First Day of Student Teaching

When a child has a severe disability, is it better if they remain in the classroom or is it more beneficial if they are removed and placed in a different learning environment? At KW there is a girl that I will call Beth to keep her privacy. She has severe autism and is not able to participate in any of the regular activities during the day. The teacher has tried to work with her but it is very difficult when you have a class of 22 other students who have the same right to be learning. Instead Beth sits at a computer in the front of the class. She is supposed to be on educational games and programs but in smart enough to work her way on to the internet to YouTube and other websites. She stays quite throughout most of the class time yet when there is any change or transition; she loses it and has an episode. An episode consists of her fake crying, screaming, and throwing herself on the floor disturbing not only the class but classes throughout the wing. It took me by surprise and I’m wondering how it is going to go throughout the semester. The first school I student teach at is a school in a lower income area. I expected to see a lot of new situations but one thing I did not expect to see were kids getting hair cuts at school. It was right by the gym entrance; students plopped in chairs getting their hair cut if it was too ratty or long. This is a good service but not one I expected to see. On aspect of being a lower income school, many of the students in the class have a big sis or big brother. This is a mentor program where students in High School and college are paired with elementary school students. During the school week, they visit and hang out, work on puzzles, eat lunch, or work on computers. One girl was taken out during reading, a kind of important subject, and her big sis stayed with her for over 3 hours. She missed all of the afternoon lessons. Don’t get me wrong it’s wonderful to have mentors for these children but I feel it’s counterproductive to have them taken out during class. Mentors help these students stay on the right path instead of getting mixed up in gangs. Speaking of gangs, I saw gang symbols today at school. I few students in class have partly shaved eyebrows which represent one of the gangs in the area. I don’t know much about gangs but it is so sad to see 9 year olds already influenced. On the positive side, lunch was probably the most hilarious thing I have ever seen. First all the teachers have to shovel their food in their mouth because they are given about 20 minutes to eat before recess duty. My soup didn’t even have time to cool down from the microwave. Once at recess it was like seeing a swarm of bees on the slide. Legs where flying, bodies stacked on body, with at least 10 kids climbing on the outside of the slide. The teachers didn’t seem fazed by this. On the other side was the largest game of soccer I have ever seen, made me miss my days of soccer. All in all it was a good day; it was just an eye opener to many things.