Sped 438 Journal Assignment 2

7/30/2019 Sped 438 Journal Assignment 2

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Journal Assignment 2

Description of Contact:

Since my last journal reflection I have only had one new contact. I went to go observe

their son J at school. I got there at the beginning of the day and was able to stay for two and half

hours before I had to leave for practicum. I was able to meet his case manager, general education

teacher, two of the paraprofessionals who work with him, the nurse, the physical therapist, and

the speech therapist! I have had about 4 and half hours of face-to-face contact thus far. I have

emailed Mrs. D three times I visited her son at school, with only one response from. We were

supposed to meet up for breakfast Saturday the 9

th

, I emailed and then texted asking what time

we should meet but I never got a response. I will wait a few days before emailing again, because

I feel like I am starting to nag them!

Personal Perceptions and Feelings:

I had an interesting experience when I went to observe their son at school because it gave

me some insight as to how to the professionals work with my mentor family. I noticed that my

mentor family seems to have a really great relationship with their sons case manager. They text

each other to talk about things that are going on at school and at home so the lines of

communication are very open. I really enjoyed meeting his case manager because she seemed

very professional and she was very nice. A few of the other individuals I met all seemed to speak

pretty highly of my mentor family, everyone mentioned how nice they were and how much they

like J.

However, when talking with some of the professionals who work with J I noticed a little

bit of tension due to the parents not always doing what the professionals thought they should. It


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wasnt anything that was really bad, because in general my mentor family is great so there really

isnt much to criticize them for. I was really disappointed that I sensed any tension at all because

the things they were mentioning seemed so little. For example, they mentioned that they wished

they had him sit in his wheelchair at a 90-degree angle rather than slightly leaning back. And I

think they mentioned something about not letting him use the wings on the wheelchair as a sort

of headrest, because he needs to learn to use them to drive his power wheelchair. I dont mean to

make it sound like they were bad talking the parents, because I really dont think that was their

intention, and like I said they really had a lot of nice things to say about his parents. I think I was

just extra sensitive to any comments that could come off as a criticism, partially because of this

class, and partially because I am also a family member of someone with a disability. Visiting the

school really made me realize how careful you need to be about comments you make as a

professional because even when you mean well it can come off as a criticism. I also was

disappointed that they would say something like that around me; especially knowing I was

coming as a sort of friend of the family. It seemed to me that simple phone call to the parents

could have straightened out those differences.

Guiding Questions:

1. This question is a little tricky for me to answer because I have really only had twoexperiences with the whole family so I dont know that I have great picture of their

parenting a child rearing practices. However, from what I have seen I would say that our

views are pretty similar, but there are some key differences. One thing that really stuck

out to me about their parenting was how in sync they are with one another. Their family

has low cohesion in the sense that it is really only the parents who take on most of the


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responsibilities. They had mentioned that they were going out for Valentines day and it

was the first time they had ever been away for a night together for years. Because of their

sons medical issues they are very reluctant to relinquish any responsibilities to anyone

else. In my family there are a lot of other people who end up taking a sort of parental role

when it comes to taking care of my brother with a disability. Other than that I think our

views on raising children are pretty similar. I noticed when they were correcting their

youngest childs behavior that they value manners, politeness, and responsibility. Those

are all things that my parents taught me when I was growing up and they are also what I

want to teach my own children some day.

2. One major life transition that they experienced was when their son entered the childhoodlife cycle; this is also when he started going to elementary school. This is huge transition

for any child and their family but it can be even more stressful when the child has a

disability. My mentor familys son receives a lot services at school such as speech and

physical therapy. He also goes to see the nurse to get fed through his feeding tube. I think

it was stressful for them at first because there were so many things to get straightened out

and it can be stressful for a parent who is used to providing most of the care to let go and

trust that the school is going to do it. Luckily my mentor family is really close with the

case manager at their sons school. I think having that good relationship helped them

cope with the stress of this transition. I also think it helped that they are so involved in

what is going on at school, they really feel a part of team so that helps relieve a lot of

stress.

3. My mentor family has two sons their oldest son with the disability is 7 and their youngestson is 4. Because they are so young I dont really see any caretaker relationship between


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the two. As they get older the younger son may start to be more aware of his brothers

disability and develop more of a caretaker role, but as right now they just behave like

typical brothers. I think that one of the reasons they have a good relationship is because

their parents are very good about giving them equal amounts of attention. I think there are

definitely times when their son J gets more attention because of his disability, but at

home he seems to be pretty low maintenance so his younger brother is able to get a lot of

attention. I think I noticed that the younger brother C didnt directly interact with his

older brother very much, and I think part of that may be because J doesnt have a good

form of communication yet. His parents ask him a lot of yes or no questions and he

makes a different facial expression for yes or no, but they are still working on getting him

a more advanced communication system. C is so young that he probably doesnt really

realize that he needs to ask specific yes and no questions. I also havent been around

them too often so he could communicate more with his brother and I just havent had the

opportunity to see that yet. I think, as he gets older their communication will definitely

improve.

Documents

Sped 438 Journal Assignment 2