Parent-Teacher Conferences

You may notice that it has been some time since my last post. This is no big surprise - I am a teacher in the throes of parent-teacher conferences. Any parent will tell you that conferences are stressful. Any parent who has attended them that is. I can remember what it was like when my own children were in elementary school. You gather your courage and wander into that familiar, yet all too foreign domain that is your child's elementary school. This is an important environment. Your child spends the bulk of his or her waking hours in this place and these people have a great deal of influence on your child's world. Do I bring the student? Do I dress up? Does this teacher think I'm a dingbat of a parent because my child went to school yesterday with her coat on inside out? Is my child sharing every intimate detail of my home life with the class during sharing time? All of this before you get to the real questions - how is my child doing? Is he learning, progressing, making friends, making mistakes, coping, failing, smiling, clowning... Just what is going on here anyway? I have to trust you people and that is hard for a parent to do sometimes.
I'm now on the other side of the desk. I teach special education. My students ALL have emotional or behavior disorders. Some are autistic, some have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety disorder, obsessive- compulsive disorders, traumatic brain damage, and a grab bag of other obstacles to progress in school. The parents who attend conferences with me have frequently had bad experiences in school themselves. Most have had battles and fears and tears with one teacher or another because the problems my kids have are often misunderstood. As a special education teacher my job is as much to be an advocate for the child with classroom teachers as it is to teach them. Having said that, I have to say this has been a REALLY exhausting week. I try hard to be at as many of these conferences as I can but they are scheduled around the classroom teachers schedules not mine. This means that I have conferences in different buildings taking place at the same time. I had just such a situation this week and was late for one conference. The mother attending that conference was torqued (my new word this week). I could just about follow the trail of smoke as she made her way to the principal's office to complain about me, my lack of responsiveness to her requests, her child's lack of progress, and the school system in general. All of this lack of responsiveness has manifested itself in less than 4 weeks of working with the child. Oh joy! This principal is (mind you) a brand new principal here -my new boss :o The next day's conferences included the parent who is concerned about her 2nd grader's level of anxiety in the classroom so she is visiting the classroom and holding him on her lap so he will be calm. My dilemma is that I can completely understand both parents' point of view and intentions. I can completely relate. My children will tell you that I'm the queen of expecting kids to be independent but that is NOT my knee jerk reaction to any situation. I've had to work hard to teach myself not to gather them all in and try to make it all better. It is, however not going to be helpful for me to nod and agree. As I write this I am finishing up my last night of conferences and have had the opportunity to meet with the first parent (the mama bear). I wasn't able to tell her that her son's learning "difference" is going to be overcome in a single year of services. That he will be functioning at grade level by next year. I can't tell you how much I would like to be able to say that. I'd love it if I could find some magic formula to put myself completely out of work. But so far I haven't found it and I really do care!