Monday - February 15, 2016
This morning, Brinley's friend Rachel called to invite us to go ice skating with them at the outdoor rink in Logan. I didn't think we'd be able to go, since Roger has to work overtime tonight. I figured he'd stay in bed until 2 ish, we'd spend some time with him, then he'd leave for work. They wanted to meet at the ice skating rink at 12:30, so I told them that we couldn't make it. Roger ended up walking up a little after 11:00am. I was surprised that he was awake. Brinley was excited. She couldn't wait to ask him if he wanted to go ice skating. He debated about it for a little bit, then decided to take us. As we were driving, we were wondering if it would even be open. The snow was melting. We assumed they must have checked it out, before inviting everybody (they had checked online, and the website said it was open). We got there before everybody and there was a sign warning us to stay off the ice. Alissa and Roger were rebels and went out on the ice anyway.
I messaged their friends about it. They were coming anyway. We decided to play on the playground near by for a while.
The kids were really excited when their friends showed up.
They had a lot of fun playing. Roger kept them busy having snowball fights. I had a fun time visiting with Rachel's mom.
Eventually we all got cold and tired. Roger wanted some time to relax before he had to go to work, so we headed home. We picked up some lunch from McDonald's and Cafe Rio on the way. We are home relaxing now.
I messaged their friends about it. They were coming anyway. We decided to play on the playground near by for a while.
It was interesting talking with Rachel's mom. She asked how Parker is doing in school. Parker's teacher that he had at the start of the year, quit. I'm not sure of all the stuff that happened to make her want to quit, but she mentioned that she was frustrated and felt like there were too many complaints against her and she felt unappreciated. Parker was really sad about his teacher quitting. He really liked her. She was very patient with him, so I was disappointed too. His new teacher started 2 weeks ago. Parker does not really like her. He hasn't told me all the details of what has been happening at school. He comes home and complains about things, like, the whole class missing breaks and having to sit with their heads down because a couple of students were being loud. I didn't have a hard time getting him to go to school with his old teacher, but he really doesn't like school with his new teacher. I kept hoping that it was just because of the change. He doesn't like change and he doesn't handle it very well. But I keep hearing more and more stories from other parents at the school about incidents with this teacher and how she treats Parker. I don't know why Parker hasn't told me about them. I'm going to talk to him about it tonight. I have a feeling that he is keeping things to himself because he doesn't want to get in trouble. The incidents start out with him getting upset. The way the teacher is reacting to him is making it worse. Parker struggles in school. He struggles with changes. Even switching from one subject to the next is difficult for him. He handles it better when there is a set schedule and he knows what to expect. The new teacher came in and changed their whole routine. She also keeps getting mad at the class and taking away their breaks.
The other day Maryann told me about an incident where Sydney got in trouble. What happened was, Parker was upset. His teacher had brought him to the high school room to try and work things out with him I guess. I don't know that whole story, I just know that Sydney got up to go and comfort him and try to help out, but her teacher told her not to. Sydney got upset and told the teacher that her best friends little brother is upset and he needs my help right now. I will not sit down. The teacher sent her outside after that. I hadn't heard anything about what happened with Parker. His teacher hadn't tried to contact me at all about any problems they were having. I just figured everything was fine and that Parker was just struggling because of the changes.
During the first week with the new teacher, there was another incident that I hadn't heard all the details of. Brinley's friend Rachel, who we went to the park with today, has a sister in Alissa's class and a sister in Parker's class. Her sister in Parker's class is Shannon. I had heard on the day it happened, that Shannon had gotten upset and just left. She ran out of class and walked home.I learned more details about it today from her mom. This is their first year attending school. She has been homeschooling them up until this year, so Shannon didn't really understand how bad that was of her to run home. But, that's beside the point. Shannon was upset because the teacher was being horrible to the other students and the thing that pushed her over the edge was the way the teacher was treating Parker. She got upset at Parker. He was having a hard time and not handling things well. He started to cry and hid his head in his jacket. She shamed him in front of the class and made him stop hiding his face. It hurt Shannon's heart to see her friends being treated that way. She didn't know what to do, so she just left. I wanted to burst in to tears when she told me that. I can't handle hearing of the way he's been treated. I really don't understand why he hasn't talked to me about all of this. He has been begging for me to homeschool him again, but I keep telling him that it will get better. It's a new teacher, but it will be better once you get used to the new routine.
Another thing I heard about today, its that the teacher has 2 kids in the class. One of them lost their lunch. When the teacher realized, she accused the class of stealing the lunch. She punished them and talked to them about how it is wrong to steal. The next day when she found the lunch, she didn't apologize to the class.
Also, Shannon wrote an apology letter to the teacher, when she came back to the school. The teacher took it and read it, but never said "Thank you" or "I accept your apology" or, "Let's talk about this".
Parker did complain to me about how when he went to school his desk was moved. His old teacher knew he had a hard time with this, so she would talk to him before moving desks around. I told him to be patient with this teacher. she doesn't know, but I'm sure we can talk to her and work things out.
On Thursday, Parker's teacher asked me to come to class during their rotations, so I could help Parker. Apparently, he refuses to move each time and that's why they are struggling. I went to class and sat with Parker. He showed me what he was doing and where he was supposed to go and everything went smoothly. I din't love the way the teacher talks to the class. she reminds me a lot of the teacher Brinley had a few years ago that was always yelling at the class and punishing them whenever a few of them acted up. Brinley had a rough time dealing with that and she came home crying a lot. This teacher is a lot like that. She got made at the class a lot while I was there and when she thanked them for being good, it was in a rude way. She said it in a way where she thanked them and put them down at the same time. I don't know how to describe it and I wish I could remember the words she used so I could share an example. It just wasn't nice. She is not very good at working with kiddos.
The more and more stuff I hear, the more frustrated I am feeling. I'm not sure what to do. This school has been better for Parker because they work with him on the level that he s at and they are helping him to get caught up. At the public school, they didn't worry if he knew anything before moving on to the next level. So each level was harder and harder because he hadn't had enough time to learn the previous level. Public school was pointless for him to go to and that's why I had to homeschool last year. This year he is making progress because they are able to work with him on the level he is at and get him caught up, but I'm afraid that he is going to start having emotional issues again because of the new teacher. The biggest improvement I saw in Parker after homeschooling him last year was his confidence level. He is much better at knowing how to control his emotions and keep from freaking out. We haven't had any major issues this year that I know of, but it sounds like it's getting bad and kind of out of control and they aren't telling me about it.
I'm going to talk to Parker about it tonight and go to the school tomorrow to talk with his teacher and special ed teacher and see if we can work something out. Parker does not need to be shamed in front of the class. He is a good kid. He has the biggest heart. He just has some struggles. I'm pretty sure they are Autism related, but I've never had him tested to find out. But, I think it's time we find out. We never wanted him to have a label and that's mainly why we haven't checked it out. We worried about how giving him a label would affect him. The reason we are looking in to it now, is that I realized there are things I need to know in order to help him better. I don't feel like I've done a horrible job, but I bet things could be a lot easier if I knew exactly what is going on with him and I had some resources to help me know how to handle the different situations we face with him.
The thing that really got me thinking it was time to find out, was when I was talking to the special ed teacher at his school. She mentioned that her son has Asperger's. At some point in the conversation it came up that kids with Asperger's really don't like to feel like you are mad at them. It is really upsetting to them or maybe it was just to her son. I don't know. But this stuck in my brain. Later that night, Parker got upset over something and he was over reacting and getting really mad. I went to talk to him and get him to calm down. I explained that what he was doing was wrong and he needed to stop. He was still freaking out a little and he said, "I feel like you're getting mad at me." Normally, I would have said, yes I am getting mad at you, because of the way you are behaving it is hard for me and your sisters to handle. We don't like it and we want you to stop please. And I'd explain why it is bad and why he needs to stop. But I remembered what the special ed teacher said about how they don't like to feel like you are mad at them. So, I told him that I wasn't mad at him. I love him and I understand that he is having a hard time, but his temper tantrum is hard on everybody around him. I explained why he should stop and that I understood why he was feeling upset, but I need him to find a better way to calm down. I gave him some ideas of how to calm down and told him to chose to do one of them. He chose one and calmed down. That was a little before bed time, so he went to bed after that. The next day when he woke up, He came and gave me a big hug and said, "Thank you so much for not getting mad at me when I was upset yesterday. I'm really sorry that I did that." It was so cute and so special. My heart felt so happy that I had been able to help him in such a positive way. He has a doctor appointment next month, so we'll see how it all goes.
I didn't mean to ramble on for so long. It just feels good to get stuff all out there. And I think writing it down helps me to sort it all out. Hopefully things will get better with Parker at school.
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