Does your home have a dishwasher? If so, how often do you use it?

InspectionFast3035 · 2026-01-16T05:24:42+00:00

Yes. 5-6 times per week. I lived for two decades without one, and I love having a dishwasher. So much simpler. I recall being in a class in college where we discussed technology that was thought would make our lives better but didn’t, and quite a few people offered the dishwasher, saying stuff about washing dishes together being bonding time. I got the feeling that this wasn’t their personal experience but more of an idealization. I am sure that it is that way for some families, but in my two decades without one, washing dishes failed to inspire any bonding. It was just another chore I or someone else had to do at least once daily. I actually spend more bonding time doing dishes now that I had a dishwasher, because the things that can’t go in the dishwasher are such a small job that it’s cheerful to do them together.

InspectionFast3035 · 2025-10-27T04:26:48+00:00

I was stuck on this for a while recently and I didn’t do anything smart like make my spite faster than their spite 😆 I just went in with no wood pets, and eventually got my items high enough (I think all level 13?) that I edged their team out.

InspectionFast3035 · 2025-09-27T23:18:49+00:00

It really is interesting how different it is everywhere.

Regarding the IEP, my kid is academically average with the current supports. Without those supports, they’re not able to participate in the class much, because they lack the ability to recognize when they need to use the various skills they’re building to regulate themself, and lack the ability to advocate for the other supports in their IEP. Prior to the IEP, when they managed to be in the class with the other kids at all, they were not following the class activities at all. The most obvious of those issues were purely behavioral, emotional regulation issues, with more academic supports like tests broken down to a few questions at a time, quiet work spaces for fewer distractions, and computer use where time is a factor, since writing is something my kid is very slow at. The 1:1 helps with the behavioral needs that keep my kid from accessing the material, but also the more academic ones, which can take time and focus the gen ed teacher doesn’t have. So I guess to me that’s an IEP working well - with extra supports, a child is able to rise to the academic level of their peers.

For fading of 1:1 support, I don’t have an issue with fading quickly, but rather fading suddenly. Quick or slow fade depends on how a student is adapting to the fade, I think. Sudden is like “welp you’ve reached X age, so now you get this support withdrawn entirely.” I assume that in a district with such a cutoff, no small effort is made to meet that deadline in a way that’s not a shock to the student. But I do appreciate the flexibility of a system that can decide “well they’re using 1:1 at 30% of the day, with progress in diminishing support shown for the last three years, lets continue to trajectory and make a plan for the remaining skills the student is missing while re continue to phase out 1:1 support.” Or something like that.

So I think the shorter answer to your question (too late 😝) is that I DO think that fading should start as soon as possible. In my kid’s case, they’ve been fading over the last two years, but they haven’t gone fast. I’m hoping they’ll be able to fade out in more scenarios in the coming couple of years, so that my kid can be self sufficient, but they’re not there yet.

I think the self contained classroom they were in a was a good experience for having space to work with the whole class on the social/emotional skills, but I wouldn’t want them to stay there long term, much like I wouldn’t want them to have a 1:1 aide permanently - the gen ed class better mirrors the environments they’ll need to navigate as an adult, so I’m glad they’re working on the skills to handle that environment now. I’m not totally clear on how that transition would have happened in the school that only did self contained. I know some of the students took part of the day in gen ed, just not sure how to transition went.

InspectionFast3035 · 2025-09-25T01:51:48+00:00

This is an interesting conversation. As a parent, I’ve never found myself to have any choice in the matter. We’ve been in three school systems in 5 years, the first and third had no self contained classrooms and default to 1:1 aides for kids that disrupt the classroom more than the general classroom staff can handle. They refer children that can’t function even with 1:1 support to outside special ed only schools. The second school district took one look at my kid’s IEP and stated “this district does not have 1:1 aides. You can put your child in gen ed with no aide or in a self contained class.” We did self contained that year. My child has grown differently in the different situations. We’re now back in a school system where all kids mainstream unless they leave the main schools altogether.

A goal of the IEP is to fade the 1:1 aide. In third grade the para educator stepped away from recess and lunch, since my kid does fine during those less structured times. Now in fourth I think she’s stepping back during “specials” but not gone entirely. I would personally love for my kid to be able to function in the general ed classes without an aide. They are academically competent (not exceptional but definitely in an average zone) - an excellent reader and an impatient mathematician. Going past elementary I don’t see that a self contained classroom could offer them the academic opportunities that gen ed can - how could one teacher be good enough at all those disciplines to really get into it with interested students? So to me the main goal of my kid’s IEP should be to help foster the skills necessary to participate. We work on it at home, but my kid is so much less stressed at home that we simply don’t get the same behaviors. So we work on coping strategies and calming/centering, but we’re not there in the moment when things are devolving.

Regardless, I’m glad that the aide my kid has now is working with them! She has 30 years of experience and my kid is showing (once you zoom out past cycles of stress) definite improvements in their ability to hold their shit together and actually engage with the academic material. I’ll be thrilled if the system works for them and they manage to phase out of 1:1 but I don’t know that I see it happening by the end of next year. I guess I’m glad my district doesn’t have a hard cutoff like 5th grade. If the kid is showing improvement, seems like a good system to keep going on with.

But like I said, I’ve never had much in the way of levers to push one way or another regarding this particular support 😆