Half a Cup of Blues

Saturday, March 04, 2006

Monday, Monday ...

I will finally have two aides in my classroom on Monday!

We have shuffled some staff around the school and tried to redistribute the
areas of strengths and weaknesses so that each class has a better balance. I have always been the "strong" staff in whatever room I've been in (as an aide or a teacher) because I catch behaviors very EARLY and intervene in most cases BEFORE anything breaks out into violence. It takes a hyper-vigilance that can be exhausting but well worth it in the end.

Debbi has been my aide for over a year and she's awesome. She is the ultimate "Mom" and she nurtures the kids and always makes them feel special. I'll be getting Jerry and he's a very quiet and highly intelligent man. He'll be running a lot of our homework because he's very good at that.

My class size has fallen from the usual 12 down to 9. They hadn't wanted to give me too many new kids while I was already short-staffed and I have lost a couple of kids for various reasons. I may lose another one very soon. I can't say anything about it until all is said and done but it weighs heavy on my mind. There are some important things that I need to take care of in the meanwhile.

The next three months will be instrumental in determining whether or not I stay with the company. We've spent HOURS revamping our behavior management system in order to make it user friendly and it will implemented schoolwide so that we don't have different classes running their own programs anymore. That may go a long ways towards raising morale. I sure hope so! This could be a major turning point for several of us. Wish us luck!

Today's Plan: Order a pizza, watch a movie and RELAX.

2 Comments:

  • Wow, a classroom these days that is gaining more staff than students; don't think its similar here in Portland.

    By Blogger pdxbiker, at 3/05/2006 5:58 AM  

  • Our students are all mental health diagnosed and predisposed to violence so we have a high staff ratio. We also have an MHRS (mental health Resource Specialist) in the room for 4 hours per day.

    Every day is a new challenge!

    By Blogger Michelle, at 3/05/2006 6:37 AM  

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