Aug

24

Disconnected From Life

Filed Under "At-risk" students | 2 Comments

I can see them now. Their body language says it all. In they come to my class –a bit late, feet shuffling, hoods over their heads almost covering their eyes and that sullen look on their faces. Hate school, hate home- disconnected from both looking to others like themselves for emotional support. Some turn to gangs; some escape into MSN, video games or drugs. Ask them a question, they shrug their shoulders. No short term goals; no long term goals. They live in the moment; no thought for the future. No future. They choose outrageously wealthy sports figures or musicians as role models. Something they can never be. There’s no voluntary interaction with adults to learn how to navigate the coming adult world. These are the kids I spend my days with. These are the kids I try to reach. When I do, I’m so grateful.

What can we do to try to help these at risk kids reconnect to family and school? I can only tell you what has worked for me-sometimes. I can only tell you what the kids have told me. Since I am a special education teacher, I get to work with a lot of these kids. Some I teach everyday in my class; others I monitor on a regular basis by meeting with them during their lunch, or when I withdraw them from other classes.

When I first meet them, I work hard to develop a relationship with them. It’s not easy. You might think that students would respect me because I’m a teacher. Not these kids. I find that I have to convince them that I respect them first, before they will respect me. I convince them by being compassionate. I try to understand where they are coming from and not judge them. In an earlier post, Don’t Blame the Lettuce, I touched on this topic. Basically, I try to determine their needs and then try to meet them.


What are their needs? They tell they want someone to listen to them without telling them what to do. They tell me they want an adult to really care about them even when they’re bad. They tell me they want to listen to their MP3 player while working.-it helps them concentrate on their work. They tell me they want to have a bite to eat while they work. They tell me they want to go for a short walk during class because they can’t sit still. They tell me that they want to play Connect Four after they finish their work. They tell me that they’d like one of the lollypops I have in my desk-a green one, please. They tell me they’d like to wear their hat in class because it’s a bad hair day. They tell me they want to talk to me in the hall because their parents just broke up and now they’re living with their mom and four siblings in a hotel. They tell me their cat died last night, and they are really upset and can’t work. They tell me they are hungry because they didn’t eat breakfast or lunch. They tell me…

What do I tell them? I tell them I don’t believe they’re bad, because they are not. I tell them that we all have different strengths that we can use to help us succeed. I tell them being a teenager sucks because people expect you to act like an adult but treat you like a kid. I tell them I hated being a teenage. I tell them I hated grade 10. I tell them to come and see me even when they’re not in my class any longer. I tell them I’ll buy more lollipops when I get paid on Friday. I tell them that I want to help them set realistic goals for the future because if they don’t have realistic goals, they’ll have no future. Basically, I tell them, and I show them that I care.

Aug

23

Get A Buddy. Have A Buddy.

Filed Under Behaviour Management, Special Education | 3 Comments

Many of the kids I teach have difficulty paying attention to what’s going on in my class. I’m not really surprised by this, since that’s why they are in my class in the first place. But…….. I’ve had twenty kids in my class, and on some days I’d have to teach the lesson twenty one times. No kidding! That’s my life, or it was until I discovered The Buddy System.(Thank you Noreen Hardwick) You’ve just got to love it. It helps keep me sane saner, helps improve the kids’ listening skills and helps improve the kids’ social skills.


First, I explain The Buddy System to my students, and why I use it. I tell them two heads are better than one. So, I want them to work with two heads-theirs and a buddy’s. They are to pick a buddy, or sometimes buddies as the case may be, to work with and sit next to during class. Now when someone has a question, he is to ask his buddy first. I will only answer a group question. If someone asks me a question, I answer by asking, “Is this a group question?” If the student says no, then I tell the student to ask his buddy. If it is a group question, then I answer it. Simple. This cuts down on many of the silly questions I used to get that drove me crazy. You know the ones like, “What do we have to do?” after I just finished telling them what I want them to do. Oh yes, it does take a little while to train them to use The Buddy System, but it’s worth it. Their listening skills improve, as do their social skills. And, I get to live another day.

Aug

21

Miss, Are you Going to Be a Real Teacher Next Year?

Filed Under Special Education | 2 Comments

I’d almost finished teaching the lesson when she blurted out, “Miss, are you going to be a real teacher next year?” That stopped me in my tracks! Am I going to be a real teacher next year? What was she talking about? I am a real teacher. I’m a Learning Strategies teacher. I’m a Student Success teacher. I’m her teacher. What was she talking about? I wasn’t sure what she meant. I told her that I was a real teacher. Now she was puzzled and said, “You know, a real teacher like a math or English teacher”. I thought about what she had said for a moment, and then her statement made sense. Of course!

I’m a Learning Strategies teacher. I’m a Student Success teacher. What kind of subject is learning strategies or student success? Often kids don’t even know that there’s such a thing as a Learning Strategies course, until they’re sitting in front of me. They know about math, English, history, geography, science- but Learning Strategies. What is that? Well, it’s about learning styles, about multiples intelligences, about characteristics of successful people, about metacognitive reading strategies, about self advocacy skills, about dealing with difficult people as well as other things more traditional things like study skills, writing tests and organizing notebooks. It’s about a lot of things.

More or less, a learning strategies class is a class that supports students who have difficulty with certain aspects of learning. Usually, but not always, these students have been identified as having a learning disability of some sort and have an Individual Education Plan, or I.E.P. that outlines their strengths, needs and the accommodations teachers need to make so that the students can be as successful as possible. The students in the learning strategies class have average or above average intelligence but find school a struggle because of the way their brain is wired. (Mel Levine in his book A Mind at a Time explains this extremely well.)

One of my responsibilities is to create the Individual Education Plan using my expertise as a Special Education Specialist and the feedback I get from the students themselves, their parents, teachers and other interested parties. After creating the I.E.P., I share it with the student, the student’s parents and the student’s teachers. Then, I monitor the student’s progress throughout the semester by getting feedback from the students and their teachers hoping to nip any problems in the bud. At the end of the semester, I complete an I.E.P. Progress Report that is sent home to parents or guardians.

 

I’d like to think that with all the support learning disabled students are entitled to, they would do well in school. I’d like to think that, but remember I used to be naive. I’m not naive anymore-well maybe a bit too optimistic. Like I tell my students: students are human beings first and students secondly; teachers are human beings first and teachers secondly- me included. Some students buy into the program; some don’t. Some teachers buy into the program; some don’t. What can I say? I just keep being a real teacher and hope for the best.

 

 

 

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