Friday, April 10, 2015

Blog Assignment 6


The team I participated on that was hardest to leave was my basketball team I played on in high school.  In seventh grade my family and I moved to a town of about 10,000 people.  From that time I started playing basketball with a group of girls.  We continued to play together until we graduated high school.  We did not win any championships or anything but I spent a lot of time with this group of girls.  We spent many hours working together on our basketball skills at practice and a variety of camps.  We also spent many hours together outside of basketball.  We had the opportunity to travel together and form strong relationships with each other.  We watched each other grow up and mature throughout the years.  I felt many emotions when the basketball season was over my senior year.  A part of me was excited for the new advantages that were ahead for me but I was also sad because I was not going to have these same experiences with these same people ever again.  I guess graduation was the closing ritual for this group of girls but it would have been fun to take a trip together before we all went our separate ways. Now with Facebook I am able to stay in touch with many of these ladies and I enjoy seeing their families and what they have done with their lives. 

I believe the hardest groups to leave are the ones where you have made close relationships with the group members, you have worked hard together to meet accomplishments and you have been a part of the team or group for a long time.  I imagine I will adjourn from the group of colleagues here at Walden by posting thank you and well wishes on their individual blogs.  I believe adjourning is an essential stage of teamwork because it brings closer to the process and experience.  It allows people to acknowledge their group accomplishments and look forward to what is in store for each person in the future.
                         


Saturday, April 4, 2015

Blog Assignment Week 5


           In my second year of teaching preschool I had a young boy in my class that had never had any type of structure in his life.  After being in preschool for a week or so he started acting out.  He started by refusing to follow our classroom rules and routines.  When he did not want to do something he would hide under the table, try and leave the classroom, scream and yell or throw different objects in the classroom.  I talked to his mother about his behavior and I started trying different strategies to help him in the classroom.  His mother was very young and in denial of her son’s behavior.  One day she would come to school and talk about how he does this same behavior at home and the next day his behavior in the classroom would be my entire fault. 
Finally, one day she came to pick him up and he was hiding under the table.  We were talking about how he did that day at school and all of a sudden she lost it.  She said she wanted to speak to my supervisor.  I said ok I would go get my principal and she started saying no I know there is someone higher then her and I want to talk to that person.  I said I had no idea who that would be and I went and got my principal.  When my principal came in the mother started telling her how it was not ok all of the problems he was having at school and if we couldn’t figure it out she would pull him out of our school.  At that time I was extremely pregnant, very emotional and frankly when she said that I thought to myself oh please do!  I know this wasn’t the right attitude but I also knew she wasn’t going to take him out of our school.  Right away my principal used a very calm voice, acknowledged the mother’s concerns and started asking the mother questions.  First she asked, “What do you do when your son displays this behavior at home?”  The mother went on to answer my principal’s questions.  By the time the mother left that day she was calm and more willing to work with us to help her son.  A few months later this mother actually came up to me after school one day and thanked me for all I was doing for her son.  She said she had noticed a big change at home in his behavior since he had been learning in school. 
When I look back at this situation I see that my principal did a good job staying calm and using probing to get answers from the mom.  This calmed the mom down and helped her look at both sides of the situation.  I also know I could have shown more compassion for this mother.  From the beginning she was not very nice to me and I did let her attitude towards me affect my feelings towards her.  I needed to make sure I was using more compassion in my communication with this mother.  In the end things worked out well but I did learn a lot from that interaction.  I do have and show more compassion for parents who have a child who is struggling with their behavior and I also ask the parents more questions.  I believe by asking the parents questions it makes them feel much more involved in helping their child in and outside of the classroom.  Has anyone else had a parent get upset with you for his or her child’s inappropriate behavior?  If so, how did you handle the situation?