The Audiblox Diary of Kori Mitchell

Hi! Kori has gotten 23 on the sequencing and 19 on the pattern 2. Then this morning I made the changes and she got 15 on the sequencing and 15 on the pattern 2. She liked the changes to the spatial because it is a bit more challenging although still very simple to her. Arrows were almost perfect this morning. We are just beginning the 21 - 50 and she struggles going backward on that now. The reading exercise was much better this morning. She is still working on the 20 words and makes a few mistakes now and then but she is definately responding quicker and more accurately. As for the Auditory exercise she still only gets 5 correct in the whole 14 minutes but is continuing to get closer to being correct. She is determined to work that one so I'm thinking she'll be better at it soon.

A couple of times she has asked if we could so extra practice on the auditory exercise so she can do better. If she wants to do this at night for fun should I allow it?

Thank you for the latest update! Kori really seems to be catching on well to the adjustments I made yesterday and I am proud of her. Kori, thank you for working so hard – you are a star! Michelle, note that you should now follow the new program that I e-mailed to you.

Concerning the Sequencing and Pattern exercises, Kori is doing very well with the new targets, but it will be a bit too soon to increase the pressure once again. Continue as is with current practice targets. When doing the Arrows exercise, note that you should now do Step 2 and Step 3. For the Spatial exercise, I am again forwarding you a more advanced version of this exercise.

Concerning the Auditory exercise, I will definitely never complain if a learner wants to do some extra work! I think that is a great sign of her motivation starting to kick in. When doing it as part of the lesson, continue as is, but when doing it as an extra, you can always bring in a fun element. You can read her a pattern of three blocks, reading it as you have been doing it so far. She must then build the pattern. If she manages a pattern with three successfully, she will then get an opportunity to test you. If you manage three successfully, you will again test her, but now you will give her a new pattern consisting of four blocks. If she makes a mistake, you get another chance to test her with a different pattern of four blocks. If she manages four successfully, she will again get an opportunity to test you. If you manage four successfully, you will again test her, but now you will give her a new pattern consisting of five blocks, etc. See who can remember the most blocks correctly!

Kori is doing well. With the Sequencing exercise she gets between 15 and 21 right. Auditory pattern 3a she got 6 correct today but usually only 4 or 5. The pattern 2 she gets 15 or 18 correct. Spatial exercise is going great. She loves it and has no trouble telling which block is where. She gets them right everytime. The arrows are very hard for her now. It will take some time for her to get the arms and legs in sequence. She is doing the reading exercise better. She is up to 26 words now and is speeding up some. Benetta, she says she knows the words but sometimes they don't come out of her mouth correct. She seems to have a good attitude and is trying but sometimes she just seems to stumble over the words when trying to get them out so fast. I imagine some of it is normal at first but what do you think? I tell her just to keep trying to go as fast a possible. She does seem to be holding up for the whole 15 minutes though.

She is still working the 21 to 50 for counting. The bean bags are harder now and she is not catching them very well. Paper is fine!

Thank you for the latest update! Kori is really working hard and I can see that she is starting to become more motivated towards her work! Thank you for your commitment, Michelle, I am sure that from here on things can only go better and better.

Kori is doing better with Pattern exercise 2 than with the Sequencing exercise. Keep the target for the Sequencing exercise the same, but make the necessary changes to the target for Pattern exercise 2, as indicated to you in my e-mail. No change to the Arrows exercise yet. Please keep me posted on her progress. Note if she makes any mistakes on left/right, and also tell me if she is able to maintain a proper rhythm throughout the exercise.

I am glad that she is seeing the Spatial exercise as a challenge. It is quite difficult, especially as one has to think on an abstract level in order to answer the questions. Managing 6 blocks on the Auditory exercise is good. Are you doing the extra Auditory exercises with her at night?

With the Reading exercise, it is great to see that you have finally been able to add new words again. Just remember to constantly try and increase the speed at which you throw down the words. I do not think it is really a question of stumbling over her words, but more a matter of the eye not yet being quick enough to pick up the words that you have thrown out, especially if you manage to throw them down at the demonstrated speed.

Kori is up to 24 correct on the Sequencing.
Pattern 2 with the changes she did 15 correct today.
Auditory pattern is the same, 6.
The arrows are still not going well. She messes up continually and can't get the arms and legs to work together. We will keep trying this one.
She is still practicing the 21 to 50 counting.
The spatial exercise is doing good she gets them all correct most the time. Bean bags are still hard with the left and right exercise. I added no new words today. She is still working the 26.

Well thats the update. We are heading out to The Wild Animal Park and Sea World for the next few days.

Hi! Thanks for the latest update!

Due to the small vacation (a well-deserved rest for the both of you!) I am not going to make any earth shattering changes to her program today. I will wait until you are back from the few days at the Wild Animal Park and Sea World, before making any adjustments again.

I hope you will enjoy the short break and have a safe journey!

Hi! We had a great vacation but came back and had to put a new hard drive in our computer so today is the first day that we've been up and running.

Kori's update.
Sequencing - Thursday she got 18 correct and Friday 21.
Auditory she got 6.
Pattern 2 she got 21.
Spatial she makes an occasional error with left and right but usually quickly corrects herself.
Counting she is still on 31-50.
Reading we are up to 30 words.
Arrows are coming along a little better. She still needs to work on rhythm but she's definately improving.

Today will be our 21 hour of Audiblox! I can't wait for the results. We are excited and I'm very thankful that we haven't begun to feel burdened by it yet. I know that sometimes they say it gets boring and repititious but we haven't minded at all so far. Kori likes it and doesn't complain. She loves the challenge of the block exercises. If she doesn't get better and better she tries harder and harder til she does. I love the help from Benetta it gives me more confidence to go on trying to help Kori. I feel empowered to keep moving forward where as before I found myself feeling so frustrated and like a failure because she was not reading after all these years.

Welcome back! I hope you enjoyed the short vacation! Thank you for the latest update. Thank you also for your kind words.

I am sending you a personal e-mail with some changes to the program. If you will bear with me, in today's diary I only want to comment on the fact that you mentioned that you haven't begun to feel burdened yet, whereas sometimes parents complain that Audiblox becomes repetitive and boring after a while.

Yes, I agree that Audiblox becomes routine after a while. Unfortunately, that is a reality of life – no job, no matter how interesting it may be, is without routine tasks! I started thinking about the vast variety of routine tasks that we are facing every day and the list just kept on growing… Brushing your teeth, taking a bath, shaving, washing your hair, taking care of the home and garden, preparing food, driving the same route daily to and from work… and then I haven't even thought about all the routine tasks that one is faced with at work! I am not pretty keen on going to the gym, but I insist on doing it, because I have a sense of responsibility towards my own health and my own appearance.

A parent has a sense of responsibility towards his child's future, and therefore should persist when Audiblox becomes routine. One important reason for persisting is to help him overcome his learning difficulty. A second reason is to teach him/her to manage routine tasks with a sense of responsibility.

When you, as an adult, are faced with a routine task, you cannot simply give up because you are “bored.” Imagine doing this at work. One has no choice but to do routine tasks, because if one fails to do them, or does them without the necessary tenacity and perseverance, one might get fired or one's chances to be promoted will be meagre. But in all probability giving up is what you *will* do if you have not learned to handle routine tasks. Remember once again that there is nothing that any human being can do that he has not learned to do.

Therefore, it is important to instil this attitude in your child, i.e. to teach your child to manage routine tasks with a sense of responsibility. This is what Audiblox does. It is not a program that only focuses on the skills underlying reading, writing and mathematics. The program also prepares your child for adult life, by teaching him/her that even though the task at hand might be routine, one has no choice but to try one's best!

I will speak to you again shortly!

Well the good news first. Kori has got 24 correct on her pattern 2. The arrows have all of a sudden gotten so easy for her. She does them perfect. We've gone to the next level in counting 31-60. Logical thinking she gotten to group H and so far has not had much of a struggle with it. Spatial exercise is pretty easy and she very rarely makes a mistake. Reading we are up to 38 cards and I've noticed a huge improvement in her speed in the last few days. It's like she's relaxed and it seems to be much less difficult for her to say what she sees. This one was exciting for me!

Now for the not so good results. Bean bags are difficult although she doesn't seem to think so. She's always dropping them. And the Sequencing is still at 18 correct. She just can't seem to get past that mark. I can't imagine why someone would be better at the pattern than the sequencing! Even after the changes to the pattern exercise she has done better, being at 24 correct on Friday. With the Auditory exercise she has gotten 6 correct. It is still sort of awkward for her but she seems to be catching on and improving. Everytime we move to a larger pattern she seems totally lost when she has to build but after awhile or toward the end of her 12 minutes she seems to be able to start making progress.

Thank you for the latest update! I was especially glad to see how many words Kori is currently reading. Of all the news, that was the best! Kori, you are a star and I am so proud of you!

I am a bit concerned about the Sequencing exercise. This exercise drills some of the most important skills needed for reading. Most learners find this exercise easier than, for example, the Pattern exercise. When doing the sequence, they only need to focus on the colors, whereas when doing Pattern exercise 2, they have to remember the colors and the position of each block. One possibility may perhaps be that her ability to perceive sequences is rather poor. Please read the advice given in the personal e-mail I sent you. Keep the target for the Sequencing exercise the same, but make the necessary changes to the target for Pattern exercise 2, as indicated to you in my e-mail.

Concerning the Arrows exercise, continue with Step 2 and Step 3, but now do it on the new arrows chart that you had to make, according to the description I gave you in the previous personal e-mail.

When starting with the Auditory exercise, start with 6 blocks now and work it up to 7 or 8 blocks. Do not do combinations with less than 6 blocks any more.

I do not regard her performance with the Bean bags exercise as bad news. Remember that co-ordination is one of the skills that develops slower than some of the visual-perceptual skills, which is why we only have four Bean bags exercises in the whole program.

With the Logical Thinking exercise, it is important to regularly revise some of the groups that she managed correctly. Remember that her explanation to the answers are just as important, because the idea behind this exercise is not only to teach her to reason logically, but also to be able to verbalize her thoughts.

That is it for today! I will speak to you again shortly.

I like Audiblox because it's fun doing the reading exercise and really, really fun doing the pattern exercise. I like the bean bag toss because it's like playing. I think I'm getting better at reading. Sometimes when I do Audiblox my mom is happy that I can remember that many blocks and build it. My mom says that soon she'll let me be the teacher and have her do the exercises. That will be really cool.

Kori, how nice to hear that you enjoy this program. My son is really looking forward to teaching me as well, and I think that I could learn a lot! The patterns are a challenge for people of any age.

It was cool to hear from you for the first time! I hope everyone reading your message will be just as proud of you as I am! You are doing great!

You're a star, and I LOVE your diary. It's really cool!! Do you think your mom would be able to do more blocks than you? I wonder...

Y are woking hard and it is paying off. Isn't it exciting to be able to read better and to build your memory skills. My daughter is really enjoying the program, too. I don't think I will let her teach me though, because I know I can't do as many blocks as she can. I bet your mom will have a hard time keeping up with you, too!

Hi! I'm so glad someone is ejoying this diary. I'll make sure Kori posts now and then. We also like to hear about others progress. I always read all the posts and share with Kori how well Audiblox worked for others.

Here's Kori's update:

Sequencing:Tues. 18 and Wed. 21

Arrow's (new): This threw her way off and she was incorrect on the left/right many times. I think she was too used to the other pattern of arrows.

Pattern 2: With the new changes today she managed 16

Reading: She is now doing the 3 at a time and doing okay. We haven't added any new words, except one so that there would be 39. Hope that's okay! It just seemed needed to make it even for the 3's.

Spatial She's still getting these correct most of the time.

Auditory: She is still working on getting 7 correct but it hasn't happened yet.

Counting: She is doing great on the 31 to 60 and I'm planning on moving to the next one. We have also been doing plenty of review on the old couting exercises.

Bean bags are slightly better and I'm happy to hear that that one is ok to struggle a bit with!

Well, I think that's all! Kori will be updating her taped reading journal this week so I will compare and let you all know how she did. She will also meet with our homeschool director who is trying to help monitor changes and improvements with Kori. She is also the same lady who is in charge of the Drama program and has been so encouraging to Kori. She has been making comment lately that Kori seems to be more confident in reading aloud in front of the group. I was shocked because she really hasn't been able to read enough to do that in the past but this lady claims that she feels Kori is getting much better. Also some other adults in Kori's life have been informing me that they notice her trying to read signs and instruction on her own! So this is all new to us and we are thrilled to see her trying!
Sorry so long, just happy I guess!
Thanks,
Michelle

I'm proud of you, Kori!

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