The Steens: Zoo Boise

My nephew, Jericho, had his 2nd grade field trip to Zoo Boise today. Jericho is autistic so his teacher asked my sister, Holly, if she would come to the zoo just in case things didn't go perfectly. She was supposed to meet him at the zoo, but he refused to get on the bus when it was time to leave the school, so she quickly drove to the school to coerce him to get into the car to go to the zoo. She found him at the computer looking at zoo animals and the conversation went like this:

"Hi Jericho," She said.

"Do you want to go to the zoo?"

"NO"

"Do you want to stay at school?"

"NO"

"Do you want to go home?"

"NO"

"What do you want?"

"Com-pu-tor"

He didn't want to go to the zoo, because he didn't want to miss out on his computer time. Silly boy! Holly and Miss Andrea came up with a plan to get him out the door. They let him play on the computer for 10 minutes. Miss Andrea set a timer and they put together a visual schedule. (A piece of paper that says what will happen next--like a list you can cross off.)

First--Computer

Then--Go to car with snacks

Zoo

School

When the timer rang, he crossed off computer. They showed him the list about every two minutes, as he worked on the computer. He looked at the next thing on the list, made some noises about how he really didn't want to do it. Then, he picked up his snack and walked to the car without one melt down!

Holly always amazes me with her patience and the way she is able to talk things through with Jericho and explain things in away that makes sense to him and motivates him to act.

Meanwhile, Matthew and I were getting ready to meet Aunt Holly and Jericho at the zoo. We had to drop daddy off at the airport first.

We made it! Zoo Boise isn't the greatest zoo in the nation. At this age, Matthew doesn't mind and in fact I am just happy if I can tell that he notices the animals at all. He was much more aware of his surroundings this time which was exciting!

The Jeep - one of the best spots at the zoo. Especially for little boys!

Matthew gets his turn to drive!

The giraffe slide - hot spot #2!

Jericho makes it down the slide.

Matthew at the top of the slide. He always held the line up as it took him a while to decide that he was really going to go down. I had to have the little girl behind him give him a little nudge to get going.