Hello, friends!

Talking to my friends isn't limited to people I know intimately but includes those that are close by proximity in miles between us and people we meet along life's highway that are what we like to call "divine appointments." I believe the first time I heard the term divine appointments was in the book, The Prayer of Jabez by Bruce Wilkinson. God puts us on His directed path and along the way He places people in strategic points along that path for each of us to meet exactly when we need them and they need us. Divine appointments! They are God's plan for friendships that last and are functional at the same time.

What happens when friendships end? Blam! Door slams! The end. Stop! Reverse or rehearse! Find the next point or wonder in the desert for food! Look back or cut some slack. Say goodbye or wish, oh, wish why! Friendships, though fleeting, have an eternal hope for future eternity. They are written in the Book of Friends in eternity. Your hope is to meet them again in future eternity.

Detour message: Man, I went to www.friendship.com/au for some content & found a skeleton, dead, and picked to death from abuse and unuse. The site hasn't been updated since 2007. Scary! I sent them a message to help me understand why they've neglected something as precious a friends.

Back now--So, where were we? We discussed communication as a way to keep the fire burning. Friendships need warmth and comfort like a cozy blanket by the fireplace. Divine appointments are strategically place on the path of life so there's someone at your place of need when they are needed. Friendships never end. It's like cyberspace. If you put it out there it can be found if you know how to do the search and retrieve. Friendships are written in The Book of Friends in eternity.

Let's go on a few more paragraphs making a definition of friendship or accepting what the world considers a delineation of what constitutes friendship. From a University of Stanford website in the area of Philosophy, love seems to be the stabilizing factor in friendships. However, there are 3 different types of love.

• agape love -creates value intrinsically and exponentially that increases with time and shadows the love of God toward us;
• eros love - sensual & sexual in desire toward the friend going past the boundaries of agape love. Usually kind of love that marital partners have one for the other.
• philia love- affectionate regards or friendly feelings toward all who one may be in relationship with such as;

***family;
***friends like ones at school or neighbors;
***employer/employee or peers in community relationships;
***love for your country.

Site: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/friendship/

Apology!!!

I must apologize for not saying anything concerning my favorite job--friendships. The percent return on friendship is only measured when attention to the relationship goes lacking. So, I ask your forgiveness. I will work harder at keeping this blog up-to-date.

You see, I don't have a money-making job. I use my master's degree to homeschool my grandson. He was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome at the age of 3. He's 11 now and doing extremely well. We manage at least 2-3 good days per week and on the not-so-good days we may complete one simple task. The really cool thing I observed on the few good days this week was how I'm learning from him as much as I hope he's learning from me. Also, we make sure there's plenty of learning goin' on out of the "virtual" classroom like grocery shopping from a list that keeps us within our budget, baking and measuring and mixing as well as oven preheating and timing cook time.

Some other important tools for Ethan are a Rubric and a graphic organizer. Rubrics tell exactly what he needs to do on an assignment so, he upfront knows what he has to achieve to get the grade he wants. A graphic organizer helps put his information in groups and plots so instruction makes sense.

Instruction from movies we watch, and we talk about after watching, is reinforced with comparative instruction in related areas. An example is the movie Remember the Titans. During Black History month we watch it and talk about how things have changed since the 60's. He compares the problems from the 60s to problems today and if things or better or not and why. He did note that there probably wouldn't have been a black president in the 60s. He also noted that President Obama still has trouble but not like he might have had in the 60s.

He is an excellent artist and has an amazing creative mind concerning how his world would be if we all lived in his environment and by his rules. He has great difficulty with his writing skills so I allow him to draw when he's receiving new information like from lectures on American History or new reading activity like books he chooses to read. His spelling words come from his readings. I let him pick the new words from the book as he reads them.

Ethan's strengths are his spelling and reading abilities that are at a level above 6th grade, his knowledge about History and what we study is effective for recall, and now that he has gotten his multiplication tables memorized we'll be able to get past 4th grade level. Yeah! It wasn't until I told him that the majority of Aspie kids get math concepts quickly that he started improving his multiplication tables. I told him that he is math smart and he fitted into the majority, not the minority, of Aspie kids.

His social skills are sharpening. He has fewer & fewer melt downs each day. That means a lot to me. I know what he's capable of and I expect nothing less. He also started karate this semester and has received his second level belt--an orange one. He was so proud of himself and I was happy for him and his success. He is striving to obtain his yellow belt then we'll rethink if that is what he wants to do and go on until January 2011. I belief he has found his niche.

I am a lover of behavioral psychology. Ring the bell and the dog salivates. Ethan's not a dog but he works best when he can cash in on his work. Pay him and he works harder. He is learning a good work ethic. Do your job and do it well then you will be rewarded. I also like Vygotsky and his philosophy of scaffolding and teaching within a community and helping the child get within the zone of proximal development

This school of thought comes from psychological scaffolding. You stand by the child on the scaffold and introduce new information. As you see him or her getting it a little bit you walk further away to the end of the scaffold but within a secure distance. Next you step down one step at a time on the ladder. As you assess his/her level of success with the new information, you may see he/she's stuck so you step back up one step at a time until he/she takes back control and makes measureable progress. Back down you go one step at a time until he/she successfully completes at least an 80% assessment or review exam. Eighty percent is a good goal to start with however, I know Ethan is capable of 90% or greater. So, I let it go at 80% and higher assessment grades are icing on the proverbial cake.

Ethan's immediate community comes from his nuclear family. I am all over social instruction within the community. Ethan has 3 brothers & 6 cousins as well as aunts & uncles, grandparents, and even great-grandparents that influence him behaviorally. He lives with his mother and 3 brothers as well as me and his PawPaw. I'm called MawMaw by my grandchildren. He isn't given special treatment because of his disability except when he melts down quickly and out of control. We intervene for him and redirect his energy and help him, & us, as we try to understand where communication went wrong.

Scaffolding is a way to teach and assess. It works best for students that need one-on-one instruction like Ethan. Ethan was not getting the support he needed in third grade public school in our county and he failed. As a family, we all decided to try homeschooling. We even got input from his estranged father. I felt his Daddy needed to know the change to help catch him up. He agreed and we have been through 2 years of school together.

Next year will be a pivotal point since he will be at the middle school level and his brother who will also be in middle school in 6th grade. It will be another family decision with Ethan being the loudest vote of course. He still has issues with being "different" and his self-confidence hasn't met up with his intelligence. However, I believe it will. I believe his karate will be a great influence for his self-esteem. I believe Ethan will complete his education through to the 12th grade and go on to college. We've already been looking at colleges together!

Well, I'm trying to coordinate my blogs!

It's getting a little easier. Now I've got to interject working on my book and having it ready to go to the publisher by March 31, 2010. If I get slack, give me a wake up call. I do most of my work at night when the other 6 people in this house are sleeping. I'm truly a night owl.

I worked as a nurse on the night shift for over 20 years and my biological clock has never reset. Remember me in your prayers. Satan doesn't want this book published. Greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world! Victory! I love ya all!

Work on Friendship? Really!

Why would one have to work on a friendship?  Does finding lifetime friends come easily?  What about keeping friendships intact?  Is it much like keeping your marriage through thick and thin?

I can count on one hand the number of lifetime friends I've had.  Each of them came along at milestones of my life and they are still in contact with me except for one who passed away a few years ago from a stroke.  When I did some research on quotes, synonyms, antonyms, and definitions, I was interested in the word impact in relationship to friendships.  I was surprised to find that impact in friendships is a "forceful coming together of 2 things such as people forming a friendship together."  

The impact is compared to a glass shattering on a tile floor, a bashing together, clobbering, pummeling, taking a licking, clashing, crashing into each other, colliding into one another, and hitting with force.  What do these terms have in common?  They are forceful and intense.  When you think of your best friends,are the relationships you have and love best also forceful, having power to influence and bring about results one on the other?  Has a best friend jarred, jolted or shocked you?  Was the impact with power and punch?  Was it a meeting and agreement of feelings and senses?

From the Encarta (MSN) website the dictionary says friendship is a relationship between friends having mutual feelings of trust and affection with mutual assistance, approval, and support.  When you think of your closest friends do you both value honesty, integrity, forgiveness, harmony and peace and one another's uniqueness?

Friends: To Have, To Hold

Do you remember your very first friend? I was in first grade. Babs was her nickname for Barbra. We only saw each other at school but she gave me reason to look forward to school each morning. We liked to jump rope, play hopscotch, and swing. Then the hoolahoop came out & we had a new first love. What was it about Babs that attracted me to her? I believe it was the things we had in common.

We also loved to read. Learning to read was an adventure and we read everyday from See Spot Run. I can hear us taking turns in our reading groups. We learned to sound out the words. Ya' know--phonics! We shared our lunch and swapped fruit or cookies. But there was no sharing of my pears. I love a fresh, ripe pear and sharing was difficult. After first grade making friends became my job. Dad had trouble with alcohol and rage as well as my Mom with rage, physical, and emotional abuse when she couldn't control Dad. I moved every school year to a different county in South Florida and two times I changed schools in the middle of the school year. I went to 13 schools in 12 school years. I had no trouble making friends. It came to me easy. Then the trouble came when I grew six and three-quarters inches in the summer between sixth and seventh grade. I started eighth grade at 5'10" weighing 160 pounds. I was hoping I had done all my growing but not quite. I continued to grow taller and when I completed twelfth grade I was 6'1" and 170 pounds. What does my growing so tall have to do with friendship?

I knew that those with whom I made friends from ninth grade until my senior year were lifetime friends. They didn't pick at me with name calling because of my size except in fun. I have had many nicknames like Jolly Green Giant, Alligator Wrestler, and Minibod! Because I had the ability to adapt to change and other difficulties, and my friend making was what I was good at, school became my escape. It was the place where I was the happiest and I excelled at school knowing the whippings would come if my grades fell below a 'B.'

In 1966, I was in the ninth grade and met my lifetime friend. Her name is Mary Lou Anderson Mullis and we have been friends for forty-three years. We spend vacation time together, talk on the phone regularly, and we have a girlfriend journal we pass back and forth. She lives in Florida and I in Georgia. We had the best time from 1966 until I got married and moved away. Then she got married and I had my first child. Our lives were very different but we never stopped loving one another.