More on the play group

We are calling our social skills group a play group which is easier for the kids to understand. Some are sophisticated enough to wonder why they are in this group and why other kids from their class are not in the group. No one asked yesterday during group time but I have to have a good answer ready. Just playing together will work for kids like Julia who really don't see themselves as pick out for any reason, but some of the kids know they have differences and may connect the two. I am hoping our parents are willing to fess up to their kids -- yes, you are different, and we are working to make playing and friendship easier for you -- but that is up to parents, not the group.

Oh, I slept well last night. I saw Dana this morning at school and asked her what she thought about our group. She was surprised that it went so peacefully and so well. The kids seemed to be thrilled to be able to play together and to have a whole bunch of new stuff to explore. We need to up the anty, the stakes, and encourage conversation, but the general feeling seems to be that they had a good time and want to come back.

I wrote a long, long report of the session for the group's yahoo group. I hope I will do that each week to serve as a some sort of journal keep/research for myself. I have tried to encourage others to add their own observations but I am a bit worried that I am intimidating the other parents with my long writing. I just need to get it all down.

I really don't feel like I am that good at guiding the children in play. I mean, I am okay at it at home with Julia but not observant enough or intuitive even to pick up on what is going on to effectively intervene. I hope it takes practice. I can do that.

On the Julia side of life -- She took forever getting ready to get to school today. We were up early and siting down to breakfast earlier than usual, but she just took her time like crazy. I try not urge but not rush. Usually, I fail miserably. Today, I tried harder but the encouragement really fell on deaf ears. We arrived at school ever so late.

Now to organization and cleaning which is just a long four letter word.