"Schultz, let's go over these lesson plans one more time." "Ok!" This process started at 4:00pm on Thursday and covered about thirty minutes as I wanted to be sure I knew where all the materials were kept. Comfortable that I had the game plan down, I walked out of the classroom around 4:30pm to begin the four day Memorial Day weekend. I'm not sure how long Gnu stayed around but I knew, when she walked out of the classroom, she would not return for the remainder of the school year as she will be on maternity leave. It's rare that I check my school email on the weekend but for some reason I checked it on Friday morning. There were a couple of those generic messages that get deleted without even reading them and two from the BigB2. The BigB2's first message was pretty lengthy as there are a number of events coming up before the end of the school year. The one that interested me the most was the discussion about fourth grade camp. Every year, for the past several years, every fourth grade scholar in our school goes on a school sponsored camping trip. This year camp runs from Tuesday through Thursday and for the first time in the five years that I've been at this school, two of our scholars, MiniJ and BigHouse are going. In order to pull this off, someone with experience with our scholars needed to go on the trip. I was the obvious choice but I quickly shut that down because I felt it was two risky. Fortunately for our two scholars, FBG volunteered to go. Although I haven't said too much about FBG in this blog I will share this with you. If there was one person in our school that I would like to have around when all hell breaks loose in a classroom it would be FBG. Why? He has this amazing ability to bring calm to a room like no other person I've ever worked with.
The second email message from the BigB2 announced that Gnu was on maternity leave. The part of the message that I was hoping to see was the BigB2 announcing that a substitute teacher will cover for Gnu in her absence. That did not happen, so as of right now, when I walk into the classroom on Tuesday morning I will occupy the front of the classroom. The good news is that MiniJ and BigHouse will be at camp. The sad news, I was counting of FBG to free up a good part of his day to lend a helping hand in the classroom. Obviously, that is not going to happen for the first three days of next week. Maybe they'll find a substitute teacher over the Memorial Day Weekend. Fat chance of that happening. I just thought of this. Maybe, a retired teacher from as far west as Utah will fly in and help me. Nah! Too far away. Maybe a retired SpecEd30+ years teacher will drive down from Michigan. Nah! Too far away. Hmmm! Maybe my part time editor, part time consultant, and full time spouse will help me because her school year is over. Possibly!
Although it was invented in the 1990's it sat dormant for decades. It reared it's ugly head in 2017 and thanks to a combination of pointy headed intellectuals, MD's, and PhD's, who labeled this device as stress-relieving, it is permeating our school and driving teachers nuts. Welcome to the biggest marketing scam since the pet rock, the fidget spinner. I'm sensing some bad vibes right now. I thinking someone out there is questioning why the intellect of a lowly instructional assistant is trying downplay the importance of a device label as stress-relieving by highly intelligent pointy headed intellectuals, MD's, and PhD's. Well, I'm going to tell you why my limited intellect is right on the fidget spinner. It's pretty simple. I currently occupy a classroom and these pointy headed intellectuals, MD's and PhD's have probably been out of a classroom for decades.
We are in our reading block. Gnu is at the front of the classroom reading a tall tail. She completed the first couple paragraphs in the story when she asked this question. "MiniJ, what is the setting of this story?" There was no response. "Knapper, what is the setting of this story?" Silence. On the opposite side of the room, Grr! raised his hand and said, "Texas." Gnu continued reading and then asked another question. MiniJ, Knapper, BigHouse and Tourette sat silently. On the other side of the room Uh-Uh-Uh answered the question. Gnu continued reading but stopped abruptly and headed toward MiniJ. "If you don't put that in your backpack I'm going to take it and throw it in the trash." MiniJ reacted by kicking the leg of his desk, pounded on the top of the desk and mumbled something unintelligible. MiniJ was the first one in our classroom busted for playing with his stress-reliever. This is not a stress-reliever design to help a scholar stay focused. This is a toy that is a major distraction and here is proof. Knapper, BigHouse, and Tourette could not answer the questions because they were watching MiniJ play with his fidget spinner. Grr! and Uh-Uh-Uh could answer the questions because they were sitting on the opposite side of the room and could not see the fidget spinner.
Stress-relieving, therapeutic, helps scholars stay focused are the buzz words that advertising executives are using to convince parental units that this device will solve some of their scholars education problems. Bull! On May 4th of this year, variations of the fidget spinner occupied every spot on Amazon's top 20 best selling lists. And where in Amazon do you end up when you do a search for fidget spinners? In the TOY section.
The last big task that Gnu had to accomplish before going on maternity leave was case conferences with the parental unit(s) of our scholars. She had four schedule, Whale, Blank, Grr! and Knapper during her last few days. The case conference that involve Grr! and his parental units went smoothly. The only point of discussion was trying to convince Grr!'s parental units to read with him daily over summer break. Like Grr!'s case conference, Knapper's also went well. The big topic for discussion with Knapper's parental unit was Knapper's transition to the fifth grade. Gnu has some real concerns about Knapper moving to the fifth grade emotional handicapped (EH) classroom as this classroom will have four returning scholars that have some pretty serious anger control issues. The plan, at least for now, is to have Knapper spend as much time as possible in a fifth grade general education classroom and only use the EH classroom as a last resort. Hopefully this plan will work. If it don't Knapper could regress to behaviors that took Gnu two years to eliminate.
The case conferences for Whale and Blank were much more involved as both of the scholars were being evaluated to determine if an EH label should permanently be attached to them. Both of these scholars spent the better part of the second half of the school year in our classroom for a couple hours a day. During this time period not once did either of them have an anger outburst in our classroom. In fact, both of them were so quiet you hardly noticed their existence. So, on the day of the case conference, I'm thinking neither one of them will be labeled EH. Wrong! Gnu tried to explain the reasoning behind this decision to me but she was using clinical terms that were beyond by capabilities.
Although the curtain is almost closed for this school year, thoughts are already drifting to the next school year. As it stands right now, Grr!, S&T, Tourette, Huey, Whale, and Blank will be in the classroom. That is six scholars and this will be manageable. Unfortunately, there are at least three scholars in our school that have been challenges for their general education classroom teachers that may also be labeled as EH and placed in our classroom. That will take us to nine. The big unknown is how many scholars from outside our school boundary will relocate and enroll at our school with the EH labeled already attached to them. That could take the final count to ten or higher. If we get to double digits for scholars it may be time to reconsider what I'm doing because our classroom will change from an academic setting to a warehouse for troubled scholars. I thoroughly enjoy academics. I want nothing to do with warehousing.
It's now midday on Monday, May 29th, and still no baby announcement. June 1st will be the start of week forty so you know it's got to be real close. Gnu's doctor told her that he didn't want her to go beyond June 1st so he many induce labor to get the process started. Unfortunately for you, you'll have to wait until next weekend to get the final details. That's it for another week. Thanks for continuing to follow along.
Monday, May 29, 2017
Sunday, May 21, 2017
The Emojis
Although you weren't here to witness it, there was a coin toss to determine the title of this blog. If the coin landed on heads the title would have been "Oh Shit" Thrice. If the coin landed on tails the title would have been The Emojis. Although you weren't here to witness the coin toss you now know it came up tails. I'm a bit relieve that it was tails. After all, "Oh Shit" Twice plus "Oh Shit" Thrice totals five "Oh Shits" and you can only talk about shit so many times before people lose interest.
Hopefully, after the nonsense in the opening paragraph, you are still with me. Let's begin. It's Friday morning at 8:25am. I'm alone in the classroom when the telephone rang. When I reached the telephone I looked at the LED display and knew the call was from the Administrative Czar in the front office. "I thought I'd give you a heads up that you will be getting a new scholar this morning," said the voice on the other end of the telephone. "There are only thirteen days left in the school year and we are getting a new scholar," I respond. "That is correct." "That will be a problem," I say. "Gnu is at a doctor's appointment and will not be here until 11:00am at the earliest. FBG and I are taking the scholars on a field trip and the bus departs at 9:30am with a scheduled return time of 1:00pm. That means that there will be no one in the classroom when this new scholar arrives." "That is going to be a problem," the Administrative Czar responded. "Let me tell the BigB2 and someone will get back to you."
The clock advances fifteen minutes, there is no comment from the BigB2 on the new scholar, and I have to head to my bus duty station. Somewhat concerned that things could go badly without Gnu in the classroom, I take a detour and head toward the BigB2's office to get clarification on what is going on. When I arrived at the BigB2's office, she was sitting on the floor putting a puzzle together with what appeared to be one of our preschool scholars. When the BigB2 looked up I said, "were supposed to get a new scholar today." "No, Mr. Schultz, that is not going to happen." "Not going to happen today or not going to happen at all," I asked. "Not going to happen at all. The parental unit enrolled the scholar in our school but the parental unit failed to mention that the scholar had a 53 label." Get your note pad out in case this comes up again. A 53 label is given to scholars that have such poor behavior that they are placed in an alternative education school. Our scholars, despite all of the behavior issues that you have read about, have a 52 label. That means that the scholars with the 53 label can behave even worse than our scholars.
Advancing the clock again and I'm standing in an open grassy area in the second largest city park in the country with our scholars as we have reached our field trip destination point. The scholars are standing in a large circle with the other scholars from our school participating in the first activity when I decided to take a picture of them and send it to Gnu. About ten minutes after sending the picture to Gnu I get a response. "Aww! It looks like they are having fun. Just so you know, I'm still at the doctor's office. The person examining me wants me to have an ultra sound because there is some concern about the size of the baby." This message was followed by four Emojis that contained the yellow face with tears leaking from the eyes. I'm devastated. How can this be happening this late in the game. I texted Gnu back. The text message was one word, praying.
It's now 12:30pm. We've boarded the bus and are heading back to school. So far, no further contact with Gnu. Just as we were exiting the park my cell phone rang, it's a text message from Gnu. "I'm back in the school and I'm watching some scholars so anther teacher can eat her lunch." I text back that we should be back in the classroom in twenty to twenty-five minutes.
FBG was sitting at the front table. I was sitting at my table where I have view from the back of the room watching the scholars eat their box lunches when she walked in. Her facial expression and body language told me nothing. When she reached the front table, she turned to face the scholars and said, "tell me about the field trip. Did you have fun?"
It's now 3:55pm. The scholars are gone and I just finished putting the classroom back together when Gnu walked back into the classroom. She's quiet. Should I asked or should I just say have a nice weekend, see you on Monday. After a little hesitation on my part, "everything alright," I asked. "Yes, everything is fine." I've been hanging around behavior specialist and behavior therapists long to enough to know that "fine" may not be telling the whole story so I wait for further comment. Here we go, are you nervous? Gnu told me the doctor was concerned about the baby's size because she hasn't had an ultra sound since the one taken to determine the sex of the baby. Taking this ultra sound was not on the agenda for this doctor's visit so Gnu immediately became concerned that something was wrong with her baby. She tried to call her husband but did not get an answer as he was at work and her tears are flowing. The ultra sound results are in. A measurement of the size of her stomach was taken and the doctor told her everything was fine and that your baby will weigh around eight pounds when you deliver him.
There is an acronym that is used in several healthcare facilities here in central Indiana. It is called A.I.D.E.T. I'm not going to bore you with all of the details except to say that the E stands for Explain. The E is like the game plan that a doctor, nurse, therapist, or housekeeping person will do whenever interacting with a patient or the patient's family. This doctor failed miserably at Explain. In failing to Explain, at the beginning of the examination that there would be a precautionary ultra sound, this doctor scared the hell out of my classroom partner who is more that a classroom partner, she is also a very special friend. This doctor should have the E for Explain shoved up his ass for putting Gnu through that ordeal.
Editorializing
This is from the Washington Education Association. "The education budget was leaked. It ends student loan forgiveness....."
This is from the graduating class of 1976. Every penny of the college education expenses was paid, in full, by me. I got no help. I would not have begged for student loan forgiveness because that is not how I was raised.
This is from the graduating class of 2004. I guarantee you parental unit that your money will be well spent as I leave for an out of state university. I guarantee you that I will graduate in four years and that you will be proud of me. Every penny of college education expenses was paid, in full. Would she beg for student loan forgiveness? No! That was not how she was raised.
This is from approximately the graduating class of 2012. She paid for her own education. There was no help. She has student loan debt. She taught class all day and then tended bar in the evening and on the weekends to pay off her debt. She taught, after the school day ended, office campus instruction to earn extra money to pay off her debt. She is now teaching Saturday school to help scholars pass the state mandated IRead3 test to pay off her debt. At no point have I heard her whine about her student loan debt, she is just slowly paying it off.
Ok, here we go in my recently discover matter of fact style. Dear Generation Y. You chose to take on debt to earn a degree and then failed to graduate. Step down on off your stump and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. It took you six years to earn a four year degree. Get off your high horse and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. You chose to earn a Liberal Arts degree from a private university that costs $30,000+ plus per year when you could have earned the same degree from a state university for a fraction of that cost. Get off your band wagon and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. My recent performance appraisal stated that I was a "kind, calm and caring individual," so I'm going to offer you a few suggestions. First, try and haul your lazy ass out of bed by 11:00am and get a job. When you have secured that job, meet with a professional financial planner so your debt can be organized and a plan put in place to pay off the debt. An lastly, stop whining to your immediate family, relatives, friends and any Generation Snowflake that will listen about you student loan debt, after all, you are the one that screwed up.
The curtain to another school year is slowly closing as there are only twelve days of school left. Sometime during those twelve school days a young man will enter this world and an instructional assistant may or may not have a substitute teacher in the classroom with him. How this will all play out is an unknown so if you want to hear the rest of the story you'll have to return next week. Thanks for following along.
Hopefully, after the nonsense in the opening paragraph, you are still with me. Let's begin. It's Friday morning at 8:25am. I'm alone in the classroom when the telephone rang. When I reached the telephone I looked at the LED display and knew the call was from the Administrative Czar in the front office. "I thought I'd give you a heads up that you will be getting a new scholar this morning," said the voice on the other end of the telephone. "There are only thirteen days left in the school year and we are getting a new scholar," I respond. "That is correct." "That will be a problem," I say. "Gnu is at a doctor's appointment and will not be here until 11:00am at the earliest. FBG and I are taking the scholars on a field trip and the bus departs at 9:30am with a scheduled return time of 1:00pm. That means that there will be no one in the classroom when this new scholar arrives." "That is going to be a problem," the Administrative Czar responded. "Let me tell the BigB2 and someone will get back to you."
The clock advances fifteen minutes, there is no comment from the BigB2 on the new scholar, and I have to head to my bus duty station. Somewhat concerned that things could go badly without Gnu in the classroom, I take a detour and head toward the BigB2's office to get clarification on what is going on. When I arrived at the BigB2's office, she was sitting on the floor putting a puzzle together with what appeared to be one of our preschool scholars. When the BigB2 looked up I said, "were supposed to get a new scholar today." "No, Mr. Schultz, that is not going to happen." "Not going to happen today or not going to happen at all," I asked. "Not going to happen at all. The parental unit enrolled the scholar in our school but the parental unit failed to mention that the scholar had a 53 label." Get your note pad out in case this comes up again. A 53 label is given to scholars that have such poor behavior that they are placed in an alternative education school. Our scholars, despite all of the behavior issues that you have read about, have a 52 label. That means that the scholars with the 53 label can behave even worse than our scholars.
Advancing the clock again and I'm standing in an open grassy area in the second largest city park in the country with our scholars as we have reached our field trip destination point. The scholars are standing in a large circle with the other scholars from our school participating in the first activity when I decided to take a picture of them and send it to Gnu. About ten minutes after sending the picture to Gnu I get a response. "Aww! It looks like they are having fun. Just so you know, I'm still at the doctor's office. The person examining me wants me to have an ultra sound because there is some concern about the size of the baby." This message was followed by four Emojis that contained the yellow face with tears leaking from the eyes. I'm devastated. How can this be happening this late in the game. I texted Gnu back. The text message was one word, praying.
It's now 12:30pm. We've boarded the bus and are heading back to school. So far, no further contact with Gnu. Just as we were exiting the park my cell phone rang, it's a text message from Gnu. "I'm back in the school and I'm watching some scholars so anther teacher can eat her lunch." I text back that we should be back in the classroom in twenty to twenty-five minutes.
FBG was sitting at the front table. I was sitting at my table where I have view from the back of the room watching the scholars eat their box lunches when she walked in. Her facial expression and body language told me nothing. When she reached the front table, she turned to face the scholars and said, "tell me about the field trip. Did you have fun?"
It's now 3:55pm. The scholars are gone and I just finished putting the classroom back together when Gnu walked back into the classroom. She's quiet. Should I asked or should I just say have a nice weekend, see you on Monday. After a little hesitation on my part, "everything alright," I asked. "Yes, everything is fine." I've been hanging around behavior specialist and behavior therapists long to enough to know that "fine" may not be telling the whole story so I wait for further comment. Here we go, are you nervous? Gnu told me the doctor was concerned about the baby's size because she hasn't had an ultra sound since the one taken to determine the sex of the baby. Taking this ultra sound was not on the agenda for this doctor's visit so Gnu immediately became concerned that something was wrong with her baby. She tried to call her husband but did not get an answer as he was at work and her tears are flowing. The ultra sound results are in. A measurement of the size of her stomach was taken and the doctor told her everything was fine and that your baby will weigh around eight pounds when you deliver him.
There is an acronym that is used in several healthcare facilities here in central Indiana. It is called A.I.D.E.T. I'm not going to bore you with all of the details except to say that the E stands for Explain. The E is like the game plan that a doctor, nurse, therapist, or housekeeping person will do whenever interacting with a patient or the patient's family. This doctor failed miserably at Explain. In failing to Explain, at the beginning of the examination that there would be a precautionary ultra sound, this doctor scared the hell out of my classroom partner who is more that a classroom partner, she is also a very special friend. This doctor should have the E for Explain shoved up his ass for putting Gnu through that ordeal.
Editorializing
This is from the Washington Education Association. "The education budget was leaked. It ends student loan forgiveness....."
This is from the graduating class of 1976. Every penny of the college education expenses was paid, in full, by me. I got no help. I would not have begged for student loan forgiveness because that is not how I was raised.
This is from the graduating class of 2004. I guarantee you parental unit that your money will be well spent as I leave for an out of state university. I guarantee you that I will graduate in four years and that you will be proud of me. Every penny of college education expenses was paid, in full. Would she beg for student loan forgiveness? No! That was not how she was raised.
This is from approximately the graduating class of 2012. She paid for her own education. There was no help. She has student loan debt. She taught class all day and then tended bar in the evening and on the weekends to pay off her debt. She taught, after the school day ended, office campus instruction to earn extra money to pay off her debt. She is now teaching Saturday school to help scholars pass the state mandated IRead3 test to pay off her debt. At no point have I heard her whine about her student loan debt, she is just slowly paying it off.
Ok, here we go in my recently discover matter of fact style. Dear Generation Y. You chose to take on debt to earn a degree and then failed to graduate. Step down on off your stump and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. It took you six years to earn a four year degree. Get off your high horse and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. You chose to earn a Liberal Arts degree from a private university that costs $30,000+ plus per year when you could have earned the same degree from a state university for a fraction of that cost. Get off your band wagon and stop whining. Dear Generation Y. My recent performance appraisal stated that I was a "kind, calm and caring individual," so I'm going to offer you a few suggestions. First, try and haul your lazy ass out of bed by 11:00am and get a job. When you have secured that job, meet with a professional financial planner so your debt can be organized and a plan put in place to pay off the debt. An lastly, stop whining to your immediate family, relatives, friends and any Generation Snowflake that will listen about you student loan debt, after all, you are the one that screwed up.
The curtain to another school year is slowly closing as there are only twelve days of school left. Sometime during those twelve school days a young man will enter this world and an instructional assistant may or may not have a substitute teacher in the classroom with him. How this will all play out is an unknown so if you want to hear the rest of the story you'll have to return next week. Thanks for following along.
Sunday, May 14, 2017
"Oh Shit!" Twice
In an attempt to get parents engaged in their scholars education and actually show up at school our school leadership, in conjunction with our parent involvement educator, came up with an excellent idea. Donuts and Dads got us started and that was followed by Muffins and Moms a couple weeks later. Both were a huge success as our parking lot was full of cars and our cafeteria was full of parents and their young scholars. Muffins with Moms was an interesting day. Because the parking lot was crammed full of cars I had to park quite a distance from the school. When I reached the main entrance to the school I noticed that the front door was propped open. At first I was concerned about this given the number of school shootings but I figured what are the chances and proceeded inside. Because I had to walk so far to get into the school, I was running late for bus duty so I went directly to my duty station. In what was a pretty rare occurrence, two of our busses were running late so I headed to our main office to inform the BigB2.
When I reached the office, the door was closed but I heard voices inside the office so I lightly tapped on the door. The door only opened a crack and I saw the LittleB looking up at me. She invited me in but kept the door from opening real wide. When I stepped into the office I was promptly greeted by a puppy that had put it's front paws up on my legs and was wagging it's tail rapidly so I started scratching it's head. "Who's dog," I asked. "We don't know," was the response. "It wandered into the school because the main entrance door was propped open." I then informed the LittleB that two busses were running late and cautiously tried to back out of the office. In an instant the puppy was by me and right there, in the main office, this came out of my mouth very quickly, "oh shit," and the puppy was on the run in the school.
Fast forward a whole twenty minutes, I'm in the classroom sitting where I have my view from the back of the room. Gnu is at the front table giving Grr! and Tourette their spelling test. FBG is at the side table working with Huey. Fortunately, all of the fourth grade scholars were off to their general education classrooms because right out of nowhere, and stated quite clearly was, "oh shit." I looked up toward Gnu. Grr! and Tourette are quickly moving books and papers out of the way as Gnu accidentally spilled a carton of milk. I looked over at FBG and we both start laughing. FBG then looks at me and says, loud enough to be heard at the front of the classroom, "maybe I'll do my next group lesson plan with the scholars on the use of profanity in the classroom." I'm laughing as I look toward Gnu not knowing what to expect. Although her head is down wiping her table you can see the smile on her face.
Going in reverse now and it's Friday of last week when our social worker walked into the classroom. "I've got bus transportation set up, WLNutt will be here on Monday." As a reminder, WLNutt has missed the last sixteen days of school. Jumping forward to Monday morning. Any guesses? I'm on bus duty. All of the busses have arrived and departed. Any guesses? WLNutt is absent for the seventeenth day in a row. Tuesday morning, all the busses arrived and departed. I head back to the classroom, walked in, look to my left and there sits WLNutt so overjoyed at being back in school that he has pulled his hoodie up over his head with his head lying on his desk. I looked up at Gnu and she informed me that his parental unit drove him to school. Wednesday morning. all the busses arrived and departed. When I walked back into the classroom, no WLNutt. Forty minutes later he walked into the classroom with the same enthusiasm as on Tuesday. It's now Thursday morning and the scholars have not arrived. Gnu was at her front table preparing for the day when she said to me, "I spoke with WLNutt's parental unit last evening." "How did that go," I asked. "She was concerned because her young scholar told her that no one will help him with his work." "How did you respond," I asked. "I told her it was a little difficult to help her young scholar when he never comes to school." For the record, Gnu and I refused to help WLNutt with his work on Thursday and Friday. Why? WLNutt failed to show up for school.
Whale has been coming to our classroom now for a few months. To refresh your memory, Whale was in one of our life skills classrooms for the past two years. A life skills classroom is designed to help scholars who have some pretty serious learning difficulties. I believe, and maybe my friend SpedEd30+, who is sitting on her retirement throne up in Michigan, can help me if I get this wrong, these life skills classrooms have scholars that have a cognitive disability. During his time in our school, there has always been a concern that Whale had the wrong label (life skills classroom) so a decision was made to allow him to come to our classroom for about half of the school day. Although Gnu was not overjoyed at having another scholar in the classroom she realized that it was the right thing to do and so far Whale's attendance in our classroom has not been a problem. In fact, academically he is on the same level as S&T and Huey and from a reading standpoint, he reads better than Grr!, S&T, and Huey.
Although it took a while, the powers that be decided to retest Whale to either confirm that he belongs in a life skills classroom or he should be placed elsewhere. I'm not sure of the exact date that the testing began but I can tell you who was involved. Once I tell you who was involved, you will come to the same conclusion that I did, this is going to take a long time. Let's see, his current life skills teacher, his former life skills teacher, Gnu, a behavior specialist, a behavior therapist, a psychologist, and finally me. What did I contribute? I had to answer a sixty question survey regarding Whale's behavior in our classroom. In doing so, I had to answer questions about any anger issues that I saw. For the record, there were none that I observed although I have seen him angry outside our classroom.
After weeks of discussion and reviewing reams of paper on Whale's behavior, a decision was made and a case conference was set up with Whale's parental unit. I believe it was last Wednesday when all of the involved parties in Whale's retesting gather around the large oval shaped table in our school conference room. When all of the parties had their say, Whale's parental unit was informed that next school year Whale will be placed in a classroom for scholars with emotional handicaps. And what classroom will that be? Gnu's of course. Great! That is finally settled. Opps! I forgot one minor obstacle after going through this weeks long retesting process. Whale's parental unit has decided to relocate outside of our school corporation's boundary and Whale will be going to a new school next year.
Next up is the fidget spinner. Hmm! Are you familiar with the fidget spinner? Maybe not. Ok! Do an internet search and we'll discuss one of the greatest marketing scams since the pet rock next week.
Happy Mothers Day.
When I reached the office, the door was closed but I heard voices inside the office so I lightly tapped on the door. The door only opened a crack and I saw the LittleB looking up at me. She invited me in but kept the door from opening real wide. When I stepped into the office I was promptly greeted by a puppy that had put it's front paws up on my legs and was wagging it's tail rapidly so I started scratching it's head. "Who's dog," I asked. "We don't know," was the response. "It wandered into the school because the main entrance door was propped open." I then informed the LittleB that two busses were running late and cautiously tried to back out of the office. In an instant the puppy was by me and right there, in the main office, this came out of my mouth very quickly, "oh shit," and the puppy was on the run in the school.
Fast forward a whole twenty minutes, I'm in the classroom sitting where I have my view from the back of the room. Gnu is at the front table giving Grr! and Tourette their spelling test. FBG is at the side table working with Huey. Fortunately, all of the fourth grade scholars were off to their general education classrooms because right out of nowhere, and stated quite clearly was, "oh shit." I looked up toward Gnu. Grr! and Tourette are quickly moving books and papers out of the way as Gnu accidentally spilled a carton of milk. I looked over at FBG and we both start laughing. FBG then looks at me and says, loud enough to be heard at the front of the classroom, "maybe I'll do my next group lesson plan with the scholars on the use of profanity in the classroom." I'm laughing as I look toward Gnu not knowing what to expect. Although her head is down wiping her table you can see the smile on her face.
Going in reverse now and it's Friday of last week when our social worker walked into the classroom. "I've got bus transportation set up, WLNutt will be here on Monday." As a reminder, WLNutt has missed the last sixteen days of school. Jumping forward to Monday morning. Any guesses? I'm on bus duty. All of the busses have arrived and departed. Any guesses? WLNutt is absent for the seventeenth day in a row. Tuesday morning, all the busses arrived and departed. I head back to the classroom, walked in, look to my left and there sits WLNutt so overjoyed at being back in school that he has pulled his hoodie up over his head with his head lying on his desk. I looked up at Gnu and she informed me that his parental unit drove him to school. Wednesday morning. all the busses arrived and departed. When I walked back into the classroom, no WLNutt. Forty minutes later he walked into the classroom with the same enthusiasm as on Tuesday. It's now Thursday morning and the scholars have not arrived. Gnu was at her front table preparing for the day when she said to me, "I spoke with WLNutt's parental unit last evening." "How did that go," I asked. "She was concerned because her young scholar told her that no one will help him with his work." "How did you respond," I asked. "I told her it was a little difficult to help her young scholar when he never comes to school." For the record, Gnu and I refused to help WLNutt with his work on Thursday and Friday. Why? WLNutt failed to show up for school.
Whale has been coming to our classroom now for a few months. To refresh your memory, Whale was in one of our life skills classrooms for the past two years. A life skills classroom is designed to help scholars who have some pretty serious learning difficulties. I believe, and maybe my friend SpedEd30+, who is sitting on her retirement throne up in Michigan, can help me if I get this wrong, these life skills classrooms have scholars that have a cognitive disability. During his time in our school, there has always been a concern that Whale had the wrong label (life skills classroom) so a decision was made to allow him to come to our classroom for about half of the school day. Although Gnu was not overjoyed at having another scholar in the classroom she realized that it was the right thing to do and so far Whale's attendance in our classroom has not been a problem. In fact, academically he is on the same level as S&T and Huey and from a reading standpoint, he reads better than Grr!, S&T, and Huey.
Although it took a while, the powers that be decided to retest Whale to either confirm that he belongs in a life skills classroom or he should be placed elsewhere. I'm not sure of the exact date that the testing began but I can tell you who was involved. Once I tell you who was involved, you will come to the same conclusion that I did, this is going to take a long time. Let's see, his current life skills teacher, his former life skills teacher, Gnu, a behavior specialist, a behavior therapist, a psychologist, and finally me. What did I contribute? I had to answer a sixty question survey regarding Whale's behavior in our classroom. In doing so, I had to answer questions about any anger issues that I saw. For the record, there were none that I observed although I have seen him angry outside our classroom.
After weeks of discussion and reviewing reams of paper on Whale's behavior, a decision was made and a case conference was set up with Whale's parental unit. I believe it was last Wednesday when all of the involved parties in Whale's retesting gather around the large oval shaped table in our school conference room. When all of the parties had their say, Whale's parental unit was informed that next school year Whale will be placed in a classroom for scholars with emotional handicaps. And what classroom will that be? Gnu's of course. Great! That is finally settled. Opps! I forgot one minor obstacle after going through this weeks long retesting process. Whale's parental unit has decided to relocate outside of our school corporation's boundary and Whale will be going to a new school next year.
Next up is the fidget spinner. Hmm! Are you familiar with the fidget spinner? Maybe not. Ok! Do an internet search and we'll discuss one of the greatest marketing scams since the pet rock next week.
Happy Mothers Day.
Sunday, May 7, 2017
False Alarm
Last week was quiet, real quiet. How quiet was it? So quiet that I thought about not posting this blog because there wasn't much to talk about. I thought about it for a minute and then decided, what the heck. So here we go.
I hate false alarms but not as much as Gnu. The initial alarm notification came early in the morning but I missed it as I accidentally left my cell phone on vibrate. While setting up the classroom for the day I received the second alarm notification. This one came directly from Gnu as she was calling me on my cell phone. "Schultz, I'm having a lot of pain. Mr. Gnu is going to take me to the doctor. I'll be at school in a couple minutes to get you the lesson plan and work sheets for the day." "No, stay home, I'll be fine," I responded. Knowing that there was a real likelihood that I would have to move to the front of the room, I went to the main office to let the powers that be know what was going on. "Do you have a substitute coming in," asked the LittleBigB. "No," I responded. "Then I'll see if I can get one." "Ok," I said.
I'm now back in the classroom and Gnu walks in and immediately starts gathering the materials for the day. "This is for our reading block, this is for our afternoon math block, and if you need to fill any additional time, read this book," she told me. "Fine, I've got it, now get back home." Out the door she goes and I'm texting my colleagues to let them know that Gnu will be out for the day. FBG and MJ both responded back to let me know that they will be available throughout the day and that put me a little at ease.
One by one the scholars arrived. One by one they asked me the same question. "Mr. Schultz, why are you sitting in the front of the classroom." One by one I told them that Gnu has a doctor's appointment and will not be in today. The morning went by smoothly. It was just a few minutes before noon when my cell phone vibrated. It was Gnu, "the doctor said it was false labor pains. He told me that I could not have this baby for at least two more weeks. I'm tired and I'm going home. How is your day going?" I responded that my day was going smoothly and told her that I would see her in the morning.
The doctor said, "you cannot have this baby for at least two more weeks." That would change the arrival of baby Gnu from around June 1st to maybe as early as May 18th. Gnu had told our school leadership that she would start her maternity leave on May 25th. Given the statement from the doctor, there is the potential that Gnu could be gone as early as May 18th. If she leaves that early, that means that for the last thirteen days of the school year I may be occupying the front of the classroom. That is a long stretch and it's making me nervous. By the way, no substitute teacher showed up. The person that was going to look into finding a substitute never even bothered to tell me that no substitute was available. The person that told me that she was going to look for a substitute never even stepped into the classroom to see how I was doing and at no point was I told thank you for keeping the classroom on track.
My favorite gas station, BP, and again another interesting observation. Two adults, one male and one female, I'd say mid-twenties, were standing in front of the hot chocolate machine. "How do you work this thing," the female asked the male. The male walks over and now both of them are looking at the front of the machine. "What does that say?" the male asks the female. "I'm not sure," was her response. For the record, this hot chocolate machine had several options. Two of the options were expresso and latte so it's possible that all these selections can cause some confusion especially for two adults in their mid-twenties who apparently can't read.
The WLNutt saga is now going into overtime. As of this date, he has missed sixteen consecutive school days. Our school social worker paid me a visit at the front of the classroom the day Gnu was at the doctor and informed me that on Monday, May 8th, WLNutt will arrive in the classroom. I thanked our social worker for the information and told her that I would let Gnu know when she returned to the classroom. I chose not to ask our social worker about the delay but did ask what would happen if WLNutt did not show up on May 8th. "If he doesn't, then Child Protective Services will be paying a visit to his residence and will talk extensively with his parental unit.
The fourth grade scholars are at the front of the room with Gnu. I have everyone else with me at the back of the room. Gnu stands up from her chair and says to the fourth grade scholars, "I have to go pee. Keep working until I get back and then I can check your work." A couple minutes later Gnu returned to the classroom and looked at the fourth grade scholars who were talking and not working. "If I can't trust you to keep working when I have to go pee then maybe I should start wearing a diaper to school."
Last one. Huey is at his desk and he is drawing some type of dinosaur character with a pencil. When he finished the drawing he asked Gnu for some crayons. "Huey, where is that big bag a crayons that you brought from home yesterday? They looked like they were all brand new," Gnu responded. "Oh, those," Huey responded. "My parental unit took them to the pawn shop." "Why would your parental unit do that Huey?" Gnu asked. "Well, she does that a lot when I get something new."
There are twenty-two days left in the school year according to my short timer calendar. The end is rapidly approaching. Will next week bring us a baby Gnu? I'll let you know next Sunday evening.
Bye!
I hate false alarms but not as much as Gnu. The initial alarm notification came early in the morning but I missed it as I accidentally left my cell phone on vibrate. While setting up the classroom for the day I received the second alarm notification. This one came directly from Gnu as she was calling me on my cell phone. "Schultz, I'm having a lot of pain. Mr. Gnu is going to take me to the doctor. I'll be at school in a couple minutes to get you the lesson plan and work sheets for the day." "No, stay home, I'll be fine," I responded. Knowing that there was a real likelihood that I would have to move to the front of the room, I went to the main office to let the powers that be know what was going on. "Do you have a substitute coming in," asked the LittleBigB. "No," I responded. "Then I'll see if I can get one." "Ok," I said.
I'm now back in the classroom and Gnu walks in and immediately starts gathering the materials for the day. "This is for our reading block, this is for our afternoon math block, and if you need to fill any additional time, read this book," she told me. "Fine, I've got it, now get back home." Out the door she goes and I'm texting my colleagues to let them know that Gnu will be out for the day. FBG and MJ both responded back to let me know that they will be available throughout the day and that put me a little at ease.
One by one the scholars arrived. One by one they asked me the same question. "Mr. Schultz, why are you sitting in the front of the classroom." One by one I told them that Gnu has a doctor's appointment and will not be in today. The morning went by smoothly. It was just a few minutes before noon when my cell phone vibrated. It was Gnu, "the doctor said it was false labor pains. He told me that I could not have this baby for at least two more weeks. I'm tired and I'm going home. How is your day going?" I responded that my day was going smoothly and told her that I would see her in the morning.
The doctor said, "you cannot have this baby for at least two more weeks." That would change the arrival of baby Gnu from around June 1st to maybe as early as May 18th. Gnu had told our school leadership that she would start her maternity leave on May 25th. Given the statement from the doctor, there is the potential that Gnu could be gone as early as May 18th. If she leaves that early, that means that for the last thirteen days of the school year I may be occupying the front of the classroom. That is a long stretch and it's making me nervous. By the way, no substitute teacher showed up. The person that was going to look into finding a substitute never even bothered to tell me that no substitute was available. The person that told me that she was going to look for a substitute never even stepped into the classroom to see how I was doing and at no point was I told thank you for keeping the classroom on track.
My favorite gas station, BP, and again another interesting observation. Two adults, one male and one female, I'd say mid-twenties, were standing in front of the hot chocolate machine. "How do you work this thing," the female asked the male. The male walks over and now both of them are looking at the front of the machine. "What does that say?" the male asks the female. "I'm not sure," was her response. For the record, this hot chocolate machine had several options. Two of the options were expresso and latte so it's possible that all these selections can cause some confusion especially for two adults in their mid-twenties who apparently can't read.
The WLNutt saga is now going into overtime. As of this date, he has missed sixteen consecutive school days. Our school social worker paid me a visit at the front of the classroom the day Gnu was at the doctor and informed me that on Monday, May 8th, WLNutt will arrive in the classroom. I thanked our social worker for the information and told her that I would let Gnu know when she returned to the classroom. I chose not to ask our social worker about the delay but did ask what would happen if WLNutt did not show up on May 8th. "If he doesn't, then Child Protective Services will be paying a visit to his residence and will talk extensively with his parental unit.
The fourth grade scholars are at the front of the room with Gnu. I have everyone else with me at the back of the room. Gnu stands up from her chair and says to the fourth grade scholars, "I have to go pee. Keep working until I get back and then I can check your work." A couple minutes later Gnu returned to the classroom and looked at the fourth grade scholars who were talking and not working. "If I can't trust you to keep working when I have to go pee then maybe I should start wearing a diaper to school."
Last one. Huey is at his desk and he is drawing some type of dinosaur character with a pencil. When he finished the drawing he asked Gnu for some crayons. "Huey, where is that big bag a crayons that you brought from home yesterday? They looked like they were all brand new," Gnu responded. "Oh, those," Huey responded. "My parental unit took them to the pawn shop." "Why would your parental unit do that Huey?" Gnu asked. "Well, she does that a lot when I get something new."
There are twenty-two days left in the school year according to my short timer calendar. The end is rapidly approaching. Will next week bring us a baby Gnu? I'll let you know next Sunday evening.
Bye!
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