The Importance of Maintenance

Today's gift is the importance of maintenance.

My daughter works so hard every day with everything she learns.  Whether it is learning something new in school, learning how to do something for herself like feeding herself with a fork or learning a new type of stretching at physical therapy she is always learning.  And with learning also comes maintenance...to help her maintain the skill.

During the summer and throughout the school year she is given "maintenance" work to go over in school and at home so she doesn't lose any of the skills she has worked so hard to gain.  At physical therapy they are always incorporating many different types of techniques...new and old...so she is always has familiar ones in case a "newer" technique doesn't go smoothly.  Sometimes when they try a new method of stretching she doesn't like it as she is unsure so they have to maintain the old ones to have a fall back, in order to get the stretch for the day.

Tonight at dinner she stated she wanted "more" after she was finished.  I had already given her a little extra to eat, but didn't want to give her a full second helping.  So I asked her if she wanted some fruit....and she said "ya".  So my middle daughter brought over some blueberries to the table.  After I gave her a couple to pick up and eat, I decided to turn this into a little "maintenance" session.

I placed a large blueberry in one hand and a small blueberry in the other hand.  I then asked her to point to the larger blueberry.  Bam!  Without hesitation, she not only pointed to it, but picked it up and ate it!  Then I switched the smaller blueberry to the other hand (without her looking) and picked up a larger blueberry and asked her the opposite question.  Bam!  Again...perfect answer followed by a blueberry in the mouth!

Next I decided to work on numbers as numbers and my daughter don't go well together...she is not a numbers girl....kinda like her mommy!!!  I placed three blueberries in one hand and one blueberry in the other and asked her to point to the hand with three blueberries in it.  WOW!  She was on fire tonight!  We kept doing this over and over again.   And she kept showing me that she knew her "stuff"!!!!

Something so easy...I know.  However, learning these skills was not easy for my daughter and I am so thrilled that she understands the concept of larger and smaller and more and less!!!!  I am beyond thrilled with her desire to learn and only want to help her maintain all her knowledge!

Here is a quote for today....

Let her sleep... for when she wakes, she will move mountains-Author Unknown


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