Today was the first of monthly visits I’m scheduled to make to Quinn’s classroom to help out in the mornings. I agreed to once a month, thinking I would do this for both the boys and be at the school once every two weeks. Turns out that the kindergarten class doesn’t need me, but the Grade 1’s were happy to have the help. After today I may be offering up more of my mornings.
Everyone knows every child is different and it is impossibly hard to compare any one child to another. Personalities, learning styles, comprehension, focus, and the general willingness to please (or not) are just a few of the characteristics that you find crammed into one classroom. All of these characteristics can make a classroom very crowded despite the number of children there are inside. Quinn has 16 kids in his classroom. This was amazing news for us considering Jordynn has had up to 31 kids in her classrooms over the years. I think it is wonderful to have a smaller class. You would think it would give a teacher an abundance of time for individual attention. This is not necessarily the case.
I spent the morning with a beautiful little boy who I was told has yet to be “assessedâ€. This particular little man needs one on one attention to be able to stay focused on a task and unfortunately he does not have an EA. He and I had a very successful morning together and the teachers were happy with his progress. This progress only happens for this little trooper when he has someone working with him. Unfortunately all the other days, when there isn’t the one on one, he does not find the same success or achievement. This broke my heart. This is also hard on the teacher who is unable to give what she obviously wants to give to this student as it would take from all the others. 16 is a rather big number now in my eyes.
Then I saw children who just seemed to not have any respect for the teachers repeated requests to be quiet, pay attention, work on the assignment, or put up their hand. I was however told that today they were a little excitable (likely due to my presence), but I know some of these kids from Quinn and his teachers in past years, and am fully aware of what the teacher has to face every day with some of them, mainly their lack of respect.
Of course among these children are some that have been desensitized to the regular distractions and disruptions of others and coast through their day, following rules, and looking forward to recess to burn off the boredom/frustration.
I guess in a way it is like any job where you are subjected to all different types of personalities, opinions and behaviours. Call it a wakeup call for me though to see firsthand the skills our children learn at such a young age. Given the restrictions put upon our teachers for maintaining order, it appears to me that our kids are forced to grow up a little sooner with the life lesson of tolerance, or sadly, the disservice of just being tolerated.
Let me finish by saying this; I left that classroom this morning with a warm fuzzy in my heart having given to a kid who deserves more that what is presently available to him. We had success. We did the assignment…albeit not easily…and not without steady redirection to the task at hand, but the smile on that little boys face made my cup runeth over. He beamed, puffed out his chest and took his work to the teacher for his well deserved praise. We even did the extra bonus work damn it…and by God he felt good about it. Our shared high-five at the end of that made my day/week/month. The sad part is the ache in my heart for I know that tomorrow may not be as good a day for my new little friend.
There is an ache in my heart for those who will potentially never learn respect for others, and will unfortunately grow up being tolerated, never knowing that isn’t a good quality in life.
There is an ache in my heart for those who are held back from their full potential as a result of having to tolerate others.
Hats off to teachers. Whitney, I think of you often and admire your perseverance, your patience, your tolerance. Today reminded me of my respect for teachers. Especially the good ones. We need them.
So the next time the form comes home in your child’s back pack to see if you are willing to offer up some of your time to volunteer in the classroom…and you could actually make some time….don’t recycle it right away thinking you are already too busy with life and its demands. Think of my little buddy who may only have one morning a month with a mom who didn’t realize how badly she was needed in the first place.
Nicely written honey. I guess that would be an eye-opener. Imagine if every parent gave a couple of hours a month to help their child’s class? Although that’s a lot of traffic in and out of each classroom, maybe there’s a practical limit to this sort of thing.
Also, ditto about the kudos to Whit and the other teacher folks. While there’s nothing I love more than teasing teachers about having summers off, they fully earn it during the school year.
What a great blog entry, Nik! I can only imagine how good that little boy felt today, completing the task. That you had the opportunity to spend quality time with him, and to help him experience success at the same time, is something that unfortunately might be infrequent in this little learner’s life. It’s true that while we might grumble some days, the days like you describe are the reason why we teach. Hopefully more moms and dads will find the time to help out, too. Think of all the successes that could be had.
So Court, but this is by far the most beautiful story I have read on this blog to date. Nikki, I think you may have found your calling 🙂 Wow, you got me at “my cup runeth over”!! Sounds like you’re needed there!! Thanks for sharing that wonderful story!! I too have a sister that’s a school teacher with 3 at home!! How does she do it!!!!
Love,
Colleen
Oh, I meant to say “Sorry Court” not “So Court”
Thanks guys. That whole experience really moved me and opened up my eyes.
I’ve been doing “Duty Days” once a month for the past two years at the preschool as it is a co-op and that is part of the deal when you sign your kids up. The kids just got used to having two different adults in the classroom every day. I think that Court’s point of having parents donate their time a few hours a month would be a lot of traffic, but kids are resilient and would likely adjust. The benefit of the traffic would likely outweigh the distraction.
The preschool allowed parents to *pay their way out of Duty Days* and the ones that were willing/able to spend time with the kids in the classroom didn’t have to pay the fee. I thought this was a great idea. Parents who wanted to be involved, would then get more duty days. Unfortunately you would be surprised at how many moms and dads are willing to pay that fee to get out of being involved.
It’s not ideal and would likely never happen, but wouldn’t it be great if our government gave parents/couples even 6 days a year off to contribute in the classrooms of our schools.
Obama’s inaugural speech stated that there are people who do great things in the world, and people who make great sacrifices. In that same thought he stated it is, “also a parent’s willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.”
We have one year off for maternity leave now, when not too long ago we only had 6 months (Jordy was part of that age). Slowly the powers that be are seeing the way of the future is through nurturing our kids…maybe it will hit the classroom soon…hopefully.