Beyond the school doors

Just because you are the teacher does not mean that you stop learning. I have learned more from my little ones and their families over the past two years of teaching and my five years in college than I feel that I could have ever offered to them. I clearly remember sitting in as an observer while still in college on a discussion between a parent and one of the directors of the school where I was student teaching. The parent had two beautiful and amazing children who had been enrolled at the school, twins whom I had worked with the previous year. One of her children had been born with a significant brain abnormality, and while he demonstrated no motor delays he had significant cognitive, social, and language delays as a result. He had absolutely charmed me when I worked with him, and had stolen my heart. Her other child had been born without any complications, but later while still in the hospital had suffered a spinal cord stroke and was paralyzed from the mid chest down. She had significant motor limitations, but was not delayed in her cognitive, social, or language skills (speech was impacted by her ability to control breathing somewhat). She too had stolen my heart as I marveled at her quick wit and incredible independence. The parent was discussing her love for both children, but the incredible injustice that she felt at times. They had just had a birthday party for the little boy (They were twins but did not share a birthday - one child was delivered, then labor stopped and held off for a period of time before the second child delivered) and she was saddened by how he was unable to participate with the other children and instead spent the time running around in his "own world". She then was talking about how proud she was of the little girl, but how she was still mad because she was supposed to be her child that was born healthy, the child of unlimited promise to "compensate" for all that was "lost" with her brother. This very personal conversation, which I felt honored to be a part of, opened my eyes to the depth of emotion that comes with having a child with special needs. It took the theoretical of "what if" and gave it a face, a name, and a heart. I had never before truly considered the multitude of emotions, of the daily frustrations and heartbreaks as well as joys and celebrations, of the questions without answers and the need to create new answers that seem to be a part of being a parent of a child with special needs.
In that moment I recognized that I would never be the expert sitting at the table when I was meeting with a parent about their child, and that to behave as if I was would be to do a complete disservice to the child and to the family. I may be an expert in the field of education, but in regards to that particular child their parents and family members have earned a degree of information that I can never aspire to holding, but that I desperately need to work with in order for the educational process to be successful. I may have a child in my class for 7 hours per day, but their parents and family have them in their homes and in their hearts 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year. Even if I think I know what is best, I can not pretend to know the impact that the needs of a child have had on a family. That is when I need to listen, to work with parents to arrive at a solution or a plan that will be successful not just for the child but for the entire family, to form a collaborative team rather than oppositional forces. I always have as my goal a teaching environment where parents feel comfortable expressing concerns, asking questions, sharing information, and knowing that they are a critical part of a team that is working towards providing the best education possible for their child. Teaching without being aware of the impact that a child's needs has on their family, or the needs/concerns/information/ideas that their family may have, is to teach incompletely and to only part of the child. Children are part of a family and a community and it is my job as an educator to provide information, support, assistance, and to collaborate with their family/community. Only then am I educating the entire child and only then will I be successful.

They Get It

My kids get it. I could not be any prouder of these children and how much they have accomplished, and what I am most proud of can not be measured on an IEP goal or on a developmental checklist. What makes me want to give them each a gold medal and set them before the world as true heroes is the fact that they have come together, a group of children that includes three children who are typically developing, one child with an emotional disturbance and language delay, two children with severe disabilities, three children with autism, one child who has mild developmental delays but is learning English as a second language and one child who had developmental delays as a result of medical issues but who (even with his trach and g-tube) is kicking butt and catching up rapidly (also learning English as a second language), and formed a class that takes care of each other. My child with significant autism who has just begun to say a few words has become the protector of is classmates and is the first to come investigate what is wrong when someone is crying. He offers consolation in his own way, with a gentle touch, a smile, and the offer of a cherished toy. One of my inclusion peers has taken another child with autism into her care and is her guardian, making sure that she is not only safe but included in all activities. She very patiently and lovingly plays with her classmate, bringing her into her activities and ignoring her missing social skills, instead filling in for whatever is missing and thus providing a scaffold naturally so they ca play together. Today another inclusion peer requested a toy and when given it, my child who has behavioral issues tried to fight him for it. I redirected him and set a time limit for turns with the toy. When his turn was up, the child was allowed to give the desired toy to any of his peers who were sharing it with him (it was the key to the mailbox they were playing with that was so hotly contested). Instead of being angry at his classmate who had just 5 minutes earlier tried to hurt him, he kindly handed it to his peer who had tried to fight him and told him "its your turn now, X. thank you for waiting". He wasn't just echoing my words either, he meant them. I can give a hundred more examples - how my children talk about how some day the two children in my class who use wheelchairs will walk with them on the playground when their muscles get stronger and learn how to work together, how they compete to see who gets to help push the wheelchairs or hold a friend's hand to help them down the hallway, how they speak up for one another and are intuitively aware of each other's strengths and weaknesses (when playing chase they will often slow down so that the children who are slower can keep up without being asked to do so, they will choose to play games everyone can play together). We are by no means a perfect class - my little ones can fight like scrappers, can argue, can take advantage of each other, can have awful days when I am tempted to set them outside with a sign "free to a good home". But we are something special, and not special in the way that it is used in education. We have created something together, and I mean that the kids are just as responsible as the adults - we did it together, where everyone is a valued and treasured part of the community and ability level is meaningless. It is fact in our classroom that everyone has things they are good at, and everyone has things they need help doing and that we simply help each other when we need help. I did not realize how deeply this belief went until my principal made a comment when displaying my class to her supervisor that "they all have special needs. well, not all of them. two of them are normal." I was shocked because I don't see normal/not normal and I am willing to bet every dollar I have ever made that none of the children in my class do either. We see friends, we see classmates, we see the children we know and share our days with but we do not see disabilities or differences or abnormalities or normalities or atypicalities or typicalities. At the ages of 3 and 4 my kids get it completely, deeply, and without question. They accept one another as individuals, they support one another playing off of each other's strengths and weaknesses, and they love their friends for who they are not for what they are. So where do we lose it? If we can get it so easily at 3, why is it so hard to get it as adults? Where does it go? How do I help get it back? And how do I tell my little ones just how brilliant, amazing, and extraordinary they are for their insight and maturity at such an age? Because a sticker, a paper award, a trinket just does not seem like enough to document what they have accomplished. They have proven countless adults wrong, they have proven that inclusion is absolutely worth it, they have proven that children are just children, and they have done it all without even knowing what they are doing. Sometimes the educator becomes the student.

Those Kids

The word "those" seems innocuous. It is a simple word that helps delineate one group from another, as in you can wear those shoes when it is not raining like crazy but today you need to wear shoes that will not go sliding across the classroom floor the minute you try to use running feet instead of walking feet. However, the word those can take on a very bitter and ugly meaning as soon as it is applied to children. Then it is used to set apart one group from the other, to create divisions, and to mark children as different. That is when the taste of the word becomes revolting n my mouth and I can not swallow it without choking. To refer to children with special needs as THOSE KIDS instantly strips them of any personal identity, of any worth, of anything other than their disabilities. At a mandatory meeting I was required to attend this past week someone was assured their question would not be stupid, only to prove that there are indeed stupid questions. This person, a general education teacher, immediately caused me to cringe by identifying the topic of her question as the children at her school who are served by the severe disabilities program and then referring to them from then on as THOSE kids. Her very stupid question (and I mean stupid in the sense of uneducated and ignorant) centered around how she perceived the inclusion of THOSE kids in certain activities as a waste of resources because "couldn't the teacher be better using her time for something else like a gifted class?". It took every ounce of self control in every cell of my body not to shout out in response to her, and the only way I was able to harness enough control was to remind myself that her words seemed to come from ignorance rather than blatant hatred. Even then it was a tough battle. I wanted to stand up and shout that THOSE KIDS are MY KIDS! Those Kids are someone's son or daughter, someone's brother or sister, someone's grandson or granddaughter, someone's niece or nephew, they are someone's hopes and dreams. Those Kids are not just taking up space, but each child is dearly loved, is valued, is a part of a family, is a part of a community, is an individual with worth and rights and a personality and that by relegating them to nothing more than the designation of Those Kids she was missing it all. How is it that the three year olds in my class who served as my inclusion peers (or those with less significant developmental delays) this year "got it" so easily, without even having to be taught specifically about delays and disabilities, and yet this supposedly educated adult who is in the teaching profession is so ignorant to the truth? It is so true that the children will lead us if only we will follow. It is my most sincere hope that she does not work at the school I am transferring to for next year, when I become a teacher of a class for children who receive services in a severe disabilities program. If by some most horrible turn of fate she is, she will definitely be educated in just who Those Kids are and their incredible value. You can say what you wish about me but Those are MY Kids.

Its Something Unpredicatable....

I wanted to write a creative, unique, fun and interesting way to reflect back on a year of preschool. I do believe I have failed miserably, but failed with style. Style must count for something! Anyway, below is my slightly-off-center reflections on my second year of teaching, and a year in a preschool classroom.

September: "I can't wait to go to school, then I will be a big kid, too, I'll make friends and learn so much at school" (Can't Wait to Go To School by Tom Gardner)

October: "Then you can mash, Then you can monster mash, The monster mash, And do my graveyard smash" (Monster Mash by Bobby "Boris" Pickett)

November: " Soup Soup, Tasty Soup Soup, Spicy carrot and coriander" (Soup Song by The Mighty Boush)

December: "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas, Just like the ones I used to know" (White Christmas by Irving Berlin)

January: "But as long as you love me so, Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" (Let It Snow by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne)

February: "My funny valentine, Sweet comic valentine, You make me smile with my heart" (Funny Valentine by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart)

March: "Vacation, All I ever wanted, Vacation, Had to get away" (Vacation by the Go-Gos)

April: "Spring fever, spring is here at last...Get Up, get out spring is everywhere" (Spring Fever by Elvis Presley)

May: "She's a butterfly, pretty as the crimson sky, Nothing's ever gonna bring her down, And everywhere she goes, everybody knows, She's so glad to be alive, She's a butterfly" (She's a Butterfly by John Rich and Kenny Alphin [performed by Martina McBride])

June: "For what it's worth, It was worth all the while. It's something unpredictable, But in the end its right. I hope you had the time of your life." (Time of Your Life by Green Day)

Notes on the above

September- start of school, excitement, transitioning children into their first school experience, convincing C.'s parents that he should attend a preschool program and that it would benefit him, watching helplessly as M.'s parents pulled her from the program after 4 days and denied her an educational experience that I know would have benefited her but having to surrender to their parental rights, wondering if N. could talk at all or if he had regressed and lost all speech

October- Finding our routines and coming together as a class, discover that N. can talk but has every reason to be slow to trust others and my heart finds a million new ways to break for this sweet child, watching in amazement as the inclusion process with typical peers begins to meld into a cohesive class, Halloween party with awesome costumes, Blue eyed boy as Purple People Eater, A. as superman, C. as spider man, N. begins to show interest in firefighters (this will emerge again in May/June), N. and A. begin their love/hate relationship, N.'s behavior begisn to come under control

November- stone soup feast, farmer's market, taste and try different foods, cook our own soup, avoid trying to explain Thanksgiving and turkeys to children, instead celebrate sharing and working together, emphasize concepts of sharing & team work in all areas of classroom and am delighted at results

December- P. joins our class and makes it a full house, three holidays in three weeks, children love exploring new holidays, classroom becomes a present workshop, miss the last week before vacation due to extreme circumstances and am sad to miss their building excitement over Santa and Christmas but desperately must return home

January- Receive a grant so we can have snow in our classroom to explore as well as cool books about snow, one wintery day we play our instruments until it finally starts snowing ("calling in the snow"), hope and wish for snow days that never happen, run n the snow as it falls and taste snowflakes, dance in the very tiny patches of snow on the ground, discover that we can all work together on the same unit theme and learn as a class - find a uniting topic that fascinates everyone and is universally accessible, B. begins to eat by mouth for the first time and eats school lunch with peers!

February- valentine's day party, practice colors and shapes, create bags of treats for "helpers" at school (other teachers, therapists, etc) like in our book - counting, matching a pattern, following directions, etc. all practiced, make beautiful valentines to take home, learn about different kinds of love - love your family, love your friends, love yourself

March- Spring Break!! Everyone is ready for a vacation, teacher included, as well as for the easter bunny, we have a bear hunt on the playground to search for prizes and instead of bears we find bunnies (cheaper at the store), make textured Brown Bear, Brown Bear books and practice signing the book each time we read it as well as signing along with the song, am able to get P. to say words fro the first time ever!

April- SPRING! We attempt a walk to look at flowers and butterflies but this seems to be the equivalent of barbaric torture to preschoolers, delight in playing outside more, watch as leaves bloom, plant flowers to hopefully bloom by mother's day (they don't and we end up replanting in May with already grown flowers), day and night theme celebrated with a pajama party, discover we can make awesome smoothies and that switch adapted cooking is fun, P. communicates requests for certain toys and to swing using non-verbal communication and adds speech with prompting

May- raise and release butterflies, have fun with a unit on bugs and butterflies, learn about community helpers and discover that every single child can identify at least two community helpers and most 4+, rediscover the joys of the dress up clothes and become community helpers and people in our daily lives, ride tricycles outside and spend entire mornings outside as the upper grades take state tests (we are too loud), I. gets his gait trainer and takes off - this kid can move!, more break-throughs with P. as he connects with peers and begins to show empathy and imitation without prompting and begins to taste foods (applesauce and yogurt), caterpillars take over the school playground and we catch them daily to look at

June- walk a thon with the kids in the wagon and only C. and C. remaining after one lap to go for 30 minutes of riding and walking, playing on the soccer field only to be chased away by lawnmowers, bubbles outside, face painting, End of Year Fun!!