I am here to vent my frustration.
The frum school system has come a long way in the past decade as far as providing services for children in need. These include - reading help, math help, occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech therapy and on and on. Our school, like many others, is affiliated with yeled v'yalda and we have a whole slew of therapists and proffessionals who work full time at my school.
Over the years I have come to know, associate with, and become friendly with the therapists who frequent my classroom, and I generally carry a pretty good relationship with them. One of them "Mrs. A.", a speech therapist, has an especially outgoing and lively personality.
Well here's where the problem began.
Episode 1
Mrs. A. walked into my classroom in Elul and saw that the students were learning about tekias shofar. She quietly walked over to me and asked me if she could just observe the child instead of pulling her out because she did not want the child to miss an important lesson. I agreed. Well, Mrs. A. did not just stand quietly, observe the student and write some notes, Mrs. A. stood near the child's desk and 'helped' her follow along. This lasted a full 15 minutes.
Episode 2
Mrs. A. came to school on Friday - teachers don't like to send students out on such short days, so she usually uses Fridays for paperwork. My Friday schedule usually looks something like this:
9:00-9:30: Tefila
9:30-9:50: Kriah
9:50-10:45: Chumash
10:45-11:00: Recess
11:00-11:50: Parsha
11:50-12:00: Pack up
12:00: Dismissal
For some reason that day I had decided to switch my parsha and chumash lessons and so I was teaching parsha at 10:15 when Mrs. A. walked in. She told me that since she had missed a day of work that week she was making up the session by observing "Ahuva" in class. She stood in the back of the classroom as the class came up with some titles summerizing the parsha. I wrote our brainstorms on the board and asked the students to copy them down on their parsha sheets. It happened to be that I needed to stand somewhere for no more than 60 seconds while they were writing and I partially blocked the view of the board from some students. I was aware of this and I apoligized to my students, told them I would move in less than a minute and then they would be able to see. Within 10 seconds of this announcement Mrs. A. was at my desk asking me if I could move over so that the kids could see. I moved as soon as I was able when I did she said to - "Morah, the students really couldn't see the board!"
I then continued my parsha lesson during which she interrupted me twice to give her own examples of what I was teaching. After that I gave the students a few quiet minutes during which they would illustrate points from the parsha we had learned. During this "quiet time" Mrs. A. circled my classroom while commenting and talking to the kids she passed about what they drew. Suddenly 25 kids ALL wanted Mrs. A. to come see their paper and she was hopping around the classroom. Needless to say, there was NO quiet time involved over here.
Episode 3
One of my last classes before Sukkos. I had such a creative lesson planned about the 4 minim. Right as I was starting my lesson Mrs. A. walked in. This time it was to ask me about a schedule change. She tried to ask me her question while I was teaching and I told I couldn't talk right then. Well, she decided to stay - again with the reason that she was observing "Ahuva" and "Racheli."
She interrupted me countless times to 're-explain' what I was saying because "some of the students didn't catch on the first time." She stood near the board and wrote down what she thought would make things clearer for the students. She was showing them motions to help them remember what they were learning - while I was teaching!!
I dismissed the class to recess 10 minutes early.
I've better 4 minim lessons in my teaching career. Way better.
Episode 3
6 weeks passed without an incident (2 of them were Sukkos vacation).
Today she came into my classroom again. She wanted to ask me about a schedule change that she had asked me about at least 5 times this year - I did not approve, it was not a good time for that particular child to miss class. Then she stayed. She stood near "Shani." Shani is not a student she works with. Shani has an extremely difficult time following multi step directions. Shani's visual comprehension is also not good and worksheets are very hard for her. Shani also has poor handwriting. She does not have a speech problem - she never leaves class to see Mrs. A. I know all this about Shani - I know her weaknesses and strengths.
Mrs. A. stood near Shani's desk while we did a chumash worksheet. She helped Shani the whole way through. The entire class had their eyes turned toward Mrs. A. wondering what she was doing and wishing she would come help them.
Then Mrs. A. came over to me - in the middle of the chumash lesson - to ask me if I knew that Shani had some issues. I was not willing to discuss it with her so she went to my desk, rummaged around to until she found a paper to write on - and wrote me a whole note about Shani.
How many red flags have you seen in these stories?
They are all true, they all happened this school year with one Mrs. A.
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3 comments:
Oh. My. Gosh. Go. Complain. To. The. Principal. NOW. I don't care that Mrs. A. is probably older than you and "deserves" respect; you're the teacher, and your classroom is your castle. She has NO right to be doing what she's doing.
This may seem to be overstating the obvious, but have you tried talking with Mrs. A about your expectations for visitors in your class?
While hearing it from your perspective makes it very clear where she is overstepping her bounds, people do have very different expectations of the role of other professionals in their classrooms.
I am by nature more reserved, so when I started student-teaching I rarely said anything or intervened with any students. After a couple of months when it came time for my first evaluation, I got several ratings lower than I expected because the teacher wanted me to show more initiative in getting involved with the class. Once she told me that, I became much more active -- and helpful. There were times when I would start to do something the teacher didn't agree with, so she'd give me a signal or whisper an explanation and I'd change course (for instance, if I was about to calm down a student who was upset, she might pass by and whisper "Justin needs to cool down by himself now" and I'd nod and go help someone else) Once the expectations were clear, we were both much more comfortable and satisfied.
Like SIS said, even if Mrs. A. has some kind of seniority, it is in no way disrespectful for you to discuss your expectations with her.
If I were doing this, I would avoid mentioning anything she's done in the past and stick with I-type messages. Focus on what you want, not on what she is doing. For instance, (Episode 1) "Shira needs to do this assignment independently. (Thanks for your help, though. I appreciate your concern.)" or (Episode 2) "I try to keep [parsha/whatever] time quiet for the kids."
Episode 4 -- Assure her that all of your students' needs are being addressed. Smile sweetly and when she leaves, either read the note or deposit in nearest trash receptacle as desired. :-P
Of course, all of this would be more effective if you first have a little chat with her at a neutral time (not when she's about to embark on an "observation" nor when she has just left your classroom with you steamed) to discuss the way your classroom runs in general and what the role of the teacher and non-teachers in the classroom is. Just make sure to validate her by telling her what TO do and keeping the focus off of the "don'ts" You CAN tell her simply and respectfully that you need to be the only one talking when you teach the class -- explain as much as you can, for instance you can make her feel like she's helping the kids by being quiet because "I want them to learn to assert themselves when they don't understand."
If you can deal with the nosiness but just don't want to have the disruptions and annoying conversations, you can invite her to write you more notes when she thinks you should be doing something differently. That way, unlike the verbal intrusions, you can discard her comments as you wish.
Just tossing around some ideas in case you actually wanted them. Of course, if this was just a vent, you have my full sympathy! I also can't stand when people do these things!
And that is why I teach high school, where even if a student has issues, they rarely have a P3 provider, and when they do I speak to them about once in three months.
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