Am I being overly critical?
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| Sun, 08-21-2005 - 12:40pm |
Looking for opinions here. I am new to the middle school experience and so far I am severly underwhelmed with Cait's AS teacher. Mind you, I have heard wonderful things about her from other staff, our therapist and parents who have met her but not parents who have been in her class. I was impressed when I met her. She said all the right things and was very nice.
Here are my current problems and looking for input on whether I am just overly sensitive or what. It is only 2 days into the school year.
1. Concerns written here before about the school orientation and class changes. I had emailed the teacher about them and got an Ok pat response. The kind you pretty much expect to hear and could have practically written myself. ya know, lets wait and see how she does, if we need to we will make more changes and modifications, transition is always hard to middle school and we want to do our best to make the transition as smooth as possible.
2. On the first day of school I got welcome letters from every teacher of all my children telling the parents about the years and expectations, except her. Nothing. No papers sent home. No messages on how Cait did. Nothing in Cait's book that was papers she had worked on her in class, nothing.
3. As part of the class is study skills they are supposed to help organize the kids. The other teachers had put things into the binder. Helped the kids as a whole set up binders, but nothing from the study skills class. I ended up completely setting up Cait's binder. I had left it so the teacher could use what ever system she did as a class, but with no system I used one that would work for Cait.
4. And this is the biggest. Cait came home on Friday with 4 uncolmpleted papers in her binder from her academic classes. She had no clue what they were or what she was supposed to do with them. She also had an assignment written on her homework assignment sheet and she had no idea what it was.
I guess it could be that it is only 2 days in and things aren't settled yet. That I got a bad first impression. BUt I am kind of ticked. I emailed the AS teacher yesterday about the homework assignments but no response. She may only answer school emails during the week though.
On the good side Cait is happy and enjoying it so far, but she usually does well in the beginning.
Renee


ok Renee..here we go....this is one of the big things I see with Jake..
"And this is the biggest. Cait came home on Friday with 4 uncolmpleted papers in her binder from her academic classes. She had no clue what they were or what she was supposed to do with them. She also had an assignment written on her homework assignment sheet and she had no idea what it was." ** He will come home with HW written down in his agenda(thats what they call it) and have NO CLUE what is it is or when it is due. I then have to email the teacher of the class and always CC the AS teacher about what are we supposed to be doing, ect..please have the aide explain to him before he leaves the class..etc.
Jakes AS taecher doent really teach any classes she is more like a support person who understands the kids and can advocate for them with the teachers. So say I have a problem with said teacher I can email her and she will handle it and make sure Jake brings home what he needs to.
I have just ranbled on and on... I say give it about a week, she is still adjusting but make it clear to the AS teacher that she is there to support and advocate for your child.
Liza
I totally understand the new to middle school feeling and everyone saying "oh, he'll (she'll) do just fine"-- BULL! I know my kid. And you know Cait. If you're worried that she's already lost, take that feeling and go w/ it, listen to your instincts.
1. I hate pat answers and I get the feeling that this teacher thinks she knows
AS kids but she hasn't gotten to know Cait. Not such a good thing.
2. Did Cait's other teachers send welcome letters as well, just not the AS teacher? If so, maybe she feels she doesn't have to since the others did. If the others didn't either, maybe you could suggest that they do this in the future because nt parents like to know what their kids are doing as well. My middleschool kids got outlines of the courses they're taking, grading practices and expectations. Both student and parent had to sign them.
3. ARG! she should be setting up their binders and even helping them w/ their backpacks and lockers. Warren's teachers gave them ways to set up their binders, but he has to have more organization so we use a separate zippered binder for his homework both completed and still working on that has a small accordian folder attatched and pencil case and pocket for his calculator. Amelia's (6th grade) teachers helped them set up their binders and they had a whole day (the first day) that they didn't change classes and just worked on getting familiar w/ the school building and all the rules and meeting all their teachers.
4. I say give it 2 more days-- absolutely no more-- because you don't want to run into another weekend. If they haven't gotten it together put on your mother bear look and get some answers! I have always waited too long and then we have problems and a well that Warren has to dig himself out of (and always just w/ our help, the teachers wont do anything to help). This year I emailed the resource teacher that will be doing his organization help every other day during his homeroom. I asked that they do the 2 help things for him that were on the IEP I hadn't seen yet(an alphasmart to take notes and do homework on and a 2nd set of books for at home) and I got responses w/i the day. The teacher also said that once all the extra stuff settled down she'd be working w/ him in homeroom.
Warren is finally getting so he'll raise his hand and ask if he doesn't understand what he's writing on his agenda(it's only taken 3 years of constant questioning him and drilling into his head that he has to know what the homework is so that he can do it). We also have a "homework hotline", it's both on the internet and a phone message. So I ck this just about every day to make sure he has the correct things on his agenda. But the teachers don't always have it updated.
I do think you have reason to be ticked and reason to wonder if they're building Cait up just to fail. I also think teachers are terribly unorganized this time of the year and need to be cut just a little slack (not too much) because everything at schools is very unorganized at first.
Betsy
Thank you, thank you both. I guess I am not crazy.
On the letters, both the mainstream teachers sent one but Cait will have 2 classes a day with the AS teacher. She will be graded on them and misses PE and her elective to go to this class so I think it should be the same expectations as the other classes. It isn't that she is just getting support from the AS teacher like in resource room.
I will check on the homework online. The Math/Science teacher is great it seems. he has a website, does online grades that he emails to parents and offers his personal email as regular correspondence. I will check if he has that.
I was unsure what to do about the homework. Since the AS teacher is supposed to help with the homework thing I emailed her first to find out. I don't want to mix things up or step on her toes by going to the teacher directly. I also don't want to bug the teacher daily. However, if she doesn't email me back by tomorrow, I will email both the teachers myself. It just rots because this program is supposed to help cait learn how to do this for herself and provide support. It is practically impossible as a parent who wasn't in the classroom to figure out most of the time what the teacher wanted and Cait doesn't have the skills to find out on her own.
UGH, Middle school frustrations. I knew all along that this level would start to be a problem academically for Cait. It isn't a shock but still not fun.
Renee
Big hugs to you Renee! I know what you mean about not being in class with them and they have no idea what they are suppose to do. I even quit a job 18 months ago so I could help Jake..I have finally found a job now that give me the flexability I need. Sometimes I think I need to send a tape recorder with him but then he'd lose that and we still would be nowhere!
Liza
(((HUGS))) middle school just stinks! Warren is not AS (though I think at times he does qualify) but instead has ADD (or ADHD depending on who is evaluating)as his challenge. He has had a really rough time academically because his organizational skills are not there and he's quite behind socially as well. It's not that he doesn't know the material but that he doesn't do well in an environment that isn't quiet and structured. Middle school is not quiet and structured. He always gets "preferencial seating" which last year in LA meant sitting between a girl that NEVER was quiet and constantly was shouting out wrong answers and a boy who never sat in his seat more than 5 min (during a 75min class this is a lot of up and downs). And this is only 2 of the kids of 25 in the class. Somehow I just don't think this is helping! He would do so much better in a school where the class size was 5 to 1 or something. It's not that I expect A's either. I would be VERY happy w/ C's and a few B's thrown in.
Cait will get through this, and so will you! Though, I imagine you'll be like me...hoping this year will be different, throwing yourself into helping her as much as possible and trying to make her time at home as pleasant as possible (while still getting her to do the work) so that she's not stressed so she'll do better at home and school, and then by 4th quarter counting the days until this school year ends.
Betsy