Matthew

Introduction: Matthew is a fun and dynamic first grader. He was born with fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and lives in a single parent family with one younger sibling, whom he adores. He has some of the facial features associated with FAS and is very small for his age. His size and his developmental delays cause his peers to see him as a "baby" and treat him as such.

When I first started working with him, he could not write his name and could only recognize the letters "A" and "T" and could independently write the "T." He spent most of his time in the special education classroom and refused to go to his general education class for anything but the most interesting special activities. Every now and then, he would participate in PE and music. It was difficult to get him to do any work at all, but the assignments he was asked to do consisted of tracing over the dotted answers that the paraeducators had written on the sheet for him (without him even coming up with the answer himself). The worksheets were way above his level of understanding, as was most of the instruction he was receiving.

When regulated, he was sweet, charming, and compliant. However, when he started escalating, he would elope, sometimes just from the room, but occasionally from the school, or he would destroy the room. Since the work Matthew was being asked to do was way above his ability, he was frustrated and bored, and not actually learning anything.

Challenges:

• Elopement from the classroom and/or the school campus.
• Huge reactions to stressors that would result in destruction of the classroom.
• Difficulty with working memory and writing, resulting in frustration and boredom.
• Not able to write his name or recognize more than two letters.

Goals:

• Keep Matthew in the classroom or expected locations.
• Help Matthew regulate his emotions so that he could respond to stressors in a more appropriate way.
• Engage Matthew in learning experiences at his level.
• Write his name.

Strategies and Interventions:

• Since the worksheets Matthew was doing were so far above his actual academic level, they weren't teaching him anything or doing him any good. The first thing I did was to take that burden off of him. They were overwhelming him and setting him up for failure. If we want students to be successful, we have to teach them that they can be. I also started scheduling extra one-on-one time for Matthew with adults he likes spending time with.
• The next thing we needed to do was to teach Matthew some strategies to help him regulate his emotions. I started incorporating some videos for yoga and movement breaks throughout the day. We also started practicing some breathing techniques together when he was calm.
• Matthew has a rather short attention span and was reluctant to do any work, so I had to do some trial and error to see what would appeal to him. I ended up putting together a variety of task boxes for him to work on with an adult. I also found some worksheets that had some of his favorite characters on them that were at his academic level. He was much more willing to do work that involved tactile, hands-on objects. He also enjoyed turning worksheets into a race with an adult. Matthew also likes novelty, so I did have to get creative to keep him busy.
• Part of the reason that Matthew had such a hard time writing his name was that the muscles in his hands weren't very well developed. The work that I found for him to do involved a lot of playing with playdough, coloring, and cutting. I had some resin letters available for him to play with and incorporated the letters of his name into a lot of the work.

Results and Outcomes: Matthew really enjoyed the extra time that he got to spend with adults and he started to really like the work that I had for him to do. He also loved the movement and yoga breaks. They allowed him to get some energy out in a really fun way while also helping his proprioceptive and vestibular senses. The breathing exercises were easy to incorporate into the day and also gave him another connection point with the adults that work with him.

We were able to keep Matthew in the classroom or other expected times for the whole day without any major meltdowns. He started to realize that we really cared about him and helping him succeed.

The tasks boxes kept him busy and the hands-on work helped him to get a better sense of what we wanted him to learn. The muscles in his hands started to develop so that the physical act of writing wasn't so difficult. By the end of the school year, Matthew was able to independently write all but one letter of his name and could copy the last letter down from a model.

Reflections: Working with Matthew was a great experience. When I first started working with him, I was sitting next to him to try to get him to do some of the worksheet that was provided. He was refusing and glaring at me. He then flipped his paper over and drew a face on the back. He looked at me and said, "This is you," then took the pencil and scribbled out the face. It took a long time to finally get him to trust me and see that I really wanted what was best for him. By the end of the school year, he was always excited to see me and would give me some of the biggest hugs.

I only had a couple of months of working with Matthew, but I saw so much growth in him over that time. If I had it to do over again, I would have thrown out the worksheets right away. As a new teacher, I was hesitant to do something so drastic, but it ended up being a game changer for him. He was so bogged down with the frustration of work that he didn't understand and couldn't possible "win" at. It was only after getting rid of them that he started making progress with his letter recognition and writing. It is a great reminder for me to meet each child where they are.