Unboxing of Elementary Box

I'm really excited to share my first unboxing video with you! I reviewed my Elementary Box, which is a subscription box for elementary school teachers. Let me know what you think!
- Miss Butterfly

FREEBIES... I Knew That Would Get Your Attention!

Hi everyone! During my massive amount of free time this summer (ROFL ROFL ROFL) I've been working on something I call Today's Special. In my classroom this past year we had Morning Meeting. As part of it, we did Today's Special. I would find out about a little-known holiday such as "Tell The Truth Day" or "Don't Step On A Bee Day." (These are real holidays that someone somewhere somehow declared.) I would write up a paragraph about it, and include a picture and a question of the day. It was just a way to add a little something extra to our Morning Meeting. (I found it challenging to come up with good Morning Meeting activities for my 9 and 10 year old students whose primary disabilities were emotional and behavioral... they benefited from the routine of a Morning Meeting time, but I couldn't do the usual circle time activities such as doing nursery rhymes or counting sticks, since they were well beyond that. In the future I will probably include checking the weather using the weather.com website, and things like that.)

Anyways, during last school year I did this day by day, but I am hoping to continue it this coming year. I have written up a whole month of Today's Specials for September, and I am giving it away for free on TPT. I will eventually write up booklets for October, November, and so on, and sell them for $1.00 or something to make a little extra school supply money... but for now I just wanted to give the world something for free!

I also have several other freebies in my store that I made during the school year  I have a set of Zones Of Regulation Problem Solving and Think Sheets, which I just found out has already been downloaded by 1, 425 people. That is impressive! It includes a guided problem solving sheet that you can work through with students to help them identify choices for solving a problem, and what the positive or negative consequences of each choice might be. It allows them to choose one to try, and later analyze whether that choice worked for them, and if not, what they will try next. It also includes two different versions of a "Think Sheet," which guides students to identify what event happened, what zone they were in, how they handled it, what the result was and whether that result was something they wanted and needed, and what they may need to do to get into a more comfortable zone. It also guides them to find ways to make a situation better... they may need to clean something up, fix something, apologize to someone, etc.

Then there is the Old Orange game, which is a spin-off of the classic Old Maid game. It is a rhyming game using simple 3 and 4 letter words. Like the classic game, the cards are divided evenly among players, and players first go through their decks of cards to find matches.. in this game, matches would be rhyming words. They then take turns drawing a random card from the hand of the player next to them, without seeing which one they are taking. In the end, when all of the cards have been matched up, one player will be left with the Old Orange... because nothing rhymes with orange, of course!

I do have one other thing that I am selling for $1.00. It is a book study unit for "Sideways Stories From Wayside School." When we were kids, my brother and I loved the Wayside School stories. So, when I was looking for a way to get a group of 3rd grade reluctant readers to practice reading comprehension skills, I thought of Sideways Stories. I created the book study unit, which is pretty simple. It consists of looking up some new vocabulary words for each chapter, and then completing a story map for the chapter. Each group of chapters also includes a special project or activity for students to demonstrate their understanding of the story and characters.

I will let you know when I update things in my store! I try to keep everything either free or for a fairly low price, because I know how much I, as a teacher, appreciate not having to spend a lot of money on things to enrich my students' education. So, go download stuff, and let me know what you think!

First Day of Rec Camp

So, Rec Camp started yesterday. I have not been feeling very enthused about Rec Camp this year. It is a huge commitment with a lot of work involved, and what I really wanted this summer was to relax and recover from the awful school year. I eventually compromised and said I'd help organize Rec Camp but take 3 weeks off in the middle.
On the first day, though, once the kids started appearing, I realized how much I love Rec Camp! It is a day camp like no other. Ruddy was there for the first time, and he seemed to be having a lot of fun. We had about half kids that have been there in the past, and half new kids.
At Rec Camp every camper has a 1:1 counselor. Being one of the organizers, I don't have a 1:1 kid, and I spend most of my time just floating around and making sure everything is going smoothly. At one point, though, one of the new kids, a 5-year-old named Liam, went "number 2" and asked his 1:1 counselor to help wipe his butt. The teenage counselor was squeamish about that, so I went in to do the, um, duty.
When I went into the bathroom, Liam was still sitting on the toilet, so I waited outside the stall while we had this conversation.
Liam: "Can you go get a book and read it aloud to me?"
Me: "I can't leave you alone in here. Does your mom read to you when you're going poop?"
Liam: "I don't know. I've never pooped for this long before. I must have eaten a lot. When we were driving on vacation, I had to pee and poop so many times, my mom said next time I'll have to wear a diaper! Isn't that funny? Sometimes I get diarrhea! One time I had diarrhea coming out of my mouth and my other place!"
Me: "When it comes out of your mouth, that is called throwing up."
Liam: "Oh, I was throwing up and had diarrhea at the same time!"
(Sound of something dropping in water)
Liam: "Did you hear that? Did you hear some plopping sounds?"
Me: "Yes I did!"
Liam: "That was just my poop coming out!"
Eventually the enthusiastic little chatterbox finished up, I helped him wipe his little butt, and we went on about our business. The teenage counselor who was working with Liam thanked me profusely for doing the dirty work.
Me: "When you've wiped as many butts as I have, it is no big deal anymore!"
Teenage counselor: "I don't think I'm going to get to that point. I'm happy just wiping my own butt."
Gotta love Rec Camp!

Bittersweet

As the year is coming to a close, half of me is so happy to be getting ready to put this place behind me. The other half is sad to go. I have made good friends here. Miss Meanie is evil and I hope I never have to see her again, but many of my colleagues were awesome.

The kids were awesome too. Even when they were wreaking havoc.

Today I had to break the news to Persius that I won't be back next year. Persius is still upset that I haven't been able to run the academic groups since January (because I suddenly became the full time behavior teacher) and he asks me about it every time he sees me. "Miss Butterfly, I just have one question," he'll say. "When are you coming back to teach us?" Usually I've just replied, "I don't know, buddy," or "It's not up to me," because I was still holding out hope that they'd let me go back to my academic teaching duties and hire an actual behavior teacher. When I told Persius before that it wasn't up to me, he marched to the principal's office and demanded to know if he had made that decision. (He hadn't. It was Miss Meanie.)

So today I went into the academic room to get a stapler, and Persius was in there doing his reading group. When he saw me he asked me, "Will you come back and be our teacher next year?"

I'd been dreading telling him this. I sat down next to him and said, "I'm going to be teaching at a different school next year."

He jumped into my arms like a little kid and hugged me, rocking back and forth, saying, "But I don't want you to go! Why do you have to go?"

I didn't know how to explain it to him except to say, "I just have to." I tried to tell him, "But you can write me a letter if you want, and if you give it to any of the other teachers here, they can mail it to me."

"And can you come over to my house? Everyone I like is going to come over in the summer!"

I kept on telling Persius that I wouldn't be too far away, and that all the other people he liked would still be there next school year, and eventually convinced him that everything would be okay.

Tomorrow I have to tell the little kids, which should go over a little easier... they'll be sad but their attention spans are significantly shorter and they'll be more excited about summer break. I'm not even going to tell Ruddy until over the summer... he's going to be at Rec Camp with me, so that will give me some extra time to break the news to him slowly.

Which brings us to the good news... I got a new teaching job! I will be an Adaptive Classroom teacher! The elementary school I'll teach at is only a few minutes from my house. I'm so excited about it... it is a fresh new start.

I just wish I could bring Persius and Ruddy with me!

Ruddy's Turn

Now that Montana and Anise are at the Therapeutic School, Ruddy is the only student who is with me full time, And when I say full time, I mean all the time. Mrs. Meanie pulled all of the assistants out of my room, which means I have to be the one to take Ruddy to recess, lunch, specials, the gen ed room, and anywhere else he may go. Ruddy has become very attached to me and hates for me to step outside of the room. When I walk across the room to get something out of the fridge, he shouts, "Miss Butterfly, where are you going?" For a few days I got him to join the reading and math groups going on in the next room, so I could get some work done testing other kids. Ruddy got bored and came back into our room, and when he saw that I wasn't there he had a conniption fit. When I got back into the room he yelled at me, "Why did you leave me? You abandoned me!"

He is very lovable, but it is also somewhat like bringing your toddler to work with you... you don't get much other work done.

Today though, Ruddy had a meltdown that rivaled the ones Anise and Montana used to have. In fact, I have my suspicions that he was actually copying some of the things Anise used to do. He was swearing a blue streak, and even called me a bitch. He even threatened to hit me with a lunch box because I wouldn't let him leave the room! "Don't make me do this! I don't want to hurt you, but I will! Just think of how much pain you'll be in!" he shouted in my face, wielding the lunch box menacingly.

People at my work say I am the best at keeping completely calm in these situations. I barely blinked, and just waited him out. Eventually he threw the lunch box in another direction, but then he climbed up on a table and found where the scissors were hidden and threatened to cut his own ear off.

Over the summer I am going to be helping to run the city's Special Recreation program. Ruddy is signed up to be there, Whenever I tell people this, they roll their eyes and say, "Just what you need, right?" But I think it will be a lot better. Special Rec is different. Its all about having fun, and we don't force the kids to do things they don't want to do. I think it will be a good thing for him. But it will probably be just as exhausting!

I am really ready for this school year to be over. Is that a negative thing to say? I'm just really looking forward to a fresh start.

Mid-May Check In

When I started this blog a few months ago, I had four students, two who were with me full time and two who were with me part time. A lot has happened since then. I tried to make this group of kids into a class, but it was harder than it seemed. I thought I'd update you on them.

Montana was the first to get sent to the Therapeutic School a few towns over. From what I've heard, he is doing great there, and his behavior has improved a lot, at least in that setting. It doesn't mean that he is turning over a new leaf... Recently I had two boys added to my caseload who were coming out of the Therapeutic School. They were put straight into general ed classes, and went right back to their old behaviors. I think it is the school, and the therapeutic environment it is able to provide, that makes the biggest difference. I miss Montana a lot. The other night I had a horrible dream that he died in a plane crash. It was a stupid dream, but it haunted me for days. But I was at the Therapeutic School yesterday and heard that Montana is alive and doing well.

Anise, the original student for whom the self-contained class was developed, stuck around for a few months. But she developed habits of trashing the classroom, hitting staff, and kicking out the screen and jumping out the window so she could run away. She was the second one to be sent to the Therapeutic School. I have no part in the decision of whether to send them there... if I did, I probably would have kept Montana... but I was glad to see Anise go there. She needed way more than we could give her. She's on her first week and I've heard she loves it there.

Ruddy is still with me and is the only student in the class right now, which has created a weird dynamic between he and I. Since I only have one student, the special ed director, Miss Meanie, reassigned my assistants, which means it is just Ruddy and I most of the time. The assistants used to do a lot of work with Ruddy and go with him to music and PE and stuff, but now I have to do it. Ruddy has started to get separation anxiety about me and can't stand if I leave the room to work with any of the other kids on my caseload. He needs so much attention, it has started to feel a little like having a toddler!

Ruddy has made it to Level 4, which is the second highest level in our classroom. He did that by getting 10 cumulative days of having 90% on his point sheet. I am trying to transition him back into general education, but I worry that he won't be successful. He's been working really hard to deal with his anger. It has been quite a while since he has trashed the room. The problem is that Ruddy has trouble understanding that he has any sort of control over his behaviors. He doesn't understand cause and effect. If he gets a consequence, or if someone says "no" to something he wants, he thinks it is because the person doesn't like him. Ruddy asks for a million things per day. He wants to go for a walk, he wants a stick of gum, he wants to play with the iPad during work time, he wants to play music during reading group, he wants to drag all of the desks and chairs together and make a fort. I am pretty easy going, and many times my answer will be Yes, if it is doable. Yes, you can have a stick of gum if I can see that it helps you sit and concentrate. Yes, we can make a fort during break time if we put it back afterwards. But in a general ed class, or even a special ed class with more than one student,  all of those things wouldn't always be possible. He doesn't understand why he has to do the stupid state testing on the iPad. I try to explain to him that every kid in the state has to do it, and maybe even every kid in the country. He points to a sign he made that says "I DON'T LIKE IT WHEN PEOPLE BOSS ME AROUND!" In his mind, rules exist only to interfere with his fun, and he shouldn't have to follow them.

Persius... Persius could break my heart! Persius was one of the first kids I knew, back when I was running the academic groups. He has autism and his thinking is very black-and-white. He spends a lot of time flopping around in his chair wailing that NOTHING IS FAIR! Before I ended up as the behavior teacher, I used to let Persius come to my room and take music breaks when he was having a hard time in class. He claimed that music calmed him down, and it did seem to work. He liked this weird electronic music that you can only find on YouTube. When I'd turn it on, he'd start to dance, his pale freckled face breaking into a grin.

After my academic groups were taken from me, Persius asked me every day when I was coming back. At first I had been told that the set up was only temporary, so I would tell Persius that I would be back soon. But then "temporary" became "permanent." Every single time I see Persius he grabs my arms and begs me to come back to run his groups. I started telling him, it wasn't my decision, it was my boss's decision. So Persius marched to the principal's office and demanded to know why the principal had made me stop teaching the academic groups. The principal told him he had nothing to do with it. (That is true... it was all Miss Meanie's doing!)

Persius's regular ed teacher tells me that Persius also complains every day to her about me being gone. "You made a real difference to Persius. He really misses you," she said.

Today Persius saw me outside and came to give me a hug, saying, "If you don't at least come back to run our groups after summer vacation, my life will be ruined!":

I don't have the heart to tell him that I am not coming back at all next school year.

I've been starting job interviews already! It would be awesome if I could get a job lined up before summer vacation even starts! Wish me luck.

Don't Know What To Say...

Last week I got called down to the principal's office.

For the record, let me tell you that in all of my jobs, I've always been a stellar worker! I've always had great reviews and I've never gotten in trouble for anything. So I wasn't that worried when I got called to the principal's office... even though he told me that he'd invited my union representative.

When I got there, I made friendly small-talk with the principal while we waited for the union rep.
As soon as the union rep got there, the principal wasted no time in telling me, "We've decided not to renew your contract for next year."

I was surprised, because my review isn't even until the middle or end of May, and that is when they usually tell you about their decisions whether to renew or not renew your contract. This was somehow different. They had all gotten together in a special meeting to talk about not renewing my contract.

I know this makes me sound like a horrible teacher. I must have done something wrong, right? My union rep reassured me that this isn't true... especially after I asked if there were any specific reasons, and the principal sort of shrugged and said, "Oh, nothing specific."

You may remember when I began this blog, I explained that I was hired as a learning support teacher. I was supposed to teach academic skills to small groups of K-3 kids with ADHD and learning disabilities. I had set up a great classroom with lots of different multisensory opportunities for learning. I was also supposed to provide behavior support, but usually in a resource setting this is pretty mild and involves things like check ins, pep talks, and helping teachers create behavior support plans for individual kids. But the reality was, the kids who needed behavior support needed a lot more than Resource. They were tearing up classrooms and frightening the gen ed teachers, left and right! Whenever a kid started flipping out, I was called to the scene. If I was in the middle of teaching an academic group, my academic kids had to be sent back to their classes, and all groups would be cancelled until the flipping out kid had settled down. They were losing their minutes but nobody seemed to care. The only advise I was given was to stop making individualized, engaging lessons, and just put them all in workbooks. This way, any random person could step in and take over... it would just be a matter of flipping to the right page and reading the script. The idea made me gag.

Then in the middle of the year, we got a new kid who required a self-contained classroom. So the special ed director... I will call her Mrs. Meanie... declared that I would now be the self-contained behavior classroom teacher. All of my academic groups would be taken over by substitute teachers, often a different teacher each day. Anise, Ruddy and Montana were dumped into my room. From this, I had to somehow create some semblance of a classroom. In the mean time, my academic kids... many of whom also have some degree of social and emotional disabilities and really struggle with changes... were being taught by a different random sub every day. I hated to go into the other classroom where they'd been sent, because they would cry and beg me to come back. And I had to tell them, "I can't."

So that is what I dealt with. I still had to write full lesson plans for each of the academic kids every day, and case manage them, while also running the behavior classroom. The principal came in and observed a few times and complained that I wasn't posting "learning targets" on the board. When I explained that I wasn't really doing any teaching anymore... the kids just worked on work sent by individual gen ed teachers... he said, "Well, there should be academic lessons going on in every classroom." Except I had been told to just give them their folders of gen ed work. So...

Anyways, I've been canned. But I still have to stay until the end of the school year and act all cheerful around the principal and Mrs. Meanie.

Plus, today they had Skipper (the kindergartner with autism) in my class all day, because he was having behavior issues in his gen ed class and the teacher was fed up. What could possibly go wrong with putting an autistic kindergartner into a 3rd-5th behavior classroom?

It actually wasn't that bad. except that Skipper, being a little guy, needs a lot more of my individual attention than the others do. He is unable to sit and work independently. This means that the others balk because they feel like they're not getting attention (I only have an assistant for part of the day) and I get ZERO work done. Even less than usual. Believe me when I tell you, I have not had a lunch break or planning time since January.

But I'm fired because I'm doing an awful job. At this.

I'm terrified I won't get another job for next school year. This could be the end for Miss Butterfly. Stay tuned...

This Is What Rage Looks Like

A few weeks ago I posted this picture as an example of what my classroom sometimes looks like after one of my kids has gotten upset. This is actually a picture of a classroom that was hit by a hurricane, but I was only halfway joking that this is what my classroom can look like.

The other day Anise (who is back from Residential, at least for a while) tore our room to shreds. She was mad because she didn't want to go back to doing work after taking a break, and because Miss Dragonfly and I were busy with other things and weren't paying attention to her. (I was working on IEPs at the computer, and Miss Dragonfly was helping one of the boys with school work.) She raged for an hour and a half. About halfway through, I took this picture to send to the special ed director to let her know exactly how the day was going. Keep in mind that this was only halfway through the destruction process!

We don't have any sort of isolation or "time out" room. They are actually becoming illegal in my state. Instead, we are supposed to do "therapeutic holds" (aka restraint) when a student is being a danger to themselves or others. Restraint is supposed to be a last resort. They can rage like this for hours and all we can do is stand by and try to say things that might deescalate them. In the meantime the other students in the class have to be taken to another classroom, and they lose their whole routine for however long it takes the upset student to calm down.

I've worked in schools with time out rooms before. The good thing about them is that, once the student is inside, he is safe. He has nobody to hurt, and nothing to hurt himself with. Plus, there is nothing stimulating to escalate him further. Usually they just end up sitting down and crying, at which point you can try to go in and sit with him, comfort him, talk him through what happened, and eventually get them back into their routine. I've rarely seen a kid alone in an isolation room for more than 10 minutes. On the other hand, I have seen students rage for up to two hours, and I have seen students need to be restrained for up to half an hour. (The teacher restraining the student will try to release the student whenever he starts to seem calm, but for some students, such as Montana when he's in a rage, as soon as they're released they turn around and start trying to hurt themselves or someone else again, and need to be restrained again.) I think isolation rooms can be much better, if they are used correctly.,, never as a punishment or consequence. But that's just my humble opinion.

Anyways, the next two days went more smoothly, partially because Anise didn't come to school. The boys played wonderfully together and got lots of work done. I got a lot of evil paperwork done as well, since Miss Dragonfly could easily handle the two of them when they were both calm. (I would much rather actually be teaching, but people keep telling me that being a special ed teacher is more about case management, which kinda makes me not want to be a special ed teacher so much.)

Ruddy has been asking to go back to his regular class. He can't yet, and he doesn't understand why. We have conversations like this:
"Why doesn't my teacher like me?"
"She does like you, Ruddy."
"Then why doesn't she want me to be in the classroom?"
"I think she's just worried because you did some unsafe things in her class, and she wants everyone to be safe."
"I am being safe."
"You're being safe right now, and we are working on being safe in the classroom, But when you were in your classroom, you were doing unsafe things."
"Wait, so my teacher thinks I'm not safe?"
"She's worried that you might do unsafe things."
"She thinks I'm not safe. That means she doesn't like me."
"Ruddy..."
"This place is like jail!"

I am pretty sure someone in his family told him that he's in my classroom as a punishment, because for the first few weeks, he loved being with us! Then we had his IEP meeting, and the next day he came in all glum-faced and begging to go back to his general ed class.

Is anyone even reading this? Anyone at all???? Hellooooooooooo????????

Can We Make This A Class?

I don't really like rows of desks, but in this case they sort of
make sense. 

I haven't written in this blog all week! I don't usually get home until after 6, and then I spend at least an hour finishing up work, and I feel bad spending additional time on the computer instead of spending it with my dog and cat. They wait patiently for me all day and when I get home I just want to play with them!

Anyways, it has been an interesting week. I got to go do an observation at the Therapeutic Day School. My main reasons for being allowed to observe there were that Montana will officially be going there starting in April, and I will also be getting two new students from there. My room has become somewhat of a holding cell for kids who are transitioning to or from the Therapeutic Day School. I'm starting to accept that for what it is, and trying to do the best that I can with it.

The TDS has a level system in which the kids get extra privileges once they are getting a certain percentage of points on their point sheets. The levels don't fluctuate from day to day like I've seen at some schools. Instead kids have to work hard over a period of time to earn their next level, and once they are there they can keep it unless their behavior starts to seriously decline. However, they can also be put on a Building Trust level, where they lose all of their privilege for a few hours or a day until they can prove to staff that they are back on track. They would get on Building Trust for things like running away from staff or trying to hurt others.

I've put together my own level system that is pretty much the same as that one, except I added my own class's special privileges. For instance at the TDS one privilege they earn is being able to wear hats on Fridays. There is not really a school rule at our school saying they can't wear hats, so this isn't something special that the kids really care about. Some of the privileges I added in were being allowed to use the iPad for their breaks, being allowed to listen to music while they do independent work,  and going to recess and "specials" without an aide.

I also ordered some desks for my classroom. Since it used to be a Learning Support room, what we had was just a bunch of tables that were used for small groups to work at. On Friday the custodian took away one of the tables and brought me four desks instead. I'm not usually a big fan of desks lined up in rows, but in this case it kind of made sense. I spaced them out with plenty of room away from each other. They looked really nice and the kids loved them.

This coming week Anise will be coming back, and Montana will still be there, so for a while I will be back to 3 kids. Plus I've got Skipper some of the time. Skipper is a kindergartner with autism who is having a really difficult time functioning in his classroom. The other day he ended up spending most of the day in my room because he was hitting other kids and "using other kids as trampolines." Not good, Skipper, not good. He's this adorable, big-eyed, shaggy haired kid who is so sweet when he's happy, but like them all, he can be a terror when he's anxious or angry. He's supposed to start coming into my room for "breaks," but I think it is as much of a break for the teacher and classmates as it is for Skipper.

I'm a little worried about this week. I would like this blog to be an inspirational story of how I pull a ragtag bunch of kids together and make them a class... but that is hard to do when they are coming and going left and right. Like I said, it is more of a holding cell. But it is what it is, right? At least this last week nobody threw any tables!

Montana Makes Me Cry

Okay, Montana didn't single-handedly break my heart. It was a little bit of everything.

Yesterday the principal said he wanted to meet with me. This is pretty normal because they meet with us randomly throughout the year for evaluations. I wasn't even worried about it. Until I got there and found out that he was giving me all 0's and 1's on my evaluation (similar to getting D's and C's on a report card) Mostly it was because he said he didn't have "evidence" of a lot of the things that teachers are evaluated on. A big reason for that is because I usually have 1 to 3 kids in my class at the time, they are usually working 1:1 with aides, and more frequently than that they are screaming and hurling furniture at the walls. I tried to explain this to the principal. It was like trying to explain something to... well, to a child who is hurling furniture at the walls. Nothing was getting through. He also complained that my room wasn't "welcoming" enough, and also that I had too many things out in the open that could be used by students as projectiles. So basically I am supposed to turn my room into an empty cell, with all the toys and books and art supplies under lock and key, while still making it look "welcoming."

I went back to my room with my proverbial tail between my legs, but I tried to get into a good state of mind because Montana and Ruddy were there, and we had an assembly to go to first thing in the morning. We try to go to those things when we can, and I'd been preparing them for over two weeks by talking about it every day during our daily Good Of The Order meetings.

The assembly went smoothly... both boys sat nicely through it. We went back to class, and started our school work. Then it was time for Montana to go to gym class. He usually looks forward to gym class, and today was no different. Miss Dragonfly always brings him to gym class and then stays with him until it is over. In the meantime, I did some one-on-one work with Ruddy.

All too soon, though, Montana burst through the door, followed closely by Miss Dragonfly. He quickly grabbed a chair and tossed it against the wall. As I hustled Ruddy into the next room with his work, Miss Dragonfly explained, "Gym class was cancelled due to the assembly."

The assembly. Of course. I hadn't put two and two together.

To make things worse, the special ed director happened to be there. She looked at me sharply and said, "He should have been told ahead of time about that."

Well, yeah... but...

Montana whipped through the room and tore it apart. He tore up books, tore the posters off the walls, tore up all of his school work, overturned every chair and table, even knocked the clock off the wall and smashed it on the leg of an overturned chair. It went on for an hour. As long as he wasn't actually injuring himself or anyone else, we had to just wait it out.

I was standing next to Miss Dragonfly and trying hard not to cry, feeling like the most awful teacher ever. I was literally holding back tears.

Of course by the end of the day things were a little better. But today Montana spent most of the day blowing up. At this point we have more broken furniture than whole furniture. Every chance she gets, the special ed director mentions what a crappy job I'm doing... no mention of the fact that I never asked to be, or claimed to be good at being, a behavior specialist.

I'm glad it is the weekend!

Montana Makes Me Smile

My "class" is back up to an entire 2 kids, at least for a while. A few weeks ago the powers that be wanted Ruddy to come in for "behavior support" 2 times during the day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. It mostly consisted of Ruddy doing whatever the rest of us were doing at the time, while getting reinforced for his positive behavior. (His behavior is almost always positive in my room.) A few days later they said he was getting in trouble in the cafeteria, and they wanted him to come eat lunch in my room as well. Then they said he was having behavior problems at the end of the school day, and they wanted him to come to my room at the end of the day for a "check out" and have me walk him to his bus.

Today they were like, "By the way, Ruddy is going to be in your class all day from now on." At least for the foreseeable future, which could be anywhere from a week to the rest of the school year depending on what they decide at his upcoming IEP meeting.

I was a little irritated at first. Not because I don't like Ruddy... I do, he's a nice little guy... but because I'm starting to feel like my "class" is just a holding cell for kids they don't know what else to do with... kids who are inbetween hospitalizations, or on their way to the therapeutic school, or suspended, or whatnot. It is hard to create any semblance of order when they are bounced in and out like this!

But then the special ed director told me that Ruddy's teacher doesn't seem to like Ruddy and would prefer not to have him in her class at all. She sees no good in him and is just, like, "Get him out of here."

When I heard that, my first words were, "Then lets just keep him in here."

Of course it isn't that simple!

On another note, here's the sweet moment of the day!

On my desk is a little mailbox that I painted at the beginning of the school year. Way back then, when I was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, I hoped to encourage kids to write by asking them to leave me notes in the mailbox. Then life got chaotic, and I forgot about the mailbox, until today when Montana asked about it. I told him its original purpose. Montana seemed to half listen and then he wandered off. I heard him ask the aide for a piece of paper, but didn't think anything of it.

A few moments later I noticed that Montana was acting like a goof ball. He was spinning around the room, and then he was jumping up and down, and then he was hiding under the table and giggling.

"Whats up with you, Montana?" I asked him.

He giggled, "I think you have some mail!"

Sure enough, the little flag on my mailbox was up.

Inside was a folded up sheet of paper. On it, Montana had written, "Miss Butterfly you are a good techer."

My heart melted.

I kinda wish he wasn't going to the therapeutic school. My days will be easier once he goes... but I sure am going to miss him!

Students And Work Refusal

What do you do with kids who refuse to do any work? This has been a serious issue with Montana all year long. Anise too, to some extent, depending on her mood, but definitely Montana. He will flat out refuse to do work, and nothing can change his mind.

The kids are on an incentive program where they earn a token for each piece of work they do. They can trade their tokens for preferred break time choices before lunch and at the end of the day. They can also save up tokens to trade for a special activity on Fridays. 

The work isn't even terribly demanding. I try to make it fun and authentic, and gear it towards their interests. For instance, Montana and Persius hate writing, so much that just getting them to pick up a pencil can be torturous. So I helped them start their own blogs. They loved their blogs and wrote like crazy for a while... until I started trying to teach them to go back and edit their work for punctuation, capitalization, grammar, etc. Then it became work. Persius still writes in his blog and will even edit it, but Montana just spends his blogging time trying to find pictures to add to his blog, or sneakily visiting other websites. 

Sometimes I can sort of trick Montana into doing some work. Today I had a magazine article about a video game. I started reading part of it out loud in a casual, "Hey, this is interesting" type of way, and Montana came over and sat down. He listened to me read, and answered comprehension questions and everything. At the end, I pointed out that the article had a writing prompt suggesting we write about a video game we'd like to create. When I agreed to do the physical writing part as long as Montana did the thinking, he dove right into it. Afterwards I made sure to tell him he did great work, and gave him his token. 

But more frequently, he won't work. If you press him, he'll destroy the work you're trying to give him, and then move on to rip the rest of the room apart. 

I prefer to not press Montana, instead reminding him that he will earn tokens for his break time if he does some work, and that it is his choice. Then I go do something else. He will literally sit on a bean bag chair all day long, doing nothing, while loudly complaining about how bored he is. 

There are two ways of thinking about this. I tend to lean towards wanting to bring the learning to where he's at. In other words, "If Montana refuses to do this work, I need to keep trying to find something that will engage him so he can learn." However, my supervisor, the school psychologist who happens to share the room with me and tends to be somewhat of a micromanager, leans towards, "He needs to comply. Take everything away until he can comply."

I wish I knew what to do, I just read an article saying to focus your attention and efforts on the kids who are enthusiastic, and make joining in seem like the best choice. But I only have 3 kids most of the time, and with Anise away at Residential I'm down to 2! Ruddy loves to do his work and earn tokens, and even asks to do extra work during his breaks in order to earn more tokens. Unfortunately Montana could care less what Ruddy is doing, and would probably rather do the opposite.

So, any advice? What would you do for a kid like Montana?

Just When I Was Getting Used To It

This classroom was actually destroyed by Hurricane Katrina...
but it is similar to how my classroom has looked a few times
after Montana and Anise ripped through it. 

Just yesterday I was thinking to myself that I was getting used to this job. I was starting to accept the things I cannot change... that I am now the Behavior Room teacher and not the Resource teacher. Our days had started to take on a pattern, and we were becoming a real class.

Of course nothing stays the same.

Today I found out that Anise has been sent to a residential treatment center in another state, and will be gone for at least a few weeks. And in a few weeks, Montana is transferring to the Therapeutic Day School. So by this time next month my little class will not be a class anymore.

Anise and Montana are the reason we created a behavior classroom in the first place. Before, it was just the "Support Room," where kids could come to take sensory breaks and participate in social skills groups. There wasn't even a teacher...most of the kids were supervised by classroom assistants when they came. When Montana and Anise moved into the district... within days of eachother, each having moved from another state... and had each torn up their classrooms multiple times within the first few weeks... the principal decided that we needed a full-time behavior program immediately. Literally immediately, as in, "We're hiring someone else to teach Resource so you can run the new behavior program, starting tomorrow."

If you are a special ed teacher and you're thinking, "Yeah right, this can't be true... this is a fictional tale written by someone who has no idea of how special ed works!"...Yes, I know how odd it sounds. How could a principal completely change a teacher's job, in the middle of the school year, without even asking if she wanted the new position? But it happened. And after complaining loudly to the principal, vice principal, union leader, school board, superintendent of schools, and my mother, I finally gave up and decided to just go with it.

The first few weeks were rough. The support room had been designed as a sensory paradise, with a cave made out of a table, black sheets, and lots of pillows, where kids could cool off or be alone for a while, several sensory bins, dim lighting, a trampoline, an inviting reading area, a yoga ball, a tunnel, and some toys. Now all of the toys, the sensory bins, the yoga ball, and even the books, had been put in a locked file cabinet. We'd created a daily schedule and rules and an incentive system, Within those first few weeks, the trampoline had been destroyed, most of the books torn up, the tunnel smashed, and the yoga ball deflated along with my spirit.

But I grew to like the kids in spite of myself. I forgave them for destroying all of our stuff, and I bought new stuff, some of which they destroyed again but some of which they liked enough to take care of. I tried to research ways that I could teach them, ways that I could deal with their behaviors, and projects we could do as a group.

I even had moments like the few I had yesterday, where Anise and Montana meshed with each other and with the drop-in kids, used appropriate social skills, did their school work, and even seemed happy. Moments where I thought, "I kinda love this new job!"

And now Anise is gone, and Montana is going.  Weird how things turn out.

Starts Rotten, Ends Up Nice

Sometimes at work I feel like I am on a sinking ship.

I've verbalized this to some of my co-workers (I guess I'm supposed to call them "team members") during desperate moments. I told one friend, another special ed teacher at my school, "I feel like I'm on the Titanic, and it is slowly sinking, and the band is playing and everyone thinks everything is normal, but we're sinking!" The other teacher laughed and said, "None of us think this is normal. Just don't jump ship."

This morning Anise came to school in full rage mode, screaming at the top of her lungs and flipping over tables. She actually picked up a table and threw it at the wall, so hard that the legs broke holes in the plaster. An aide had taken the other kids (Montana, plus Persius, who was spending the entire morning with us because of an in-school suspension) into the next room when Anise had started blowing out, but the noise was so loud even from there that the aide ended up taking them to the library.

Anise flipped out for an hour while I stood by helplessly. If I tried to talk with her, she screamed more.
They had told me when they switched me to this job that I wouldn't be alone with Anise (she's as tall as me and probably stronger( but it was always happening anyways.

Finally, finally, Anise ran out of steam, just as the aide was returning with the boys.
We were joined byRuddy, who spends part of the day with us and part with his general education class. We had our morning meeting. The kids were all calm and happy, and actually participated in morning meeting instead of stomping around with frowns on their faces. (Montana and Anise are prone to that. Ruddy is prone to that in his regular classroom, but in here he happily does anything I ask him to. I think he's still in the honeymoon stage in our room.) 

They had sensory time. I'd brought them Kinetic Sand, and they all played happily with it, making chit-chat with each other, while I managed to get some other work done.

Then Ruddy went back to class, and Anise and Montana both did some school work.
That alone is nothing short of a miracle! They tear up their work more often than they actually attempt to do it.

The rest of the day proceeded just as smoothly! Anise and Montana did their work, took their breaks, participated in their social skills group, and got all of their points for the day. They did not fight at all. (There have been days when we've had to put them in separate rooms and lock the door, to keep them from trying to kill each other. Literally!)

I find myself starting to think that we are actually becoming a class, instead of a group of strangers being held prisoner in the same small room. 

I've been piping calming music in through the speakers. Maybe that is helping! Or maybe God was smiling on me today! Either way, I'm actually halfway looking forward to tomorrow. 

Call Me Miss Butterfly

While going through student teaching, I loved reading "teacher blogs" and getting new ideas and advice. I looked forward to the day that I could start my own teacher blog.However, things didn't turn out that way... when i finally did get a teaching job, it was at a school so understaffed and underequipped that, by the time I finished working each night, I was lucky if I had enough energy left over to take a shower, let alone start a creative and clever teaching blog full of my own ideas. 

Originally my job was as a Resource teacher for K-3 students. They spent most of their time in general education classrooms, and came to me for reading, writing and math. I enjoyed teaching, but it was a lot different from what I was used to. During student teaching I worked in self-contained rooms, where I was in charge of no more than 10 children all day long. As a Resource teacher, I was in charge of 21 children and had a half hour a day with each of them, in groups of anywhere from 3 to 12, to improve their ever-so-important test scores. It was challenging and it was all I could do to keep up with it. 

And then I got the news. 

Our small town's school district has only one elementary school, and it had never had, or needed, a self-contained behavior classroom. But in the last few years they'd started seeing more and more students with severe emotional and behavioral disabilities. One new student in particular came with several mental health diagnoses, and behaviors so severe that we were advised not to turn our back on her. She could not be tossed into a general eduation classroom, even for part of her day. So right then in the middle of the school year, the Powers That Be decided that they were starting a behavior program... and I was going to be the teacher. 

Before I knew it, the Powers That Be had locked up all of the learning toys and sensory things that I'd gathered, and rerouted all of my academic students to other teachers. I was now the proud owner of a classroom with exactly one student. Shortly thereafter we were joined by a second student. Occasionally others float in and out for breaks and support. But here's the thing... I have no idea what I'm doing! I've never been a behavior teacher before, and I don't think this school is exacrly providing me with the resources I need to be a good one. Don't get me wrong, I love the kids I work with. But I'm winging it here.  

So I am starting this blog in hopes of meeting other special ed teachers who can advise me on how to run this classroom that has been hoisted upon me!

I choose to remain anonymous, because I want to be able to write about my job without being in serious danger. I will tell the truth in this blog, but I will change some of the specific details in order to keep my cover. So, for now, my name is Miss Butterfly. The students you will meet most frequently in this blog are:
Anise, a 4th grade girl 
Montana, a 4th grade boy
Persius, a 3rd grade boy
Ruddy, a 3rd grade boy

Thanks for joining us on this unexpected journey!