How does that happen?????

Arrived at work this morning at my typical time. Sat down and began checking my various e-mail accounts. I have 3, 1 personal and 2 for work. It was just about time for the 1st bell to ring to start the day and the assistant principal came over the pa asking for all staff members to come to the media center. That's fancy talk for the library. As the collective masses made their way opposite the bevy of students coming in we all couldn't help but wonder what had happened now or who did it. To our surprise we were to learn that a young man from the school lost his life last night in an apparent overdose of drugs. Throughout the day bits of information was gathered through the grapevine. Students were very solemn. For a big high school things were very subdued. The question on my mind was whether it was accidental or suicide. I would soon learn that it was a mystery to everyone involved. An autopsy had been ordered. It would seem that the overdose did not take place at home or even at a friend's house. It happened at the juvenile detention center. How does a kid in juevie die of a drug overdose? It just blows my mind that something like that could get past the officers and staff of the facility. I have a hard time understanding this. It makes me wonder what is wrong with the system? How often does something like this actually happen in these facilities? Is this really the best place for kids that are out of control? Was this a kid who went along with the crowd because he didn't know any better? Or did he feel there was no other option and that he was a disappointment to his family? If these kids are under as much surveillance as we are lead to believe, how did he get the drugs? Most likely we may never know.

OMG!!!!

Have I mentioned that I am single and don't have children? I believe there is a reason why I don't have children. One I work with them all day. The second is I babysit for my family and friends.
My best friend has four children. I have watched them since birth. The youngest is my god-daughter. I love these kids as if they were my real nieces and nephew. Andy is 10, Elizabeth is 9, Madeline is 7, and Sarah is 5. Becky had to work 10-8 yesterday so my sister and I said we would watch them for the day. Thankfully it was my nephew's weekend with his dad. So, I get up yesterday and get the kids started on the weekly chores. They are to clean their rooms. Not a one wanted to do this. They know this is their saturday job and they were testing the waters. I told them to get started and at least pick up 20 things each. The girls finished and then it was time to play beautyshop. Each of the girls had nail polish out and one was doing my hands and the other two my feet. I now have every color under the sun on my nails. They did my make-up and my hair. I was soooo beautiful.
Laura and I made plans for the afternoon and informed the kids we wanted the rooms finished so we could sweep. We got complaints and stall tactics but we got them upstairs. We fixed lunch and told them we wanted to leave by 1:00. Each kid that cleaned the room would get to pick something out at the store. We had 3 successes and 1 failure. The youngest decided to play more than clean. The older kids were very excited. So we load them all up in the van and head for the mall.
Let me tell you what, four kids in the mall, what were we thinking? Oh My God!!! Laura had one by the hand and I had another. The two oldest walked in between us. The 9 year kept walking on the back of Laura's feet. The 5 year old was running, jumping, and skipping while twisting my arm. I kept asking her to walk right but she kept at it. Eventually I had had enough and shouted to Laura "I need to switch!!!!!!" Then she would not sit down and eat when it was time for dinner. ARRRGGGG!!!!! Then on the van ride home Laura looks in the rear view mirror to discover that she is eating construction paper. What was going on with this kid? I turn around to see the oldest and second youngest laughing and gyrating around in their seats. "What are you doing?" I ask. "Why dancing of course." Of course. Laura and I looked at them and said to each other, "well, they are Mark and Becky's kids.
Don't get me wrong. We had a fun day. But by the time we got home we were exhausted. There was a highlight to the day. I came up with the idea to have the kids make Becky a Mother's Day present. We decided to make her an apron. The kids piked a red one since that is Becky's favorite color. Each child picked out an iron patch to represent them. Andy is a turtle (his favorite animal). Elizabeth picked a flower. Madeline chose a pink poodle. Sarah chose a rainbow colored fish. We got puffy paint to draw with; a red, white, and blue heart, and letters to spell out #1 mom. I got everything ironed on and had each kid come out and write them name with the paint they chose. Then we put their birthdates on and drew some pictures. Becky actually got off from work early and ruined the surprise. She loved it though and the kids were sooo excited to show her what they had done.

my job

I have often wondered if college professors in the education field have ever actually taught in a public school classroom. Sometimes I feel that I was not fully prepared to handle all of the various aspects of a special education teacher. To be honest, none of my cooperating teachers ever let on either. I knew I would be writing IEPs and taking data to show progress. What I wasn't prepared for was dealing with the parents. I think we should have had a course in that. Behavior management for the students? Sure, I had a class in that. But dealing with a parent's behavior? Not even close. For the most part this school year, I have great parents. But there is always one. It is really hard to make progress with a student whom is non- compliant when the parent is the same way. Yesterday was an inservice day in the district. This gave me an opportunity to play catch up in the room since I am not required to attend the meetings. I spent the whole day just dealing with issues on this one student. To start off with, he is truant. He has not been to school since February 28th. I have had the truancy officer out to the house twice. The problem is that said student has since turned 18 and I can guarentee that Mom hasn't gotten guardianship of him. According to her on the last visit, the son is in Indiana with grandpa and they can't get student to return home. Now pardon me but if grandpa is ready to return to Ohio then said student should have no choice but to come back with Grandpa. Originally we were going to do a surprise home visit yesterday to see if student was at home and have an impromptu IEP meeting. I had about a day and half's notice to write an IEP on a student that has not set foot in my room in almost two months. Mid morning yesterday I learned that we were going to follow protocol and give a two notice for the meeting. I then spent the entire afternoon going through his cum file to see how it would be possible to get him graduated sooner. I am going to be ticked off if I do all of this and he doesn't return. They say the burn out rate for special education teachers is 11 years. I am at that mark and there are some days I can see why. I am not ready to give up yet, but I teeter on a thin line. Generally those are days when I get fed up with the politics of the job. I think I just found my next topic.

End of an era

I am calling this blog an end of an era today because something sentimental occurred yesterday. I bought my first car in January of 1999. I was so proud of my choice. My dad was impressed that I had picked it out on my own. I was determined to drive that car until the wheels fell off of it. It was a 1997 Pontiac Grand Am. The color was my favorite. I called it metallic green. I refinanced on it at one point when I needed cheaper payments but finally paid it off in 2006. Two weeks after paying it off I was in an accident and had to have about $3,000 worth of repairs done on it, but I still continued to drive it. Last fall my sister was having financial problems due to her lazy-ass husband. He got laid off and when he discovered that he wasn't going back anytime soon, he was reluctant to look for work. That is partly why they are separated now. To make matters worse my sister had to have major surgery and was off work for 6 weeks. I think you can figure out what happened. She lost her car. So being the big sister I looked over my finances and decided that I could afford a new car payment and I had saved enough for a nice downpayment that I would not have to use my car as a trade in. So I did research on the internet and found a nice Chevy Blazer in my price range. I purchased it in September and gave my sister my Grand Am. My dad had been thinking of something to do and was shocked when I got the new vehicle. This is one of the perks of being a teacher. I have my summers free and if I want to work a second job I can. So my sister began driving the car. I new it needed some work but we were hoping to get her through at least a year until her bankruptcy cleared. This was not going to be the case. Yesterday, she traveled down her in my Grand Am but returned to Fremont in her own new vehicle. We went back to the dealer I had gone through. They gave me $300 for my car which is more than I expected. Laura put as much as she could and I added a little. Now she and my nephew will be much safer on the rode. She drove off the lot with a 2003 Pontiac Grand Prix. It is very nice. We took it out for a test drive and stopped at a gas station to look under the hood. We had just a smidge of trouble finding the release for the hood but finally got it up. The engine was in pristine condition. As we were trying to put the hood back down some guy hollers over asking if we need help. He comes over and says, "You've got dealer plates on it and you already broke it?" We respond back that we were just looking under the hood. He says, "Well, What are you looking for?" Laura says, "I'm looking to buy it and we want to check the condition?" He asks again "Like what". As if we don't know anything about cars. I shot back," Gee let's see, the condition of the hoses, fraying on the belts, build up on the connectors for the battery." Laura pitches in with "Just because we are female doesn't mean we don't know anything about cars." He threw his hands up and began to walk off. By this point we had the hood down and were getting back in the car and I decided to add "Just because the hairs blonde doesn't mean the brain doesn't work." The man had the nerve to flip me off. I don't think Laura saw it but I did. We enjoyed a nice laugh over this the rest of the evening. As I was signing over my first car I was a little sad. Laura was joking with me saying you're not going to cry are you? Like I said earlier, it holds a lot of sentimental memories. Like my nephew's first vacation. My sister and I drove to Tennessee with him right after he turned 1. He is going to be 5 in a few weeks. Then there are all the small trips she and I took over the years. Am I being over emotional? I mean it was the first thing that I ever bought and paid for completely on my own. I should have the right to be a little sad. No one will probably ever drive that car again. It is probably going to end up a peice of twisted metal. But it was my car and it served my family well. Like I said, it's an end of an era for me.

Who I am

Well, I can't believe I am doing this. My best friend recently started a blog to document her day to day life while her husband is over seas for his second tour of duty. I have never done anything like this before. I have never even been in a chat room. The closest I got to anything like this was when I took some online classes last fall and we had to post responses to each other. So who am I? I am a single female living in a small town community outside of Columbus, Ohio. No one in my family could believe that I would be the one to end up moving the farthest from home. Home is a small town in Northwest Ohio. I have an older brother and a younger sister. My sister and I are 15 months apart in age. She is my co-conspirator in ife. We are as close as any siblings can be. We fought like cats and dogs when we were growing up. I really think my parents were afraid we would kill each other eventually. We had to share a bedroom and we actually took tape and divided our room in half. My sister thought she was good because she had the closet on her side. I won on this one, I had the door. But we have grown up, for the most part and even though there are over one hundred miles between us, we are there for each other. She currently resides with my best friend who I mentioned earlier. She is in the process of separating from her current husband. Yes, my sister is twice burned by cupid. I have never seen her more excited though. She is getting her first place on her own. She has always lived with another adult. She has never lived on her own. She and my 4 year old nephew will be moving into their new place next week.
I just realized I was talking more about my sister than me. Can you tell that I am more comfortable talking about other people than myself. I am hoping this will help me with focusing on me. I am the type that deals with everyone elses problems before mine. My doctor is trying to help me with this problem. I need to take time for me. Maybe it has something to do with the job I do. I am what is known in Ohio as an Intervention Specialist. Snazzy title huh? Basically what it boils down to is I am a Special Education Teacher. I teach at the local high school in town. I have a cross categorical/multiple disabilities unit. I have 7 students on my class roster. My youngest student is 17 and my oldest is 20. I teach a functional curriculum and work on skills needed to function independently in the community. 2 days out of my week are spent out in the community job coaching and practicing the functional skills we are learning in the classroom such as purchasing and paying for items, shopping for things that are on a list, etc.... I LOVE my job. Not too many people can say that. Sure there are days where I get frustrated with things, but its the kids that keep me coming back each day. When they accomplish a goal it is awesome. We have so much fun also. Some of my students have never had the opportunity to shop for their own clothes. They had no idea what size they needed. Every week they ask me now if we are going shopping. Wal Mart is there favorite place to go.
My students are just about finished with their Earth Day activity so I will close for now. More later.