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!