back to life, back to reality.

april break ends tonight, in approximately 24 minutes when I climb into bed (or, in approximately 9 hours when my alarm goes off. ick.)

this break went by quickly and wasn't nearly as restful as it could have been. it was a great break, though, and i was super productive.

over the past nine days away from the kids, i have had way too much time to reflect back on my year, think about my kids and about my skills as a teacher. this year has been much easier than my first year. my class is easier and i'm more experienced. in some ways, though, i know i haven't pushed myself as hard as i did last year. i worry that my children aren't as prepared for first grade and last year's class was. i worry that i've allowed myself to be detached from some social problems in our class. i worry that instead of pushing my children to learn certain math skills, i've simply waited for them to come along developmentally. mostly i worry about two of my students. and really, just one.

there's a long, long story behind this little guy. to make it short: his mother is easily angered and i'm constantly terrified she'll go ape on me if i am really and truly honest about how poorly her son is doing. if his mother weren't so freaking scary i know i would strongly recommend him repeat kindergarten. i would probably recommend he get evaluted by his town. but, because i'm scared of her, i've not been the best teacher for my little guy. something just isn't right with him and i don't know if its because of his homelife, or if its because he has a learning disability, or if he's just developmentally young, or if it its a combination of all of those.

this is where i can begin to get frustrated with my school. i love my school, dearly. its a wonderful learning environment and its fantastic for a typically developing child. BUT if your child has any learning disability, its just not a great fit. however, that is not the opinion of the school's administration (or most of the other teachers) so i, as a teacher of student that's struggling, am left with poor support/follow-through from administrators, few resources and little educational background in special ed to help these students. so, i get to feel guilty, not serve my student well and still not know what to do.

this has been gnawing at me all week, so i'm going to go talk to my administrator tomorrow. i can't end the year feeling like i haven't done all i could have for my little guy. he's super sweet and its not fair for him to suffer because his mom is scary. pray it goes well :/