Great First Day!

I had a great first day!!!

One of my students, a selective mute, read out loud to me and spoke to me. I thought it would take weeks, but I just did what Torey Hayden, a fabulous novelist who writes about her experiences as a special education teacher. She says to let a person who is selectively mute to speak to you first. Don't speak to them. I didn't. I was prepared for this to take months and months, but it only took one day. I gave the class directions, of course, and he's in the class, but I didn't speak to him one-on-one. When it was time for him to read to me, I just pointed to the words and he read them. Very quietly. I could barely hear him, but he definitely spoke the words "Put out the fire." Then when I asked him how his day was at the end of the day, he said, again in barely a whisper, "good." But he said it.

Now for Ismael. He is diagnosed with ADHD, his mother is a known gang banger, and if you ask her about him, she says, in front of the poor boy, "this one is my trouble maker. I don't like him." So, I'm going easy on him. He swore several times, he got hyper excited by the end of the day, was listening to an MP3 Player and was asked two or three times to put it away. I will have to think of rewards, rewards, rewards for him.

The two students who went to the office to complain about me last year (which, is a fairly common occurence with special ed., middle school boys with emotional disorders, but still doesn't feel good), were very courteous, followed directions and told me they wanted to stay in my class. Yay for me! Yay for me! Yay for me!

Bye for now. Here's hoping to a great second day!!!