End of the Semester Catch-Up

I'm back. It's been awhile. While I haven't failed at much in life (other than trying things from pinterest), I think we can all agree that keeping this blog updated has been a failure. Life got crazy: my TA hours went up, time spent studying went up, and therapy got easier. So guess what got put on the wayside? Yep, creative planning. I can tell you that we did a ton of amazing things that never got posted (too many science experiments, plural -s races, and long vowel hopscotches to count) so don't think I got completely lazy. Just lazy in the fact that I went straight to bed at night.

But now the semester is over and I'm back. Everything turned out great-- remember the grad school blues post? Yeah, that was not pretty. Thankfully, juggling my life got easier and now it's wonderful, beautiful Christmas break (after I correct 50 more language samples).

My client reached 4/6 of his objectives (yay). During assessment in September, I asked him to write a story. He wrote one sentence with no punctuation, capitalization, beginning, or end. Two weeks ago, I asked him to write me a story and, without any help, he wrote a setting, problem, action to solve problem, and results. Then, he went back and edited for punctuation/capitalization all by himself. I WAS AMAZED. Like so amazed that I wanted to simultaneously cry hysterically and make this face:

I also finished up with my dementia group at a SNF. The ladies were so wonderful and I'm going to miss them so much. This experience really opened my eyes to working with the elderly. I love it! I can't wait until I get another placement with adults. 

I've been on break for about a day (if you can consider it break if I spent 3 hours at school today) and am already excited to crack open the books for next semester. While the classes are not as interesting to me as this semesters', I'm looking forward to adding more knowledge into my brain. I found out that I get to do a practicum at Head Start next semester so I am over-the-moon excited! I'm not sure where else I will be or what other client I have so I'll keep you posted. 

To end this last blog post of the semester, I want to give hope to all the undergrads that I may have scared away with previous grad school horror stories. Looking back, it is not as bad as it may have seemed. While being a TA definitely added unnecessary stress to my chaotic life, I kept my grades up to my usual standards, still had a semi-social life, and learned a lot. I'm sitting here grading language development papers and realizing how much I now know. It is unbelievable. And the best part is that there is so much left to learn. We are so blessed to be in this profession. I'm so happy that someday I will get to call myself a speech-language pathologist. I truly think it is the best job in the world.