"In-Between Teacher" Appreciation Week

I had quite an appreciated and appreciative day. :)

After settling in at Little Kid School (i.e., work), I headed over to the Teacher's Lounge, totally dressed casual and in my Adidas, reasoning that it's a minimum day, everyone usually dresses down, and I wouldn't see anyone anyways. Of course I ran into 1/4 of the staff and the principal! There was a nice breakfast spread in honor of the teachers for Teacher's Appreciation Week. I was a little embarrassed about dressing more like a student than a teacher (ironically, today's student competition was "Dress Like a Teacher"), but I still went about with my business. I was even more embarrassed when the principal was standing next to me (the one, whom I just told my Big Kid School classmate on Tuesday, that doesn't even know my name), said hello + my name after I greeted her. I guess she does know my name after all!

Later, I saw N320 and even though he was all giggly (it was right after snack, a horrible time to work with him), I was proud of some of the modifications I quickly thought of and implemented. Since he was being mischievous (and he has the BEST smile to go with it), I really simplified the tasks. By the third activity, I was really losing his attention, but thankfully, we were done with the boring drill stuff. We were on "What-Bingo," but it was still challenging for him b/c it was the first time I wasn't letting him see the picture to match the answer on his Bingo board. I also tried, at first, to get him to use his knowledge of colors functionally (i.e, take the RED chip and put it on...) but that wasn't going so well so I quickly altered the task. I put out 5 chips (a mini-duration "visual"; "only 5 more chips then all done...4 more, then lunch, etc.) and covered up his entire board except for one row or column that had the particular answer (two modifications that totally helped!). Totally maximum prompting and structuring but at this point, it was about getting him to complete the task (i.e., extinction of behavior maintained by negative reinforcement; i.e., misbehaving to escape from the task). We barely made it and then he reached to paw me. No harm done; we diverted it with an appropriate handshake.

Afterwards, I was en route to the Teacher's Lounge when one of my HFA boys saw me, looked me in the eye, and greeted me! I was THRILLED!! I thought he was going to ignore me as their disorder really hinders this simple social skill that we often take for granted. True, he saw me look at him as I walked past, which probably prompted him to greet me, but I was taking it for all it's worth! Over the past few months, when I've seen him, he doesn't even look up, much more look at me and say hello. The social skills therapy and "assignments" I give them just might be generalizing after only three weeks!! Woohoo!!

When I got to the Teacher's Lounge to check my mailbox, I ran into the teacher who doubles as the school ASB coordinator. He commented on my survey from Tuesday and how he is totally with me on Nacho Libre being an awesome movie. (Phew! I'm not the only dork on campus!) When I asked him what it was for, he said that it was for Teacher's Appreciation (ASB is going to post them up for students to get to know their teachers). He also commented about how I'm not really a teacher, but it would be nice for the students to know a little bit about me. He didn't say the faux-teacher-comment in an offensive way, but it did strike me funny.

I went back to my room to prep and called two of my SDC kids. I've narrowed the group down to seeing these two in one session b/c they both need work on social skills and their language and cognition is higher than the other SDC kids. Again, I was thrilled with my two kids! My unprogrammed boy self-corrected holding his pencil correctly! His teacher has been nagging him ALL year. Last week, I talked to him for like a minute about holding his pencil right and why he should ("you don't want people to look at you funny, do you?" Seriously, that's all it takes with this one, sometimes) and today, he picked up the pencil his usual way. I was about to prompt him, but he independently stopped and repositioned it into the correct grip. I was like, HOLY SNIKEYS! Beaming from ear to ear. :) (Who knew that SLPs would also double as OTs?) Not only that, but for the first time, I didn't have to prompt him every single time it was his turn! I only prompted him once out of the entire session vs. literally 10 times! I was floored! At the end, I told him how proud I was about all those things. I'm sure that social praise was positive reinforcement to the umpteenth power for him. As for my ASD girl, I was really pleased with the sentences she wrote and the thoughts conveyed. I've struggled to see her full potential b/c when she is with the other SDC girls, she is often overshadowed and she gives up easily out of frustration. I sent them both back to call the rest of the SDC girls.

Only three out of the four were present. Right away, the talkative one said/asked, "We can play a game today?" "No." "Why not?" "Because you didn't ask me correctly. If you're asking me a question, then you start it off with, 'can we..." Dude, that taught them fast! They immediately tried again, "Miss L___, can we play a game?" "No, it's too late. That will teach you to remember to ask me correctly next week on the first try." And for the rest of the period, she never once asked me with the wrong structure! Why didn't I do this like in September with her?! Oh yeah, b/c I didn't know what the heck I was doing back then until January. She even corrected one of the girls. LOL

At one point during the session, another ASB rep stopped by to drop off this wonderful card!
My talkative girl that loves to stall asked, "Can you read it?" I said, "Yes I will since you asked so nicely."
I was so touched! The funny thing is that after I read the message (and replaced "problems" with "difficulties"), the quieter, curious one who always asks me questions about me, commented, "But you're not really a teacher, are you?" The talkative one chimed in, "Yeah, what are you?" I said, "Well, I sort of am, but am not. I'm what you call a therapist--" Before I could blab more, the talkative one said, "Oh, you're almost like a teacher, but you're not! You're in-between!" LOL I guess so.

So funny that twice in one day, I get the faux-teacher comment, too! I kinda like this in-between teacher status. Haha. :)

Since Mother's Day is coming up, they asked if I have any kids. I said, no, unless you count my turtle. In truth, I consider all of them as my kids.