For unknown reasons I woke up at 5.30 in the morning and then couldn’t get properly back to sleep, so I was never going to be all sweetness and light for the day. Nevertheless I managed to persevere with calling the leisure centre until I finally managed to get the swimming teacher on the phone and got Big into the same class as her friend, starting 16th June at 5pm. Once we get into school holidays the lessons shift to 9.30 in the morning, which I’m not nearly as impressed with, but I guess we’ll cope. She said that the best path with Small would be for him to watch Big’s session for a couple of weeks, then if he likes the look of it he can join in for a free trial, and if that works he can join as soon as there’s a gap in the class. They do continuous assessment and continuous move-ups, so gaps open up quite often apparently.
Big is of course now worried that either herself or C will get moved up quickly and not be in the same group any more, I’ve told her that they’ll just have to practise together to keep at the same standard. And if we pay for her lessons by direct debit she gets free entry to public swimming sessions, so we’ll be able to take her for plenty of practise anyway.
So that’s that one sorted, and the other achievement of the day was Small’s first Beaver session. He had been really looking forward to it, and I was allowed to stay in the hall for the first session. We were the first there, and Brown Beaver remembered us from the long phone conversation when I got him on the waiting list, so I was reasonably confident that she would cope. The session was on sign language, which apparently is used by Deaf ppl who don’t talk (I can think of a few other groups as well, but there you go) and when the children were asked if they knew anyone Deaf, Small stuck his hand up and waited patiently until he was called on. He then told everyone about “a boy at my last school who had parents who were Deaf” which I thought was a pretty good thing to remember and explain. He did of course forget his half-deaf mother until we were leaving 😆
They learnt how to say their promise in sign language, and then did Three Blind Mice and then played a game which involved charging from corner to corner of the room. Small didn’t get this bit and I could see him wondering whether to get upset about other boys cannoning into him, but in the end deciding to laugh and run after them, so that was OK. I think that is going to be the part of the session that’s most likely to be difficult for him – he did really well with the rest of it, and I thought that actually he was better behaved than most of the rest of the group.
I think that’s one of the reasons ppl find it difficult to understand why I worry about him – very few ppl have seen the full glory of a Small meltdown, and if you haven’t, it’s difficult to imagine.
I think what I might do is make an appointment to see the decent doctor at the GPs to have a chat about whether it’s worth going for any kind of expert assessment of him. Sounds like a sensible approach.
Anyway, he thoroughly enjoyed his first session, he has another three before he decides whether he wants to stick with it. I think for the next few I’ll sit in the car outside – it’s a mile from home so a little far for him to walk at the end of the day to then run around and walk home again.
So that was Monday.
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