Parent-teacher conference

Dan and I had a parent-teacher conference with Elijah's teacher today. It went really well!

His awesomely wonderful teacher said the following:

- Elijah is one of the most consistent kids in the class. He is happy and predictable and cooperative. (Goodness, I wish we could say this about him at home!)

- He has come such a very long way in his development. He is still behind in social, gross motor and fine motor skills, but not by much. When comparing him to where he was at one year ago, it is pretty amazing to think about! He has made tremendous strides.

- Intellectually/academically, he is ahead of where most kindergarten teachers want their students to be at the end of the kindergarten year. He picks up on reading and math and patterns and everything else very quickly.

Elijah is a special little boy. It takes a unique combination of grace and nurturing and structure to make him the happiest, most effective person he can be. His teacher told us today that she was a little bit concerned. If Elijah doesn't receive the perfect combination of qualities in a kindergarten teacher, he could fail. Thankfully, as always, he has the absolute best people looking out for him, so his preschool teacher is going to request that very thing for him. We are going to try to get him the most structured yet nurturing kindergarten teacher possible.

E's teacher thinks that he will need a "special" label of some sort because of his developmental delays (due a lot to all of his medical needs). Because of this, he will likely need to be pulled out of his class for at least speech services, and possibly more? She said to us that Elijah has some autistic tendencies, but that he is not autistic. I have ALWAYS thought this exact thing about him! There are so many things that he does that would qualify him as an autistic kid, but he just isn't.

We have been very blessed with the teachers and doctors who have cared for him. We continue to pray for the same from here on out. I have honestly prayed for his kindergarten teacher since he was born!