May 24, 2007

I have been told that I am not keeping up with my blog. So true!
I read over 2006 and realized during that entire year I wrote again in such a depressing mind set. I guess that is why my kids keep asking me –“Are you alright?”

Basically, yes, I am alright. I am tired, depressed from time to time, angry from time to time, and happy for the most part. My home life is good! In fact, I am blest by my situation. My husband loves me, my kids love me, and things are better for us than most people. So I guess you could say that I am normal and my life is normal. The only thing is I feel helpless sometimes about situations that occur which bother me. But that seems to have become my personality since the hurricane. It is also the personality of my friends that have been affected by the hurricane. Hopefully, all of us will become more relaxed and get a sense of peace again.

The end of the school year is here again. So I shall try to write an informative anaylsis and not a depressing story.

We made it again. Elaine and I consider that quite an accomplishment. We have found some people we like and some people we DO NOT like.

Teachers:

The other interventionists are nice to us, but I can imagine they think we are “old fogies”. This doesn’t bother me because I am! We like them and get a kick out of their ideas sometimes. They are soooo young.

Principal:

At the top of our DO NOT like list is the principal. He does not only suffer from “foot in mouth” disease, he is also suffering from “panic attacks”. He is scared not only of the kids he is suppose to be a ‘leader of’, but he is scared of his parents and teachers also. Teachers being the least. Mostly the parents. He goes through a major “investigation” of every event (discipline problem). I don’t know how many, but I am aware of four of them that disturb me to the hilt!!! When he gets involved, he talks to other teachers that may know something, the kids involved, any kids that were in the vicinity of the event and then last– to the original teacher about what he found out. In over 35 years, I have never worked for a principal that did that. Even Mr. Joey Hebert didn’t. that. And he was someone I did not like that much. But I have never been put in the position to feel that a parent or kid could cause me to lose my job. Then he takes the result which will give him the easiest or least drastic result. It doesn’t matter what the teacher writes down, because they are the least involved–he thinks. Their opinions are the least important. Both Ms. Elaine and Ms. Butcher (twice) were involved. Then the lady who handles special ed was involved. She politely told him, I am 54 years old and I disagree with your decision. She also told him never to ‘investigate’ her again. When a situation occurs regarding discipline problems, we have to write them up. This is standard procedure. The further investigation normally does not occur unless it is a possibility that another teacher was on duty at the time. Talking to other kids is only done if they do not believe what the child in trouble said. The questioning also gives the children the feeling that they are talking only about the child. Why?? Because you get several different results. They lie, they tell you what they think you want to know and sometimes they do tell the truth. In one of the situations, he had three different stories from three different children none of which were what the teacher said. All I know is, I do not like the feeling of insecurity from the top. We are losing our assistant principal, she got a promotion. That really makes me nervous. I know that next year, if I have any type of discipline problems in my group, I will keep behavior documentation.

The Job:

This was the best part of the year. I enjoyed the groups I had. They were good. I hope that it continues through next year.

So when I am asked will you come back. (I say —Yes, one year at a time) Do I really want to be where I am. Only because of the children. I am attached to some of them.