September Journal

One of the main highlights in September would be the little STAR's Birthday.

A small celebration was planned at home with my sister family over the nearest weekend prior to his actual birthday. Social story was prepared to read with him in promoting this event for his awareness.

Little STAR insist from one visual support he learn that the birthday boy must wear a crown like a king, so we bought him one to manage success, glad things turned out well & all enjoy a memorable time.

Aside from the usual routine of birthday song, cake cutting & eat cake, we played snakes and ladders, balloons, pretend play on camping inside the room(was a beautiful mess) before end the celebration with a dinner nearby our place.

We also helped him prepare some goodie bags & small tokens to be given to his classmate & teachers in EIP.

Being a sibling of a brother with special need has not been easy for my little princess, it takes great effort to share and communicate with her openly & honestly on any lack. She may be feeling unfair for a start why are we spending so much time with her brother, but has transformed lately with positive feelings, more patience than before, greater understanding and is able to co-operate and attune to his brother level of understanding and skill set. Both are equally our family joy of living and I am hopeful that as both grow up, all can have greater opportunities to experience more normal family life and activities.

Objects/topics on transportations are still very much his top interest, lately he has shown much improvement in his imaginative play be it thinking or commenting, his lining up of car now is more meaningful with 2 lanes and on different directions, his works on contructive tasks like building the block design in angry bird game or fixing puzzle pieces have displayed his the other strength.

Above construction came from his perspective thinking like a MRT station, he make use of blocks to construct bench just like what he saw in MRT station and put the people sitting on the bench waiting for the train to arrive, what puzzle us was that why he placed the people all facing inward and not facing him directly, may be he is also trying to tell us his preference mode of engagement socially to be away from public interest because he is different.

Some times have to be set aside for his home programs to elevate his special learning abilities.

It is a joy to see him so engage at time like the above writing, the most I have ever seen him contributing, thanks to mummy great effort.

Eating together in public place has been a great moment we indulge & treasure within the community, the whole family visited Proffesor Brawn Cafe for a lunch over 1 weeekend, a great place to feel the love and peace in the midst of great dinning experience, will return for more in near future.

Another highlight for September would be the in take screening test for the little STAR transition after EIP in the mid month, received the great new this morning(Friday) and finally the letter on the same evening. We are so happy and very grateful for the positive outcome from the screening test and so very thankful for the opportunity given to our little STAR to further his learning journey. We promise him to even work harder with him in the next lap together. Hope is not a dream, but a way of making dreams becoming reality. Perseverence is not a long race, it is many short races one after the other. We will focus on completing his present race for a strong finish to the remaining weeks in EIP and gear up to ready for the next race starting 2012.

Take this blessing to share some messages from SPED Team who is instrumental to his little success:-

Person A; "Believe me...we are just as elated as you that Fabian has come this far and the door has opened for him in this manner..."

Person B: "Congratulations Fabian and family. Very proud of him."

Person C: "Wow! Great. Congratulations. Let's work together and help him further. I am happy for Fabian."

Person D: "Congrats!!! So happy for Fabian & family. Excellent."

Person E: " That's great!! Was gonna ask your wife later."

Person F: "Thats's really happy news! Thanks daddy & mummy for working so hard! Fabian is really doing well in OT! Gave mummy strategies on elevating him to the next level in terms of adaptability."

Winners' Statement:

What is required of us is that we love the difficult and learn to deal with it. In the difficult are the friendly forces, the hands that work on us. Right in the difficult, we must have our joys, our happiness, our dreams: there against the depth of this background, they stand out, there for the first time we see how beautiful they are.

Sharing Ways Of Collaborating With School For Special Needs

Collaboration is a process where by two or more parties(which may or may not have any previous relationship) work joinly towards a common goal. Common goal essentially refers to the child progress.


Collaboration is already important in our normal day to day work and even more so in the field of SPED, as doing it right, right for the first time will lead to successful outcome in on going positive relationship with the SpEd Team & helps maximizing strength of each individual within the Team, ensure on going problem solving, efficient use of time and most importantly to maximize progress of our child.


Apparently, collaboration with school does not normally come easy as there remain some potential challenges such as sacrifice of personal time, school staff time, resistance and defensiveness from others such as in the way things are done and that they have tried but invain etc..Mistrust due to lack of mutual understanding or effective communication skill.

All these potential challenges can be manage and reduce if we can practise collaboration through the following ways which I have experience and will continue to explore them in the future where possible:-

1) Provide information

Overview of the child, montage or video clip in his daily life, home practises and on going updates or changes in therapies etc. I am glad that I have played this part right from the beginning until now and sure is a blessing to share, build trust and understanding without any expectation in return from teacher as this walk is about relationship with the child, any effort to enhance or elevate this speed of development will go a long way to the child progress within ther SpEd Team.

2) Seek information about class activities and child's day, establish relationship with teachers with regular positive communication/feedback, empower ourselves to offer assistant and also ask for one when we need one.

3) Share data, verified, evaluate and feedback regularly to establish mutual goals in maximizing the learning potential of the child.


4) Compromise without sacrifice the quality of intervention by being open and clear about expectations and prioritize them accordingly to the importance of the child learning needs agree upon.


5) Be proactive and take steps not to let concerns build up, request feedback or seek opportunity to meet up.


Our collaborative effort can be made easy if school is able to exploit the use of modern technology in communication, which can help print less paper & save more trees. We may have e-Lesson plan send to parents via email notification the moment teacher submit through the system in school. Parents can be authorized through login/password protection to input/retreive individual child's e-Lesson plan or shared data via school website or even post improvement suggestion/thank you message for any spontaneous recognition to teachers who have gone extra miles in making positive impact to any child's progress/development. This may also improve the parents-teachers interaction.

Winners Statement:-

It isn't easy enough to talk about peace, one must believe it. And it isn't enough to believe in it, one must work for it.

Random Happines Aug '11

The pursuit of Happiness is an inward journey, if we regularly desposit positive, encouraging and uplifting thoughts, if we continue to bite our lip just before we begin to grumble and complaint, if we shoot down what seemingly harmless negative thoughts as it germinates, we will find that there is much to rejoice about.

This is also the spirit that has keep me moving forward in my special walk with my little STAR, and what better way than to share once again some memorable moments we captured in August for a strong finish as we cross over to another new exciting and adventurous month of September.

We had taken opportunity to eat out at Joan Bowen cafe to feel the Love, Compassion and Hope, great dinning experience. Empowering & practising him to pay for item he buy is another way to promote his confidence and position in the community in term of interaction. functional communication & thinking.

The school term ended with a mini sport day where by the children form teams according to their colour assigned to participate in relay games, another opportunities to generalize his various skills learn from EIP(listen, look, follow, stay at area, co-operative play). At the end of the day, every child is a winner. Kudos to the teachers for outting up another successful and meaningful outing.

The family was back in Malaysia's Po Po's(grandma's) house at Tanjung Sepat near South-western coast of Malaysia, another truely and wonderful experience in life within greenery environment, the kampong spirit, their local food are all that we miss back in our progressing Singapore.

Taken just within the gate and compound of po po's house

Having his hair cut at his 4th autie's Final Cut Studio Salon at Puchong, first time visit since openning more than a year ago, great atmosphere and place of interaction & networking on top of just having the hair do. Happy that she has come this far and really proud of her achievement.

To my little STAR, this is also a holiday camp, little STAR taking opportunity to do his worksheets on numeric, writing and drawing and polishing his literacy skill in English.

And also some leisure and play as well! We took opportunity to setup a small little tent which he called his Tree House at a corner of the room and that he indulge in his comfort at po po's house during the stay there whenever we call it a day.

A visit to Ganofarm

A visit to youngest autie new nest in Nilai, awesome 2 floor apartment, had BBQ for the night, before we head back to Singapore next morning.

September kicks start another opportunity to express our heart felt gratitude to the teacher that have taken Fabian and make a difference in his learning journey.

Little STAR watching his beautiful montage in his learning journey with teacher Eileen.

Beside the three EIP teachers, there are also several heroines out there who have being working with Fabian to whom we also will like to extend our heart felt gratitude to them namely:-

OT Adeline, at Ozworks Therapy

SLP, Zunaida at Aidan Rush Therapy

Special Educator, Hassina at Aidan Rush(covering his literacy/Numeric/Writing & Drawing)

Special Educator, Angeline at Aidan Rush(who is taking Fabian now from Hassina)

Speech Therapist, YiTian Liang at SpeechInc Therapy for speech social group

Little did I know that I would be summoned for great patience, faith and courage in this life. My little STAR has made my humble journey in this world an extra-ordinary one. he has tranformed my ordinary days into an experience in depth of compassion and love I did not know I was capable of, he will always be my Joy Of Living.

Winner's Statement:-

It is Love that builds the bridge over anything and it is Love that helps us to find a way.