Incentive Spirometer helps our reading lessons

9/14/11

Reading with Jewel is a progressively slow and steady process.
She has become a willing and eager student.
I am using Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons by Siegfried Engelmann, Phyliss Haddox, Elaine Bruner.  It takes about 20+ minutes. (Along with the Bob books.)  The red print is for you to read to your child and the first red print says; I'm going to teach you how to read. ...The work is hard, but I think you can do it. ... =]  I like the positive parent queuing,  it is simple but some lessons may need breaks or to be divided into two lessons.  Jewel insists on writing some of the letters on her dry erase board tray and even though this is difficult it is very satisfying for her. This way the letters are reinforced by her seeing, me saying, her saying, us writing.  She gets very short of breath which makes talking very challenging so we break from the lesson and do some Spirometer blowing, (Incentive Spirometer).  It is the blue one and the mouth piece is the straw like one.  This helps her take deep breaths in to be able to blow the ball up the shaft.  Relaxation and breath are key.  Staying calm yourself is critical because our children pickup our feelings and mirror them back to us.  We have been playing card pairs and Jewel is getting better at remembering where the cards are!  Any blow toy can help the child enjoy playing and improving their relaxation, deep breathing, and lip closure, any way you can keep it fun will help the duration of the activity and attitude of the child stay positive because the blowing can become work and cumbersome.  Spirometers can be purchased for as little as $5 and some blow toys can be purchased at the dollar store.  But never leave the child with small toys that can lodge in their throats and suffocate them.   Keeping it fun is our goal.  Every child needs to have fun and play, we learn a lot through  playing and this is a way we try to incorporate both.  We are still using ice pops for helping Jewel with swallow strengthening and lip closure, though I have to limit it one per day since there are too many dyes and food coloring additives that are not good for the body.  We use the otter pops with apple juice from Cost co but there are still chemicals and additives in these.