This caught my attention because these are the things that Boards of Ed spend their time debating. From the LA Times, http://bit.ly/5U63cY.
I like how the 10year old girl convinced students to sign a petition. Future activist in the making?
BBC
As I suspected, I'm being slowly sucked into the RTI vortex at my school. We've started the process, yet no one knows what they are doing, and I'm afraid that it will somehow disintegrate into our former pre-referral system. Ugh.
My principal has begun the process of looking over referrals. I expressed my concern that there were only 2 referral forms on her desk. Teachers are still in the mode of "I don't think this child is doing well, let me fill out a referral form." They don't get it. The data, the numbers should tell them who gets referred. Am I supposed to believe that only 2 children are significantly behind in reading? Almost everyone did well on the DRA (Developmental Reading Assessment)? Really? My principal first tried to find a time to schedule an RTI meeting so that relevant staff would be present. She doesn't work well with visual logic problems. I was able to figure out the day and time when everyone could meet. I guess this spoke to my scheduling skills. Mistake #1.
A couple of days ago, my principal asked me how to move forward. I told her my vision of how RTI should look. Mistake #2. (Damn it, I said I would profess to no knowledge of RTI!) Then today, she told me about her administrators' meeting with the superintendent. The principals were complaining about the RTI process and the confusion that was ensuing in their schools. People are stressed out and felt as if there is no direction coming from Central Office. Well, that would be the case when Central Office tells everyone that RTI will look different in each school. Now principals are comparing what other schools are doing and they are upset over the differences. Initiating RTI without a clear cut view of how it should look in every school, and without some uniformity was a major mistake. But what do I know, I'm just a school psychologist. Wait, I know everything! Because unlike all the other education professions, school psychologists have been talking about RTI for years now. Years. And everyone else is being introduced to it now. Unbelievable. The kicker: My principal remarked, "Well, you and I will have to figure out how we're going to run RTI here." We??? (sigh)
BBC
I'll admit that I used this title to get some hits from prepubescent girls looking for the latest on the Twilight sequel. However, I'm referring to something entirely different.
A teacher knocked on my door and told me she had something for me to see. She showed me a card that was obviously made by a student. She told me that the student handed it to her first thing this morning. It was a sheet of plain white paper, folded in half. On the front flap it read: Happy Day of School Happy. I should mention that this child is on the Autism Spectrum. Anyway, she pointed out the fact that someone, we assumed the mother, corrected the spelling and superimposed the correct letters on the card. Inside the card was picture of the boy with his shorts to his ankles, baring his butt for the camera. It was a bit shocking, and quite funny. And of course, really inappropriate. The teacher asked me what was she supposed to do with this information. I told her that she had to call the mother and tell her that he gave her the card. Upon further investigation, I realized that it was likely that the mother took the picture. There was a finger in the frame of the shot, and I could make out a long fingernail. The picture looked like it had been printed at the drugstore; definitely not printed from home, unless they have a great photo printer. Anyway, I was convinced that his mother was somehow involved in the creation of this card, and felt that the teacher needed to confront her.
She ended up showing the principal and social worker the card. The card made the social worker's day (see previous post). I predicted that the mother would first say that the card was hilarious, then agree that the card was inappropriate, then say that she had absolutely nothing to do with it. Before the teacher called, she informed us that recently the mother had mentioned that the boy wished to take a picture of his butt and give it to her. The teacher asked her not to let that happen. I think her exact words were, "Please don't." I guess mom didn't get the hint.
Of course when the teacher called, mom denied having any involvement. She claimed that she helped with the card's cover, but wasn't aware of what was on the inside. She also said that he used the self-timer on the camera to take the picture. That just wasn't true because you can clearly see someone's finger at the edge of the picture. Also, I'm not sure he has the skills to use the self-timer on a camera.
The bottom line is: Mom is weird. This isn't the first sign of abnormal behavior. She obviously thought this was hilarious, and when called on it, denied her involvement. The good thing was that my principal recognized that the boy really had no idea what he was doing. At the very least, he didn't understand how inappropriate that gesture was. Talk about a bad influence.
BBC
"Who heals the healer?" That's the rhetorical question I asked my principal today. Our social worker missed a couple of days this week and these days no one questions if you're really sick. If in doubt, stay home-that's the philosophy in the H1N1 era. Well, I assumed she was sick. When she walked into my office, I asked her how she was feeling. She told me she felt better and told me about feeling under the weather, which I suspected. But then she surprised me when she told me that her mother-in-law died yesterday. She started to weep and it was a bit disorienting. She and I are supposed to be the ones that console others when they are sad. Now I'm sitting across from my social worker, and she is understandably sad and I'm at a lost for words. She's supposed to be the strong one. She's the one that has the right words. What was I supposed to say? I tried to offer words of comfort to a colleague. But I wasn't prepared for my own reaction to her distress.
Who heals the healer? I think this question is relevant given the shooting incident in Ft. Hood. When you remove the suspicions of Islamic fundamentalism, the issues of military service, fraternity, and allegiance to this country, you are left with a man that was in distress. Worse still, a psychiatrist. People are focused on the motives behind such a tragedy, but I wonder what was in place to help this psychiatrist keep his sanity. It's pretty clear he had some kind of mental lapse, to put it mildly. Who was available to help him? Did he seek help? Hopefully, we'll get some answers soon. Time will tell if the military will look at the mental health of their mental health staff.
BBC
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