Tag: children

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Mikaela Renee Lynch

Mikaela Renee LynchSometimes you get your heartstrings pulled in not a good way. Last Friday my daughter’s class attended the Special Olympics at Kezar Stadium. As I’m sure most of you are aware, my daughter is autistic. While we were waiting for her turn to perform we were all sitting and waiting with the kids just getting more and more excited having to sit still and not getting to run around like kids want to do. Sitting next to me was a girl who is all over the news right now — Mikaela Renee Lynch.

She attends my daughter’s school and is autistic like my daughter. She always has an aid with her because she can’t function on her own and like many autistic children and will take the first chance she gets to run off and explore. Mikaela, like my daughter is a curious little girl. She doesn’t run off like most kids, she runs off because she might see something she wants to take a closer look at. Parents of autistic kids know this and understand that you have to keep an eye on your children at all times and even turning your head for a second means you can lose them momentarily.

Well, this is a worst case scenario in that Mikaela wasn’t lost momentarily, they’re still looking for her. The information coming in while up to the minute hasn’t had enough time to be processed yet so no one really knows what is happening. What I do know is this, Special Ed teachers and aids from her school have gone up to help find her because they know her and she knows them which might help. While Mikaela likes water, it looks like there is now video footage of her away from the creek which is good. Most kids don’t learn how to swim early enough in my book, and autistic kids have a harder time understanding the concept of swimming. Add to this that we’re talking about a creek with running water that can be up to 11 feet deep and not a bathtub in a secure location makes it even scarier. So I’m glad that they don’t think she went into the creek.

Mikaela Renee LynchThe down side to this is that it is now Wednesday and she went missing on Sunday. Even for a non-autistic child that’s a long time. Where is she is what we all want to know. Reports have said that Mikaela has the mental state of a one year old. While that’s a convenient starting point there’s more to her than that. She’s ridden horses. She knows she loves peanut butter and crackers. She can walk and run. She can run very fast too. While I’m no expert I have noticed that autistic children tend to be rather strong and seeing as Mikaela is built like my daughter only older and bigger she’s a lot of work to keep from running if she doesn’t want to go along with it. Aids have switched off watching her because she can tire a person out quickly. This isn’t a bad side so much as it is just the way some autistic children are wired. When you hear the word autistic, don’t think retarded. While there is some developmental delay in some autistic children it’s not the same thing as metal retardation. Speech is frequently a problem with autistic children and when they do start to speak they tend to have problems enunciating words so as a parent or someone who works with autistic children have to learn a new language to communicate with them. My daughter is six and doesn’t know how to swear, but she needed something to say when she was upset and so she mutters, bugga-digga. That’s her swear word she invented to express herself. We don’t really know what that means to her, but we understand the context.

Unfortunately context is something that is being left out in many of the reports. If you’ve never been around an autistic child you aren’t able to see these things. While Mikaela is non-verbal there are little ways she uses to express herself. She flaps her arms wildly when she’s excited like many autistic kids. She falls to the ground when she’s tired of being held to get away, not because she can’t stand. There are lots of people out there trying to find Mikaela and I hope that they find her soon. She’s a sweet little girl that needs help and I hope for the best for all of those who are out looking for her.

UPDATE: It is with a heavy heart that I have to report the following information received from the Clearlake Police Department:

Clearlake Police Chief Craig Clausen has confirmed that the body of nine year old Mikaela Lynch has been found in Cache Creek about forty five minutes ago.

The family did not offer a statement and has asked that everyone respect their privacy at this time.

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The Saddest Playground In San Francisco

I’ve seen lots of changes to the playgrounds in San Francisco and a lot of them have been really good. Being a parent and having to take your kid out to a place where they can run around and work off some energy so they don’t destroy your house is always a good thing, but there are some places that still need help. This one is on 24th Avenue and Quintara Street.

This playground, really a mini playground has looked like this for close to 50 years. They did put in some of that spongy stuff down and have replaced the benches, but it’s still the same. For some reason it even warranted a plaque. I’m not sure why because other than a few swings, small slide and sandbox there’s really nothing else left.

It’s also not fenced in and a quick run into the streets. It is also used as a staging point for Abraham Lincoln High School’s PE teachers before making the kids run around the reservoir so when PE is happening the teachers and students don’t really care much if you’re a parent with a child there to actually use the playground. We were lucky in that we only visited this playground when our daughter was very young and she was just learning to walk. Now that she knows how to walk and can run around by herself there are plenty of other places to go to that offer much more energy releasing activities as well a mentally stimulating forms of play.

While there have been great improvements to other Sunset neighborhood parks so as Frank McCopping playground and West Sunset playground, this one has pretty much been forgotten. My suggestion to our local Supervisor Carmen Chu is to either upgrade this mini-playground or just remove it and add in a few of those concrete chessboards and leave it as a meeting place for people who often use it already as a place to meet up and have a chat. It’s a small area so you wouldn’t need much there, but leaving it in it’s current state of looking like it was built during Russian industrial era times just isn’t San Franciscan. Email Supervisor Chu or tweet her about this and maybe we’ll see something get done.

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Why The Hell Is My Daughter Speaking Dutch?

Every once in awhile some really strange happens that catches me off guard. My daughter who I’ve mentioned previously is autistic. She doesn’t talk much, but this is getting a lot better. I suddenly noticed her saying phrases that weren’t English and of all things sounded Dutch. It turns out that she was indeed speaking Dutch. How did this happen? I can blame it all on Sesame Street.

Sesame Street is shown all around the world in just about every country if not every country. Add to this an iPad and YouTube and there is where it all started. She’s going to be 5 at the end of the month and took to the iPad quicker than a pair of senior citizens I was hired to teach them how to use one. Since she loves Sesame Street and understand how YouTube works she finds lots of videos to watch. the odd part is that when she selects a video it shows suggested videos to watch. She watches a bit in English and there might be a suggested version of it in Spanish or Dutch as the case may be.

I don’t mind her speaking Spanish because, well that is a language I can at least understand. Dutch is one of those languages that I don’t even know how to say anything that would get my face slapped in [there are 12 other languages that I know how to get my face slapped in, but that’s another story.]

I understand how a young child’s mind is very malleable and it is very easy for them to learn new languages. I get a kick when she walks in the room and says hola or wants me to do something and says vuelve conmigo. That I can understand, but when she starts singing the Teletubbies theme in Dutch it becomes a little creepy. She even gets the lispy S at the end of teletubbiesh.

Since she has creeped me out quite a bit with this I felt it only fitting to torment my beloved readers with the Teletubbies intro in Dutch. Enjoy and be horrified.

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Thank you all very much!

A friend of mine and I were talking one day and we came up with the idea if you could get a million people to give you $1 a year for something that was relatively meaningful you wouldn’t have to work again.

Well, I tried that and it hasn’t worked yet, but apparently there were enough of you who thought enough to send me a few bucks to help us get an iPad 2 for our daughter. As we expected she loves it and has taken to it quickly from day one. We found several apps that are really helping her out such as the several ABA [applied behavioral analysis] apps that have gotten her talking more since we got it on Thursday. These apps show a picture of something with the word underneath and it says the word and waits for the child to repeat it. In some you can even record your own voice. We even downloaded an app that I call “Stephen Hawking” because it’s meant for people who can’t talk to be able to talk by hitting buttons on the iPad and it will speak in man or woman’s voice. We haven’t really used that with her because she’s talking more from the ABA apps.

We also found several apps that have her drawing pictures and letters and numbers in a somewhat structured way, but when she puts the iPad down and moves to crayons and paper you can see the difference. Then there are the music programs. Since my Wife and I are both musicians it’s no surprise that she’s taken to music and considering that I play guitar and my Wife plays bass it would only seem natural for our daughter to take to the drums.

I have to say that Garage Band’s built in instruments are really giving her a lot of excitement and while she’s not able to keep a 4/4 beat yet she has the virtual drum kits to help her out. The keyboard she also loves because it’s much more larger than on the iPhone apps I tried. Even though she has small fingers the iPhone. is still too small for her tiny fingers when she has some problems with fine motor skills.

My Wife downloaded a copy of Fruit Ninja for herself, but yesterday when I started to play with it Rebecca took to it in an instant. There’s not much for her to learn from the game, but she is perfecting her fine motor skills more.

Normally when we go upstairs for dinner it has to be ready right then and there or she starts throwing a fit. Autistic kids tend to be a little impatient at times, but now I just have to pull out the iPad and open up the YouTube app and we can quietly sit together and watch some of the sesame street cartoons we have saved as her favorites.

All in all I have to say that if you have a kid with special needs, get an iPad. It may take your child a few days to start to get it, but at four Rebecca’s becoming a pro already. If your kids like to tear up books like Rebecca does, there are many you can download that have a soundtrack that reads the book to them while highlighting the words.

There are many apps that are free with an upgrade so you have a chance to try before you buy which is good. For some of the apps we don’t even need to upgrade yet, but for the better ones we’ve already upgraded for the 99¢-$2.99 the apps run. So go for it. You’ll find it will change your child for the better.

Special thanks go out to Harry, Leon, Michael, Ian, Clint & Lyubov who donated. We really appreciate what you’ve done to help us help our daughter.

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Goodbye to the California Academy of Sciences

As most of you know I have had a love/hate relationship with the California Academy of Sciences. I love the fact that they have a super eco-friendly building with LEED Platinum certification, but what I have found with the new change is that they don’t have the science so much anymore. I grew up at the Academy and whenever I had a science project at school I would always do my research at the Academy because it was a treasure trove of information and because I was also a member of the Junior Academy I had access to even more.

I received my renewal notice from the Academy a few days ago and noticed that last year we paid $159 for a family membership. This year they have risen the price to $199. While that’s less than a dollar a day that kind of thinking only applies to food, not an Academy of Sciences membership which has now entered into the luxury realm. They’ve raised their prices to $29.95 to gain entrance to its hallowed halls, but once you get inside it feels empty. See the fish! See the rainforest! See the planetarium! (sorry all our shows are filled for the day) See our living roof! Oh, here’s some crap we’re using to fill in the space while you walk to our cafe to plunk down another $50 on top of the $100 you just put down to get your family of four in the door on top of the parking fee.

I’m not taking it anymore. While I grew up there and learned a lot through my activities there the Academy has been rebuilt to serve science to the rich, not the masses. This prompted me to send them the following letter:

Dear California Academy of Sciences,

It is with great regret that I will not be renewing my family membership this year. You price for membership has risen too much over the years to make it feasible for my middle class family to afford anymore.

I grew up as a part of the Academy of Sciences, attending classes at the former Junior Academy while volunteering at Steinhart Aquarium and eventually moving on to work in the Junior Academy and Planetarium. The Academy gave me great benefits at the time that gave me much more than I was learning in school and had me understanding organic chemistry at the age of 12 to the point that I was regularly pointing out errors to my teachers.

That was many years ago. Back when a $25 membership would allow your entire family and two guests walk freely about the Academy that wasn’t so incredibly packed as it is today. We also used to have free monthly meetings and a magazine delivered to us each month and I always looked forward to the free members night that gave us all behind the scenes tours of the aquarium and all the other departments at the Academy.

While the prices obviously have to rise over time, your costs less than 10 years ago prior to the rebuilding of the Academy were $65 for a family membership and came with eight guest passes and you still had the members night. Today that would cost me $1000 and on my budget that makes it unavailable. I have had the standard family membership which when I paid it last year was $159. If I were to renew it today it would cost me $199 which I still cannot afford.

There was a time when the California Academy of Sciences served the people of San Francisco. Now it would cost a family of four $100 to spend a day at the Academy and to me that is unacceptable. I regret that what the Academy once offered me it no longer offers the people of San Francisco and that my daughter will grow up without having access to what I had. I regret that there are so many people flocking to the Academy and giving up their hard earned money to view the aquarium, rainforest and planetarium with a few bits and pieces strewn about. There is no more Wattis Hall of Man, no more Hall of Birds, no more Hall of Minerals, no more North American Hall, no more Life through Science, no more Swamp and no more Entomology room. You have retained African Hall, but the only thing people seem to pay attention to is the penguin exhibit with the rest of the hall being the only quiet, open space in the Academy.

I used to be able to spend an entire day at the Academy of Sciences, but now I can take it in in under two hours. While the Academy has grown in square footage it has shrunk in what it is offering its patrons. I have friends and family who come to visit here and they would love to see the Academy of Sciences, but as soon as I tell them the price they choose to go somewhere else. I used to be able to give them my cards to use, but now you insist on members to show their ID to get in. True, you do offer the one free day a month which is by far the worse day to visit the Academy as it is so crowded it is probably coming close to passing fire code violations on occupancy.

I am not sure if I will ever return to the California Academy of Sciences again unless there is a change back to serving the people of San Francisco by not selling the sizzle instead of the steak at a high price, but by serving up science to the masses that teaches them and gives them a better understanding of the world we live in and how fragile it can be.

Sincerely with deep regret,

Eric Kauschen

The times, they are a changing. Please share this with your friends. I think it will be a long time before you hear me mention the California Academy of Sciences again.

UPDATE: After doing a little fact finding I’ve just discovered that the family membership was $60/year until 2008, A mere 3 years ago and offered the benefits of 4 free academy passes that they valued at $7 each not the $29.95 they ask today, three years later.

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The Sorry State of Education in San Francisco

I received an email today from my daughter’s pre-K teacher. I was sad to read this email. As a few of you know, my daughter was diagnosed with autism.  Few people really know what’s going on with autism. Not every child acts the same way. They could be normal looking kids who don’t have the ability to talk and are sensitive to song or the tastes of foods to the kids who have what are called “stimmy” behavior which could be that they hit themselves or bang themselves around or making odd gestures.  I have to say we have received excellent help along the way from the school system. Kara, my daughter’s teacher is the best. All of the aids who help her out are also the best. They all have the patience of saints, but the problem is that they only get $250/year to supply their class. When I was a kid, my mother along with other moms would bring stuff to the class for the teacher to use. My mom was a teacher and still had lots of left over stuff that we wouldn’t need anymore, but would probably be able to be used in the class.

I knew things were kind of tough, but I never realized they had gotten that bad in San Francisco. Autistic children’s behavior runs across a wide spectrum. Some people have seen my daughter and don’t understand because they don’t see anything odd about her except that she doesn’t really speak much at 3.5 years old. Most of these people either haven’t had to deal with kids or their kids are fully grown and they can’t remember what a 3 year old is like. The school district needs to be better run to provide for our kids whether they are autistic or not. California ranks very low on the education scale. While we’re spending more than other states because we have more teachers, our teacher to pupil ratio is much higher than other states. Here’s the email:
Dear Family and Friends,
As most of you know, I am Pre-K special education teacher in the San Francisco Unified School District.  I teach a wonderful group of 3-5 year olds, who are mostly on the autism spectrum.  What many people do not know, is the huge negative effect our economy has had on California’s schools.  The last two years SFUSD teachers have only been given $25 a month for classroom materials.  Yes, that is right, we are given only $250 a year to purchase paper, markers, books, puzzles, etc.  It is nearly impossible to access these materials alone, and our current materials are nearing their end.   Recently, I joined Donor’s Choose and submitted a project to help enrich my students’ learning through music, art, science, and sensory materials (as well as necessary classroom materials such as shelves without holes, new carpets, etc.)   On this wonderful website, you can support this project by donating any amount. Once we reach our goal, the website will purchase the materials and send them to my class. I’ll take pictures of my kids using them and we’ll make thank you notes to our donors!

A free way to donate $5 to my project  is by going to this website http://www.bing.com/gives/default1.aspx#fbid=nYe–0CPAFi&wom=false .   Click START HERE, enter your email address, click MAKE BING MY HOME PAGE (do not worry it will NOT make BING your homepage), click NO I will not make BING my home page,  and then click finish.  You will receive an email from Bing (most likely in your junk mail) subject donation code.  You can redeem the $5 donation yourself for my project at : http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=487308 .

I am sorry that my daughter’s teacher has to ask for money to help cover the costs, but if you’re a teacher think about only having $25/month to fund your school supplies. It seems to me that all the money we’re spending on education not enough is being spent on educating our children. Special needs kids especially need special things to help them get over some of the textural issues they have. I know my daughter when she was 2 years old didn’t like the feeling of dirt and sand and now she’ll be grabbing handfuls of dirt like all the other kids with no problem. This may not have happened if we didn’t have the extra help to bring her around. We might have been able to do it ourselves, but it probably would have taken longer, so I have to thank the school district for that.
I’m hoping that Jerry Brown while he’s cutting out unnecessary expenses to the school department like his removal of the Secretary of Education because it was a 13 person department with a $1.9 million/year budget that was basically a yes man to the Governor and redundant to the Superintendent of Public Education office. Our children deserve more in a state that’s the 8th largest economy in the world. I’m sending my $5 right now.
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Daly City Party Playhouse

You’ll notice Daly City keeps popping up in my blog. That’s because I consider it the San Francisco Annex. If you want a nice chain store like Home Depot, Target or Walmart you have to go outside SF and that usually means the peninsula or in this case, Daly City. Today was another one of those, “What to we do with our daughter?” kind of days. We decided to go the Party Playhouse with a friend of our daughter’s so they could have fun together.

First off, this place is AWESOME! I think I’m saying that because they encourage the parents to explore the large structure with their kids. For $6 you get an hour, but they don’t have party playhouse police coming to tell you that you have to leave or pay up again after an hour. There’s lots to climb around in as the structure from my estimate is about 40′ long by 20′ wide by 20′ high.

20′ high? Who’d let their kid climb to that kind of height? Well, that’s where this was very well thought out. If your kid falls inside they have at most 1.5′ to fall and it’s all padded. REALLY padded. There’s ball pits, big balls, things that swing into you ropes to crawl across the padded rooms and slides, slides, slides. It has just about everything a kid could want and if they get tired inside they have a few games like skee-ball and cars and trucks to ride for the smaller ones. For older kids they have an arcade that’s open on weekends. Out in front there are comfy couches for the adults to sit and watch or read one of the numerous magazines or newspapers they have. There’s also an adult getaway room with a pool table, foosball and Tulley’s coffee available. All in all it was a blast.

Now that our daughter has used up her energy we had to feed her and so we took a trip to In-N-Out burger with a stop by [mappress mapid=”12″]Krispy Kreme for some doughnuts to take home. What I always love about Krispy Kreme is when you order a dozen doughnuts they always ask, “For here or to go?” I don’t know about you, but I have never sat down and eaten a dozen doughnuts at one time, but thanks for asking. While this wasn’t the healthiest trip out for us I’m sure my daughter has burned off all the calories she got from the 100% trans-fat free junk food she had for lunch.

Total cost for 3 people: Just over $20. Yet another deal. Check out the party playhouse even if you have to borrow someone’s kid to go there.