Back to school

Yesterday Garrett and I both went back to school -- one of us to preschool, and one of us on the way to a PhD. (Figure out who is who, and Gryffindor gets 10 points!). Needless to say, we're both feeling a bit overwhelmed. (Is "a bit overwhelmed" an oxymoron? I find myself saying it a lot as a teacher and then I laugh at myself. And then cry.)

I am working at an early childhood center that is part of the Houston public school system. It is a school that consists entirely of preschool classrooms (19 to be exact -- nearly 400 4-year-olds!). It is also a Title I school (as well as another title or two), so the majority of the children are from low-income families, are learning English as a second language, or both. I am a special ed co-teacher in the two classrooms that have been labeled inclusion rooms (children with disabilities in with typically developing kiddos). One of these classes is an English classroom, and the other is bilingual -- that is, Spanish for pretty much the whole day. Eep!

We had open houses last week, so we were able to meet most of the families before school started. In an interesting turn of events (or, rather, lack thereof), it was revealed to me that none of the families knew their children had been placed in inclusion rooms. One of my co-teachers wasn't planning on telling her families, while the other was openly sharing it with hers. I found it odd that some people felt it was best to "cover it up" rather than ruffle some feathers. (But perhaps I have watched a few too many "X-Files" reruns.) Aren't we supposed to be proud of this teaching philosophy/model? How to explain the presence of a special ed teacher in the class? Anyways, we ended up "spilling the beans," and most of the parents are cool with it... though you could tell some were worried -- that their kids might catch a disability?? After the first couple days, I can already tell you that the "normal" child of one particularly concerned parent is way more trouble than my kiddo with autism. :)

The Spanish classroom is an exciting and active one. I am dusting the cobwebs from my brain and trying to recall my high school Spanish. (Was that really a decade ago??) The children are very sweet and understanding. I should mention that my co-teacher is from Venezuela, so this is not the blind/blonde leading the blind/bilingual here. I can tell you that I was left alone with 19 Spanish-speaking children for 30 minutes while my co-teacher took a lunch break, and no one got hurt. I'm using a lot of "Vamos a..." This is a very handy construction. Also, when you give commands to 4-year-olds, you get to use the "tu" command, which is the same as regular 3rd person conjugation. :) Despite my general Spanish foundation, I am lacking a lot of early childhood vocabulary, like verbs that have to do with Play-Doh and playground activities like going down the slide. I'm sure I'll pick it up.

The English classroom is fun, too. However, I am able to speak more there, which means that I have to do more leading and corraling... which, I discovered today, I am a bit rusty at. In my autism classroom, there were 5 (mostly nonverbal) kids and 3-4 adults. In this class, there are 18 kids and 2 adults. Kids who can talk back!!! I had an abysmal time trying to get 9 kids to sit for a story today. They were running all over, fighting with each other, and other such nonsense. Yes, for most of them it's the first time they've been in school, but really -- don't they know I have a master's degree?! Apparently it doesn't impress them. My co-teacher came to the rescue, saying things like, "Oh, it makes me so SAD to see all of my friends behaving this way for Miss Kitchen!" This is totally not the way I've been dealing with kids with autism. I'm supposed to REASON with kids now? and appeal to their emotions? Whoa, dude. Whoa.

It's a school night, so I should be off to bed. Thanks for reading! Hope you come back!