flexibility

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

flexibility Current mood: discontent

Lots of teachers tell me the best quality a teacher can have is to be flexible, and to be able to go with the flow, since things change all the time. Case in point, Mr Ray (the teacher whose room I'm in this semester doing my observations) forgot about me doing my electricity lesson today, and asked if I could wait until next week. No big deal. Since I wasn't all that prepared anyways, this will give me a chance to become more familiar with the material. I think I am going to do it with the boys. I let Bourbon play around with it last night and he made the light bulb light up, but maybe I will let Roman do it, and actually teach them the electricity concepts in the process. Gives me the practice, and gives them some additional science (since this is test prep time, and science & social studies are thrown out the window during state testing crunch time. Don't even get me started on that......). So today I graded papers, made copies and prepared materials for the students, and watched them do an hour of practice test material in math. Then they went to lunch and I got to go visit my Special Ed class for about 40 minutes until they went to lunch.

I really enjoy getting to spend time in the special ed class. On one hand I love it, and on another hand I don't love it. I don't want to judge, or say that the teachers in there aren't good teachers, because they seem like very intelligent, good people. But I just don't understand some of their methods and such in there, and it kinda makes me sad. The main teacher has been teaching for almost 30 years, and she has tons of great information and tid bits and advice that she gives me, so she's not a terrible person or anything. And the teacher assistant in there seems very knowledgable and is very helpful answering my questions and such. And I don't deal with the stuff that they do all day every day, so maybe they do what they do because it is what they have come up with that works. Or maybe it's just their personalities, I don't know. The first odd thing in that room is they are sitting pretty much the whole time, which is rare for teachers. They have desks that are facing eachother, and the kids raise their hands when they need their work checked or if they need to read out loud, or whatever, and they call on them and the kids bring their work, books, etc up to their desks. The teachers never go to them. Each kid has a clipboard with a daily list of work that they do, and they just work on their own individual stuff. There are kids from 1st-4th in there, all working on different stuff. They just take their clip board and start working on the daily list, and getting it checked by the teacher as each assignment is done. The kids might raise their hands for 5 minutes before the teacher aknowledges them. They say they have to ignore them sometimes because they just want attention. But to me I see kids who raise their hands and need help wtih work, and need something checked off so they can move on, and they just sit there. Not because the teacher is busy, but because they just choose to let them sit there. It's very odd. There are kids in there that range from autistic, to slightly delayed. There is a wide range. The teachers tell me all about the things the kids "have" and what behaviors they have and such, even their home lives and negative stuff, all in front of the kids. They tell me how the kids need high praise, lots of support and lots of encouragement, but I don't see them doing it. They seem to belittle them. They mimic the students in unflattering ways, call names (from knucklehead to liar), are short with them, ignore them, etc. It makes me sad. Again, I hate to judge them. I really like these women and I enjoy visiting with them and learning from them, but I just don't like how they act towards the students sometimes. They get onto the kids for smiling at me, saying they just are so attention seeking and think that the whole world revolves around them, and that they are just princesses, etc. If they turn around in their seats and smile at me, they get in trouble. Now I would think that since some of these kids have social problems, they would be praised for being social. Ya know? My favorite is Katie. She is such a mousy little thing. She is autistic, she's 7 but looks like she's much younger. She is tiny and has a baby voice, and talks about herself in 3rd person. But she is sooo smart, and reads better than some of the 4th graders in there. She doesn't seem to have any self-confidence, and I have seen the teachers make her cry in their attempts to get her to do stuff, which seems very harsh and not encouraging at all. She doesn't make eye contact much and they told me on the first day I was there that they are working on that, and make her look at them when they are talking to her. Yet she is the one that now turns around and smiles at me when I get there, and they yell at her. I just don't get it. I worked hard at getting her to even aknowledge me, she wouldn't look at me, or even acted like she could hear me when I talked to her. But the past 2 times I have been there she now turns and smiles at me, which of course melts my heart. And makes me so sad that she gets in trouble for it. I just know she could thrive and do so much better in a more supportive environment, but there's nothing I can do about it. It breaks my heart. The first time I was in there, for the 3 hours, not just visiting, Katie was in tears trying to do some math, and they just kept saying "go do it. you can get it done, stop being a baby, go" and just not very helpful, and just stern and harsh. So I took it upon myself and just started talking to her saying "Look at all that work Katie's done, you can do it! Katie can do it!" and kept repeating it over and over, and she wouldn't hardly look at me, just maybe out of the corner of her eye for a split second, but she calmed down and she slowed down and got it done. And it made me so happy, and I loved helping her. I just want to help her, and spend time with her! I want to pick her up and take her away from that classroom and make it all better for her. And I can't. So I visit everytime I am there, in hopes that I will get to help her or work with her. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. Just depends on what the teachers tell me to do while I am in there. I don't approach any of the kids without them telling me to for the most part, because I don't want to get the kid in trouble. And maybe they think the tough love approach is the best, they complain all the time that the parents baby the kids so much that they expect everyone to do things for them and won't do it for themselves, so maybe there is logic to thier behavior, and I just don't understand it. I don't know. I feel like I learn a lot by being there and working with the kids and talking with the teachers, I just don't know that what they are doing is the best course of action for those kids.