Feeling the love

You know, so many people get instantly angry, hurt, offended and worried when something like this happens. I'm probably NOT normal (but then who thought I was?) but my first thought was "HA! Looks like someone was busy last night!" I don't know why, but I find it perversely amusing how some people choose to waste their time.

On the other hand, it really upset the operation of my classroom that morning. The grumpy district painters were out trying to cover it up with beige paint, in the rain, which of course had no effect whatsoever on the dark blue and brown lettering. By the end of the day, we could still read the writing, and suddenly had to walk carefully around the puddles of beige all over the grass, and try not to brush against the beige-smeared walls.

My kids, luckily, didn't recognize most of the gang references (nor did I in point of fact, though the adults pointed them out to me,) but they have no problem recognizing the very clear four-letter words, and they spent the majority of the morning asking who had done it, why someone had done it, and if the people responsible were going to get into trouble. None of them said they felt personally targeted, but it must have been an odd sensation to walk past the angry writing all day.

I, too, wonder who it was. I wonder why they chose our school (it wasn't done just on the portable--it was all over the outer walls of the gym and cafeteria.) I wonder if it was just anger in search of a blank canvass, or if the message was intended for our school in particular. Did the taggers want to send messages to public schools or teachers? If so, what on Earth could we have done to these poor people to have engendered such rage? (I have theories, of course. *coughWASLcough*)

In the end, I hope it was just kids with too much time on their hands and enough spare change for some spray paint. I hope it wasn't a kid who "fell through the cracks." Because I've got a lot of those in my room every day, and I see the frustration there sometimes. I just hope I never notice blue fingertips.

SPECIAL Education

A few days ago, while working on a math problem, one of my kiddos looked up at me and said, "Who invented numbers?" I told him I didn't know. He then asked, "How did they know how to make them look right? You know, a one looks like just one of something, and a two kind of looks like it's two things. How did they do that?" I wanted to hug him!

This week, while reading an article about IFO's (Identified Flying Objects) my students ran across the term "lenticular clouds" and chose it as a vocabulary word. While completing a Frayer model wherein they had to explain what the object was NOT, they wrote "It's not a UFO." I wanted to cheer!

Two days ago, I wrote an IEP for a student who is qualified (to my intense horror) as "Mentally Retarded." I then got to tell her mother that I was advancing her to the higher-level reading class because she was making such great growth. I wanted to burst with pride.

Last week, I called a parent to give her a good report about her son's behaviour in my class. She laughed a little, then in a very thick voice said, "I used to hold my breath when I saw it was the school calling, thinking 'what did he do this time?' Thank you so much." I wanted to cry.

Yesterday, a student of mine received a certificate for getting a "Pride" card. (This is a way to reward random acts of kindness and positive behaviour in our school.) While holding the orange certificate over her head for all to see, she proudly announced, "It's my first one!!" I had to smile.

A few weeks ago, a very shy, socially immature young man came into class. Unprepared as usual, he fished around in my "Borrow Me" box until he found a pencil. The pencil he lifted out was violently pink, with sparkly hearts all over it. He looked at the pencil for a moment, then looked at me and said "Well, if that isn't the manliest pencil I ever saw!" With that he heaved a resigned sigh and went to his desk. I laughed so hard I almost couldn't breathe. (He brought his own pencil the next day.)

Today, the bell rang at the end of a period, and one of my students looked up and said "It's time to go already?" I told him it was okay, he would be back tomorrow. I will be, too.

This is why.

Improvement

I must apologize to my avid readers for my long absence from the blog spot, but the holidays came along and comandeered all of my "spare" time. The three snow days we enjoyed in there were a beautifully timed blessing, and the two weeks of Winter Break could not have been more welcome.

But, school is back in session and the stories just keep getting better!

The post-holiday rainstorms that flooded much of the southern part of King County also took their toll on my portable. The water seeped in under the off-kilter door, all the way to my desk, where it spoiled just a few of the books I had stacked on the floor there. *sigh* At last, the work order that our custodian put in weeks before the break was filled and a gentleman with a large white truck and huge pliers came out to fix the door. It took him all of five minutes. We haven't had enough rain to really put the seal to the test, but I'm hoping that our flooding problem will be solved at last (although I do still worry about the dry-rot that MUST be going on under there!)

The improvements to the overall structure of my portable are not the only changes being made around my school, I can assure you! On the contrary, the structural improvments are merely an aside to the total overhaul going on with one formerly-talented and prized Special Education teacher! Can you guess who I mean?

Apparently, a Master's degree in Special Education, five years of experience in Idaho, numerous professional development classes and rave reviews from everyone I've ever worked with, or for, carry little or no weight in this district. And so, hence cometh the Plan of Improvement. A four-page document of the things I am NOT doing was given to me just prior to the holiday break. (Merry Christmas!) Naturally, very little has accompanied it as to HOW these things I am currently not doing should be done in a classroom such as mine. And of course, the Plan was not couched in the terms typically used by those in the educational field (i.e. "You're doing great in these areas, but we need to work on these things....") but rather, it was a laundry list of "you really should know all this" and "we are concerned that these things are not apparent in your classroom" or, my personal favourite "your expectations seem to be extremely low, and you create activities designed to keep your students performing at a very low level." And, curiously, nothing in the plan indicated that I was teaching a special needs class.

Now, I don't want to seem...conceited or superior here, but last time I checked, special education teachers were in some level of demand. In fact, we in the profession could easily find work in just about any district in any state in the country. So it does seem...confusing that this particular district does so little to retain the few teachers it's managed to attract. I have an inkling that it may not be a district-wide mentality, but it is certainly in evidence at my school, which is even more of a contradiction, as they went the entirety of last school year with a special education position open! A situation which they seem determined to repeat.

So, my Plan. "Improvement" seems to mean, in large part, "prepare students for state tests so high above their instructional level that you can guarantee serious classroom management issues for an entire month as the students attempt to take them." Improvement also means, near as I can tell, the flagrant diregard of all of the issues that put students in the category of "special needs" in the first place. I am, it seems, not supposed to use the IEP to design instruction. Nor am I supposed to use special education evaluation information to determine the students' areas of need. (I'm supposed to use those tests--remember, the ones they can't even read? Yes, those are the tools by which I am to determine what students are and are not capable of.) I am supposed to...streamline...goals and objectives. (Translated: make them all the same.) So, the GEP--it can't really be called an "I"EP if it's not Individualized, can it?--is merely a pile of paperwork that I must by all means keep current and compliant just so it can sit in the back of a file cabinet being current, compliant and completely useless.

I'm not sure I care to improve this much.

Attempting to embrace moments in life like this as learning opportunities, however, I have been trying to learn how to plan like a general education professional. My activities are not individualized at all, but rather, differentiated. I am not doing anything that might be accessible to kinesthetic, visual or artistic learners because, and I have to quote this, "You aren't an art teacher!" I am not teaching life skills, I am teaching reading, writing and math.

I am not teaching students, I'm teaching standards.

They keep using this word "improvement." I do not think it means what they think it means.

Qualities of a Good Special Education Teacher
By Sue Watson, About.com

Have you ever wondered what makes a great special education teacher? What separates a mediocre teacher from a terrific teacher? It's not easy to define, however, here's a list of qualities listed by parents, principals, educators and students.

Are you a Top Special Education Teacher?
1. You love your role, you love being with your students and you couldn't imagine doing anything else. You were meant to teach special needs children, you know this in your heart.
2. You have a great deal of patience and know that little steps in learning go a long way.
3. You know your students well and they are comfortable and at ease with you, they enjoy having you as their teacher and look forward to going school each day.
4. You provide a non-threatening, welcoming environment that nurtures each of the students you work with.
5. You understand your students, you know what motivates them and you know how to scaffold activities to ensure that maximum learning occurs.
6. You take each student from where they are and provide experiences that will maximize success. You're always discovering new things about your students.
7. You are very comfortable working with exceptional learners and learners with diverse needs.
8. You thrive on challenge, can easily build relationships with your students and your student's parents.
9. You are a life-long learner and committed to the profession.
10. You have a never ending willingness to ensure that all students reach their maximum potential. You constantly strive to 'reach and teach' every student under your care.
***********************************************

I think most of this list is for others to judge if I fit the descriptions. I don't feel like I'm quite there just yet, but it is nice to know where I am headed, if I ever get there. I know I love my students, and I hope they like coming to school every day, and if they learn one little thing from me and I learn one little thing from them, then it has been a very good day in my estimation.

Pros and Cons--Portable Classrooms

Cons:
My portable has a very old porch and wheelchair ramp. There is a kind of dip in the deck in front of the doors, probably the result of more years of use than the structure was originally intended for, that collects water. On cold mornings, this thin sheet of moisture becomes a skating rink which makes the ramp an adventure. Later in the day, it settles into a small pond.

If it rains very hard, the small pond slowly leaks under my door, saturating the carpet all the way over to the foot of my desk. I shudder to think of the dry rot going on under there.

There is no overhang of roof to cover the porch. Kids wanting to be on time to class must stand out in the rain until I race to my classroom after early-morning meetings that invariably run right up until 8 o'clock. Kids wanting to stay dry wait in the hallway by the back of the gym, only racing the thirty or so yards to my door at the four-minute bell, or when they see the whites of my eyes. On rainy days, I rarely keep track of tardies.

My door is off-kilter. Probably again the result of the overuse of a TEMPORARY structure. It neither closes nor opens without the considerable application of force.

The main power switch to the structure is on the OUTSIDE of the north wall. There is a large handle that can be easily pulled down to rob us of power. Local jokesters have identified this bright red handle and enjoy pulling it periodically, particularly, it appears, over weekends when I have a large amount of paperwork to catch up on. I can reach it if I bring a chair outside. (I have to smile thinking about a tower of sixth-graders on each others' shoulders, working so hard to inconvenience me.)

We trip power fuses frequently, and have had to rearrange computers, printers, lights and portable heaters several times in order to balance the drain of power between the three fuses. Once again, the tripping generally occurs at very opportune moments--like after writing an IEP but just seconds before the mouse icon gets to the SAVE button.

We have ants. They have spent weeks trotting in long lines across our desks, from the windows and up and down the walls...doubtless through the cracks created by years of use and the unchecked dry rot that occurs after the rooms flood. The district pest control folks only come out when the ants are sleeping in, and they won't do anything about them unless they actually see the buggers out and about. Our building janitor cannot spray because it's toxic to a learning environment. I have to brush them away in order to work at my computer.

Our building has four-minute passing periods. It takes ME about four and a half minutes to walk, in long quick strides, from my door to the resource room on the other end of the building--and this is BEFORE school, when I don't have to navigate around and through seven hundred students, and then only if I don't have to stop at the bathroom. I only count kids tardy when I can't see them racing for my door after the bell has rung, and if they have to go to the bathroom five minutes into class, I have a hard time telling them to wait until I'm done directly instructing. It's difficult to teach with all that wiggling going on, anyway.

Pros:
Visiting district bigwigs apparently don't fancy walking that far just to wait, standing in a puddle in the rain, while I try to open my door for them.

Arithmetic

The school year has now been in session for 50 days. That's 48 student contact days, one inservice and one "data" day. If a teacher's day is to be 7.5 hours long with a .5 hour lunch, that means I should have put in 350 hours to date. According to my records, I have put in roughly 565 hours so far this school year. That means I have effectually donated 215 hours of my own time to this job, this school and this district. (For the record, that's 21.5 hours per week, or an extra 4 hours per day.) The district is paying me about $43,000 a year for 180 days of work, or 1,260 hours. That comes out to just a little over $34 an hour. By that calculation, then, I have given this discrict over $7,300!! If I had picked up even a minimum wage job instead, at $8 an hour, I could have earned $1,700 for those 215 hours, which would have neatly covered the $700 I've already spent on supplies, books, rewards and manipulatives AND given me about $500 extra per month to put toward rent, car payments, student loans and my VISA bill.

I think I need to have my head examined.

Sincerely yours,

To the principal and vice principals of the school where I once worked....

Thank you for hiring me in the first place. Thank you for my first-day tour, and the mentor you arranged for me to have the first month I was there.

Thank you for smiling at me in the hallways, and for telling people that I fell from the sky.

Thank you for always coming to my room to help out when I called to say I needed a little backup. Thank you for sending me and my class away so you could deal with the problem yourself if need be. Thank you for standing there, outside my classroom, in the hallways and even in the gym while the child who had the problem screamed, kicked, flailed, pooped, and otherwise tried to wear you down. (Thank you for finding the humor in all of this.)

Thank you for chuckling whenever you spotted me wearing a new colour of shoes. Thank you for noticing that they matched my shirt.

Thank you for your support, your encouragement, and your high expectations. Thank you for offering to help when you found something going a little askew in my classroom.

Thank you for knowing all of the great things there were to know about my kids. Thanks for not blaming them if we didn't quite meet AYP. Thanks for realizing that special education students are wonderful, valuable members of the school community. Thank you for creating this tone in your building. Thanks for talking to them in the cafeteria--they always told me if you did.

Thank you for fighting tooth and nail for sufficient aide time.

Thank you for protecting me from an onslaught of district trainings and requirements that had nothing to do with me anyway. Thanks for letting me spend inservice time in my classroom. Thank you for being the wall between me and overbearing parents, for setting limits to their well-intentioned madness. Thank you for being the place where the buck stopped. Thank you for realizing that enough was enough.

Thank you for the positive feedback whenever you came into my classroom.

Thank you for that little silver keyring flashlight on the retractable string--the one you gave me for teacher appreciation day that said "you're appreciated" on it. It SAVED me from freaking out when I discovered (at 9 o'clock at night) that the exterior lights at my new school are turned off on the weekends.

THANK YOU FOR MDT's!!!
Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou for MDT's. For the weekly chance to meet with all of the colleagues I needed to talk to in order to do my job. For taking the lead on this, and keeping yourselves in the loop. Thanks for always expecting us to be there at 7:30 sharp and done by 8 sharp, and for refusing to schedule ANYTHING else at that time.

Thank you for the peer tutor program.
Thank you for the "bottomless" supply of free bussing for field trips. Thank you for believing, as I do, that kids who don't have book skills need life skills.

Thanks for showing up for IEP meetings.

Thank you for asking me how I was doing, and staying to listen to my reply. Thanks for knowing that "I'm fine" doesn't always mean "I'm fine." Thanks for actually being there when you said you would be there if I needed help.

Thank you for recognizing me as a professional, and treating me like an intelligent, skilled educator.

Thank you for giving me a master key.

Thank you for keeping my program out of the portables at all costs. Let me say that one again--THANK YOU for keeping my program in the heart of the building, right where all of the other kids are.

Thank you for letting me schedule my kids into general education classes, even if they couldn't quite do the work, because you knew they needed to be with non-disabled peers.

Thank you for stopping by for our "Family Dinner" event every year--the kids were always so tickled when you did, especially the ones whose parents couldn't make it.

Thank you for always making sure I knew how to do what you expected me to do.

Thank you for telling me you'd hire me back in a heartbeat. It is a sentiment I cling to.