JellyFish

We've been going to speech therapy for over a year now. I can't believe it.
We started with this adventure and that adventure...and it's been smooth sailing ever since.

Our speech therapist, Miss Judy, has been testing J-man to see how he's advanced. It's been a hoot and a half to watch. He's come sooooo far! He's totally understandable now, in most areas of life. Which is a 180 from being unintelligible. We are rejoicing.

We did learn, from the testing, a few things about ourselves, though.

In this portion of the testing, J-man is supposed to identify the pictures. It's a vocabulary test.
He's going along and can identify many things. He's a bit puzzled by seeing more than one thing in a picture - like lion, tiger, giraffe -- and not having to i.d. each animal. Instead, he's supposed to say "animals".

He's going along and doing quite nicely, and stops at this one picture.
He identifies it as something that sounds like... well, I can't pronounce it. I'm guessing now that it must have been a combination of cock-a-doodle and a cuckoo. He was supposed to say "chicken" or "rooster". But he couldn't get it out and Miss Judy moved on.

Two pages later he clearly identified "Mermaid."

I just laughed.

he can't I.D. a chicken, but he can I.D. a mermaid?? I think I may have the Backyardigans to thank for that, but I'm not sure. If nothing else, it showed that we're a bit weird.

Going on, he's supposed to I.D. a part of the picture.

Miss Judy tried to prompt him. "This is the ceiling, this is the floor. What is this?"

He looked at it and said, "Jellyfish."
In the little observation room, it's all I could do to not fall out of my chair laughing.

She looked at him and said, "What did you say? This is the ceiling and this is the floor. What is this?" He said it again, "Jelly Fish."

I have my new phrase. Next time some one asks me a question, the answer is likely to be Jellyfish. Especially if it's a child and the answer to the question is obvious. Or if it's a child and they're asking "What's for dinner?" -- I think Jellyfish could be the perfect answer.

She finally figured out that he could see the next page under, (even though it wasn't a jellyfish at all) and used the real room to get the answer she was looking for -- "wall". Which is not as funny as "jellyfish". At all.

He scored at a 5 year age and we should finish the testing part on Thursday.
It's been a great thing to see his progress on paper, even though we're seeing it in life.
We do wish the insurance company would see things our way - but we're plodding along and going forward. He'll start K4, homeschooled, when we start all the new grades.

So we celebrate his progress. We work on his grammar.
and

Jellyfish.