"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.
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