When I was in school...I never had to go to the Principles office My brother of course, spent plenty of time there. In fact, school administration wondered if the two of us were really related. After all I was such an angel and he was...well, not an angel. Well, now I get my turn to visit the Principle and I know all of the school administration on a first name bases and it's not just because I'm a regular volunteer. They know my kids, and they know them intimately.
I actually called this meeting after getting one of those infamous phone calls just as I was finishing up a nice leisurely lunch with a couple of girlfriends. You know when you see the caller I.D. on your phones says the name of your child's school and your heart stops for just a second. You wonder, "who did what now?" Well, this call was to inform me that my son was being pulled from all "regular education" classes and back into the special education setting for the balance of the school year. What!? Excuse me...what the hell are you talking about? I'm thinking as my heart starts racing and my head starts swimming. So much for that glass of wine with lunch. They just killed my buzz!
The call caught me off guard to say the least. They explained how this was for the safety of my son as well as other students. "We're trying to keep him from getting himself into more serious trouble. We would appreciate if you would support us on this decision." I reluctantly agreed in order to end the phone call, but my like I said, my head was still spinning.
When he got home he let me have it! "How could you agree to that?! Why are you letting them do this to me?" I stood strong and replied, "You have not been listening to reason. You've been upsetting two students consistently for most of the year and you don't understand the seriousness of your actions. It is my job to protect you when you can't seem to protect yourself. I don't want to see you in serious trouble that I can not protect you from."
His "mind blindness" does not allow him to see how his line of thinking is completely irrational. His lack of empathy will not allow him to understand how it makes others feel when he will not accept that someone does not want to be his friend and they don't have to be his friend, just because he wants them to. He can not see that constantly asking someone every day...why are you mad at me? Why can't I call you? Why can't we be friends?" could potentially drive someone nuts! He can not see that other students have their own social and emotional issues that have nothing to do with him. They have their own moods, feelings and baggage that have nothing to do with him. All he can see is what he wants.
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Sittin in the Principles Office
Logging you in...Comments by IntenseDebate
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Adelaide Dupont · 284 weeks ago
And for those of us who knew and appreciated these points in high school to a greater or lesser extent - always good to have a refresher and feel them through the current and future generations who we survived to be able to see.
I especially appreciated points 5, 7 and 10.
And young women not settling or settling down yet is a good thing.
"It's never too late to live our dreams" - but it may be too early for some of them!
And 8 of course.
nicole · 243 weeks ago
Risa · 230 weeks ago
LAH · 221 weeks ago
Maira L. Coral · 216 weeks ago
I was looking for information for my Multi-Genre Disability Research Project from my Early Childhood Special Education class on the web, when suddenly I came across your blog. I started reading this out of curiosity and I want to tell you that as you said yourself, you will not be Amanda Gorman, but you managed to make me shed some tears, perhaps because I felt totally identified with your words, especially in the part that you speak of your son. My son also has Asperger's syndrome, he is 19 years old and he is in the second semester of College. Also like yours, he takes classes from home, likewise my eldest daughter is also taking college classes from her room. At the same time, that I work as a preschool teacher from my kitchen through a computer, my husband sleeps in the room during the day because he works at night. Also in the afternoons I myself take virtual school classes. I am a 51-year-old Latin woman who began to learn the English language as adult, so maybe you find some deficiencies in my writing, however, I was very moved by how proud you express yourself about your son. Referent your mother, I liked the humorous tone that you give when your talk about her, so I did not want to miss this opportunity and stopped my assignments for a moment to let you know that your words do make a difference, since they reach the heart of at least those who have opportunity to read you. I want confess you that is the most long I have written to someone I don't know, because your words inspired me, thank you...
Gavin Bollard · 208 weeks ago
Thanks for this post. I've been very distracted of late and so this was how I found out about our friend Kate. Kate's struggles were very real but they were so constant and so wide-ranging that it was difficult for people around her to address them. I think it's going to take a while longer for me to process all this.
I learned so much from Kate because she was always quick to point out the many injustices in the world. In her glory days, she was very much a crusader and she cared for everyone. Over the years, as her situation took its toll, I came to realise that it was the fact that she couldn't be put in a single specific category, that made the system fail her. She needed help that they weren't set up to provide.
She needed more care and she needed to be less alone. I'm so sorry that this has happened.
For a long while we were corresponding almost every day but a couple of months ago, I realised that she had become so stressed that nearly every interaction I had with her was starting to trigger her. I backed away to give her a bit more space. She only had a little time that she could stand to be online and there were too many things that she wanted to do in that time. I thought that by taking a step back, she could reach out to more people who might be geographically closer and able to assist.
Kate was a beautiful soul and she will be sorely missed by all of us.
diyalabs6192603 11p · 191 weeks ago
Robots for kids
Robotic Online Classes
Robotics School Projects
Programming Courses Malaysia
Coding courses
Coding Academy
coding robots for kids
Coding classes for kids
Coding For Kids
Spoil your cat · 121 weeks ago
Many of these living arrangement aren't good, and many of the people who run those places really don't have the residents' best interest at heart. Those places are like old age homes and foster homes, where you sometimes hear horror stories. They're hard to trust. But then there are good ones, of course.
The best thing for an autistic adult is either to go on living at home or working and renting an apartment and living independently, but that isn't always an option.
Duncan · 111 weeks ago