I Love Me Some PECS!!!!

(OK, Just kidding...not that kind...but it lured you in  to read this right????)

For a few weeks now, Nicholas' teacher and I have been communicating and collaborating to get a pecs system fully implemented in my home. Backing up, and to protect the innocent, I should not mention her name, but will suffice to say that this amazing and lovely woman has made in astounding impact on my son at school, and she doesn't want to stop there.   She has spent her own precious time, both in and out of the classroom, to help pull together photos, laminate cards, and make visual schedules and a binder full of picture options for mom and dad for not only Nicholas, but for my other two kids as well.  She came to my home yesterday, and physically set up the entire system, and ran me through some drills on how to "train" the kids to respond to the schedules. (Not necessary for Nicholas since he already uses this system in the classroom...he just ran with it immediately.)  

This morning, I was feeling particularly empowered, after only 1 hour of use.  Some amazing things occurred far beyond my expectations, and I suddenly fell in love with this system.  And by the way, this is not just useful for Autism parents....frankly, it may be even MORE useful to me with my other kids, than with Nicholas. (or at LEAST equally useful.)  Anyway, here are a couple of nuggets that I took away from our first morning of using this system with all of my kiddos.

1) My youngest, who can be quite emotional and defiant when he wants to be, was not only cooperative, but was EXCITED to do the tasks on his schedule (go to the bathroom, get dressed, and eat breakfast) which typically each require 1000000% of my undivided attention in order to complete successfully and without tears.

2)  With each of the kids following their schedules, it allowed me time to prepare their breakfast and give Nicholas some extra help where needed which NORMALLY is a chaotic situation where two kids are yelling at me to produce Milk and Waffles at the speed of light while Nicholas bangs his head against the wall in the dining room while impatiently awaiting the oatmeal that I am very distractedly trying to prepare.

3)  This one is probably the BEST, and the most UNEXPECTED of them all:  They all cooperatively sat together at the small table I use for them in the dining room.  As a result, they even paid a little bit of attention to each other.  Avery told me that Nicholas smiled at her when she repeated something from a show she likes, and she was genuinely happy that this happened....and so was I.  Later, she told me he wanted more milk, and I wondered why she had said that, and discovered it was because she took it upon herself to use the "Yes/No" card to ask him if he wanted more.  WOW!  I didn't see THAT coming!  

So, for today, this is what I wanted to share.  And since it is almost Thanksgiving, this is also what I am extremely grateful for!

I plan to write a mini-series complete with videos and photos to document our PECS progress in our house.   Oh, and for those who don't know what the heck I'm talking about when I say PECS, it is definitely a far cry from the photo above....but I just couldn't help myself when I came across that photo when googling images for the PECS system. :)

 It stands for Picture Exchange Communication system, and looks something like this, but has many variations and function:s

At any rate, I'll save the details for another post, but was super excited about this being in our home now and just had to share!!  So simple, yet SO very effective!  

Hoping you all have a lovely holiday, and thanks, as always, for taking the time to read.  Until next time....

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