is nothing more amazing than the resilience of the human spirit.

Rebecca Lily said...

She is doing wonderfully!!! Smart girl!

And I'm glad she passed the last test. :)

Lindsay said...

Way to go, Sophie!

Robin said...

Maddy went through a very similar "test" around 6 months ago and didnt' qualify either. Infact, I think her scores were very similar to Sophies. I was happy on one had that she didn't qualify because it meant, in my eyes, that she was coming along just fine. I'm sure you feel the same. :0)
Way to Go Sophie!!

Diana said...

She is so CUTE! She did GREAT on her testing.
My youngest son was 14 months when we got him and there were things he was behind in but it took NO time for him to "catch" up. His speech was the slowest as he "took it all in" for a long time and now there are days I would pay BIG BUCKS if he would be quiet for 5 minutes:)

Alyson and Ford said...

She is doing great! We will need to remember to have this evaluation done too. Thanks!
Alyson LID 01/27/06
DOR 08/12/08
Travel 09/11/08!!

Carol said...

SHE IS SO DARN CUTE!! Im glad she did well on her test. All my kids get early intervention and they catch up so quickly.If the area of concern continues you can have her reevaluated. Arent they amazing??
I see she is pretty smart too
Carol

4D said...

She is a wonderful girl! I am happy for you that you had the eval and know where she is and how she is doing. She is taking after her family...amazing spirit, loving and generous of heart.

Keep smilin!

bbmomof2boys said...

Chewing - yep, btdt! Tiana was 26 months old when she came into our lives. She was still taking the bottle for most of her nutrientional needs with some congee thrown in. She had a mouth full of teeth but did not chew. She could suck on a straw but not on her bottle. I also had EI come in and evaluate her for chewing and for speech. She qualified for the chewing but not the speech. They said even though she is only at 12 months for speaking she is now babbling and learning new sounds and signs and she will catch up quickly. Here's what they said for chewing - take a toothbrush and apply gentle downward pressure on her back teeth. This will force her to move her jaw up and down. I did this for about 2 days and she is now CHEWING!! She is still going to do some therapy for chewing but only a few visits. Try it - it might help.

Sorry so long!

Hugs,
Carla

t~ said...

She is a trooper and pretty darn cute too!

The Gang's Momma! said...

Great summary - and I love that you are such an advocate for her all the way!

Leaving on 9/11 to get our girl - hoping for Gotcha day on 9/15 :)

kitchu said...

Well of course she passed with flying colors :O) I'm glad to hear she's doing so well... it must be so encouraging! Love that photo too!

Paulette said...

Boy I needed to read this as we have EI coming this week. It will be good to see what they have to say about this almost 26 month old. Sophie is doing so great and is such an insperation to us.