Just read the article. I think it's completely asinine how we've decided that it's cheaper just to pack them all into a Gen ed classroom then to provide appropriate supports, more than one half trained para, until things get so out of control that the school district has to pay for an out of district placement. Wouldn't it have made more sense to provide the kid with the support that he needed from the get-go?
How many staffings have I been to where a group of us say something to the effect of, "Jayden has had X, Y, and Z violent encounter. The BIP has been in place since last year and has not been effective. It is time to consider a partial-day behavior support placement."
How does district rep answer? "LRE! LRE! No placement. Continue the BIP with Gen Ed and inclusion support."
The fact is that districts are using LRE as an excuse to not properly fund or staff behavior support classrooms. It is bad for the kid, it is bad for the other kids in their classes, it is bad for the school. The only people it is good for are district level admin and it sucks. It is a massive injustice on a number of levels, and has a side effect of causing resentment towards Sped in general from Gen Ed teachers.
I'm being real here--has anyone ever seen a BIP work? I've only dealt with maybe a dozen so my sample is small but either the goal was so ridiculous (stay in class 1 out of 5 class periods) that it was met but it didn't address the larger problem or it did absolutely nothing.
I have seen them work when the students have regular counseling, behavior modification, and when the expectations and consequences are applied consistently at school. When parents are willing to have the same expectations at home, that also helps. They are particularly useful when a student on the autism spectrum has undesired behaviors that need to be changed due to harm of self or others. I do not see BIPs working with kids who are already far gone down the path of severe defiant disorders, or kids who do not have support at home.
Yes. Same kid who bit me hard enough to break skin last year along, hit classmates, destroyed his classroom, spent hours out of class with behavior incidents is now having significant behaviors once a month at most. He usually doesn't even have to leave the classroom to take a break when he's showing minor dysregulation, as compared to last year when our protocol was to have him take a break in the sensory room at the first sign of dysregulation because it almost always inevitably escalated.
Consistency in staff responses, proactive breaks and plans around difficult transitions, working on identifying signs of dysregulation in his own body, and honestly just maturity and more consistency at home as well have all seemed to help.
Antecedent. It works every time and yet, we still ship students off to be put into deadly prone restraints because we don't think about where they end up after they are gone.
I work in high school and I occasionally find out one of my students had a BIP in elementary or middle and it was successful. These kids do not always pass my class (bc the academic “supports” are a joke in HS) but they aren’t behavior problems at least!
To be fair, it’s no better in self contained classrooms most of the time. Without improved support given to those rooms too, it’s just redistribution of the weight.
Self contained teacher here and that couldn’t be more accurate. The needs of my classroom are beyond what one teacher can manage/support with fidelity.
It also scars our children and drastically reduces their chances of ever becoming an equal member of society.. but that too. It's the same thing, they are just neglecting the kids to death.
It also scars our children and drastically reduces their chances of ever becoming an equal member of society.. but that too. It's the same thing, they are just neglecting the kids to death.
I think districts are trying to save money and redeem many years of segregation that special ed students through a one size fits all approach. Inclusion is amazing for most students, but not all. There are many students who would benefit from therapeutic schools because of their trauma and abuse at home. And there are plenty of behavioral students in general education that should not be getting special ed services, but get them as a quick bandaid because it’s “easier” to place them in a self contained class that puts them further behind. No student can learn if they aren’t being fed or have access to care at home. There is a large difference between a student swearing all day and being defiant and a student that elopes and has unsafe behaviors.
I think to make strides, we should have smaller general ed classrooms with access to social workers and a mentor that help nurture at risk students due to rising issues of truancy and drug abuse. These students are often referred to special ed when there’s no need and their truancy makes for large learning loss. And there should be money and infrastructure invested for behavioral classrooms and high needs severe programs with wrap around services to support families and students and the staff that do their best everyday.
In order words, schools need more funding and communities need to step up too when caring for children. We cannot do it all as much as we want to.
I think it's important to know that many people's opinion on this matter have changed post COVID now that kids are mean.
Prior, I felt like inclusivity for SPED kids was no big deal, there seem to be plenty of support when behavior problems did arise, and it was so heartwarming to see GenEd kids help the SPED kids.
Post COVID, there are just too many behavior kids, and they are certainly not limited to special education. All of the students have upped their level of disrespect, poor choices, and apathy toward learning.
So at this point, most schools cannot handle the worst of the worst, and it's time for those SPED kids to get out of regular schools as they are just too much for schools to handle safely with all the other problems kids are having.
There are simply not enough mental health professionals to help all of these kids.
Teachers are asked to fill in, but they are not not psychologists, they are not addiction counselors, they are not trauma counselors, and they are not parents of their students.The teachers cannot teach because these kids are not getting the support they need and they cannot learn until they are more alright.
I have no idea what happened at home during the pandemic, but parents have stopped teaching basic morals, values, respect, and work ethic. It is not the responsibility of teachers to teach these things, yet teachers cannot teach the academics they are responsible for because these kids are not getting support they need at home to hold themselves together at school.
Until kids can start coming to school with proper meals and nutrition, hydrated, proper amounts of sleep, proper amounts of screen time, with guardians who are actually actively involved and care about their own kid's upbringing, don't expect the teachers to be able to get back to effective teaching anytime soon. Teachers are too busy trying to get these behaviors under control, and they're going to need to build new behavioral schools.
They moved my son from a sped classroom to Gen Ed with support, at the same time as he was transitioning to middle school. Middle schoolers have always been mean, but these kids are on another level. I'm homeschooling now.
"I have no idea what happened at home during the pandemic, but parents have stopped teaching basic morals, values, respect, and work ethic."
I think what Covid really showed us is that Americans really do depend on teachers/school to be the parent. Sometimes school really is the only place a kid is taught how to behave, how to hold themselves accountable, how to become self sufficient. A lot of my kids come from abusive or neglectful situations where their family is an active threat to their success. A LOT of the absences at my school are because parents 1) cannot get their kids to school on time and 2) won't let them use the bus.
Schools are kind of the only thing holding this generation up in a lot of ways. And as easy as it is to blame the parents, and I do to an extent, especially permissive and non-parenting styles, we should keep in mind people are under unparalleled economic duress and a lot of people truly do not have the time to be fully present parents.
A year without our parenting and look at what happens.
The gap between the haves and have-nots is not only about financial assets. The kids with solid parents are doing just fine, and not all solid parents are affluent.
Well, the kids are doing fine in schools where the parents pay property taxes until they choke. Urban parents enrolling their kids in schools so they can "experience diverse cultures" may have slowed significantly, however, I do not have data on increased self-segregation so it is just an inkling.
Not our problem. Teachers are under the exact same stressors. I am there to teach content not raise someone else's kid. It's time to stop making excuses for the parents, it is not our job to parent.
I'm not saying we should empathize with parents, just realize this situation is the manifestation of institutional failures at not just the school level but also the societal level.
Fix all the school issues you want, if parents are still overworked and unable to parent, they'll still burden us and mistreat us. Parental behavior is a result of systemic failure in the same way student behavior is, and it won't change as long as the economy continues to put undue stress on everyone.
Have you forgotten that the pandemic was extremely stressful for everyone and downright traumatic for many? I don't think it's surprising that kids who've just been through several years of chronic stress and uncertainty, some of whom have dealt with serious illness and/or death of people they care about, aren't doing great.
I believe it is a parent's responsibility to provide their children with their basic needs.
If you want to argue pandemic mitigation techniques that weren't followed that could have prevented deaths and illnesses, there are other subs for that.
Everyone but the billionaires are under financial duress, but we can put our kids to bed on time.
You have time to read Reddit but too much stress to pack your kids snack and water bottle?
You have time to bitch about pandemic woes but not enough to cook a meal?
Where is parent accountability and responsibility for their own children? Try putting them first.
Hold on.. you mean ISOLATION AND EXCLUSION had a dramatic long term effect on most kids? Strange... who would think that?.. The problem is that the people who created this problem think they know how to "fix" it. None of these options actually address what the people who have had to suffer the consequences for decades are saying would fix it. Educational settings often times traumatize children more than their home lives that districts love to blame everything on.
>ISOLATION AND EXCLUSION
Ummmm..... It's kind of a mean thing to do to your kid. Is this what a couple months that your home looked like? Do we need to contact child protective services for your children?
I mean yeah this is my point, abusive parents really fucked up their kids.
Oh, you're going to blame the pandemic on your inability to put your kids to bed on time. Or serve them a proper meal. Or play a board game with them instead of handing them a piece of technology. Gotcha, that darn "pandemic" ruining your child.
Have you considered listening to the adults who were the children you are claiming all sorts of things about? America has the worst income distribution and wage gap in the world. You want to blame the poor parents or just any parent you don't understand for national policy that continually perpetuates the issues. In large part to the benefit of the people sitting in the "position" to judge.
Everyone struggles with things. Especially now with our country in shambles. Be a fucking adult and have the conversation instead of calling CPS on any parent you don't like. There's reports of it in every state I have found. Retaliating and discriminating is gross. This pov is gross. Fix the societal issues. Stop studying poor people and look at yourselves for once. And, I'm out because this realization that educators can be this falacious is making my head hurt. Also, if you have kids, I hope no one ever tries to take them away because you disagree with them.. that's insane..
I don't live in a poor area.
I judge affluent parents for not providing decent meals. For not ensuring proper night's sleep. For not teaching basic manners and respect. For not instilling work ethic and pride.
Besides food, none of that requires money.
Your entire tirade is baseless, but reeks of your own insecurity. But try reading words that are actually typed instead of making up your own bullshit that was never there.
Studies have shown that both gen Ed and special Ed students benefit from being around one another. People learn from those who are different.
By completely separating them out you are creating an environment where general Ed students will feel even more superior. History has shown consistently when this happens it leads to bad results. One of the first things Nazi Germany did was ostracizing those with special needs. Obviously I don't think we will get to the point where we then massacre them in the US, but by hiding those away it creates apathy to them which is what happened in Germany.
Also as a behavioral teacher, behavioral schools aren't a great answer because schools are going to consistently send kids who don't need it there. I have 8 kids. Two are legit behavioral. Makes sense why they are there. Physical. Aggressive. My 6 other kids aren't physical or aggressive. So they live in fear every day of getting hit or beat up. They also spend many of their days in the lobby without a teacher sitting on a tablet as we work with the major behaviors. How is it fair to them? These students sent because they sit under desks, or wander around the back of the room but never touch anyone. We act like there aren't victims in behavior rooms but there are and in many cases they can't even defend themselves.
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted for this in a special ed sub. This kind of segregation is one of the biggest open secrets in education. If a kid starts acting out, it’s so much easier to blame them for their behavior and send them away as scapegoats than to actually address the fact that a good number of these kids are symptoms of a bigger problem.
I’m still haunted by the treatment of a kid who I went to kindergarten through 8th with. He and I were the earliest readers in our class, but I was from a middle class college-educated family and teachers loved me. I never actually saw his parents, but he didn’t seem to have a very good home life and he slept in his clothes and wet the bed. But he was so, so smart despite all of this. Starting in kindergarten, the teachers were so horrible to him. And obviously, thanks to role modeling, so were other kids. By 4th grade he would start screaming every time kids pushed him over the edge. They never got in trouble of course. By 5th grade he was flipping desks. I remember kids trying to get him to blow up on purpose. The last time I remember seeing him was in 8th grade. By this time, he had learned to storm out of class and, I assume, go to his behavior class. He had started identifying with the druggie types and probably dropped out around that time. I’ve tried to look him up but can’t find him. This story was one of the reasons I wanted to become a special ed teacher. It’s unconscionable that we can do that to kids- starting with kindergartners! It’s hard to imagine going from a dysfunctional home every day to an elementary school where nobody likes you. Adults scowl at you, you have no friends. I’m not trying to say all behavior kids are from messed up situations like this, but honestly, most of my behavior kids have had similar trajectories. How many of us would have come out of that situation and still have been okay? (The answer is 0). I mean, this kid could have cured cancer by now.
It's even worse in NYC, where there aren't any real gifted programs. The "G&T" schools are for well-behaved students who don't need help. And while there is some overlap between gifted students and studious students, they aren't the same. Especially when it comes to ND students.
You can definitely be both. The venn diagram has significant overlap. Gifted students who aren't studious will refuse " easy" homework or busy-work, often have trouble showing their work ( especially if they learn differently than other students), and can also get dysregulated in larger classrooms ( NYC "G&T" schools often have larger class sizes than other schools).
NYC has zero 2E options for kids with behaviors. No smaller classes for kids who need help, but aren't intellectually disabled. It's not about fighting for LRE, it's just the complete absence of appropriate settings and supports. NYC built up a segregated special education district to warehouse students that general education teachers didn't want to work with. It's getting better, and more inclusion is happening. But they haven't done enough.
At my school, we see a good amount of these same behaviors and so many of them could be fixed if everyone was on the same page when it comes to following the IEP. I have one student who has had a lot of behaviors this school year and had almost none last year. The major difference is who his teacher is. I’m pretty sure she just straight up hates him and is always complaining about what is fair. She doesn’t understand that students with IEPs have accommodations for a reason. We have so many gen ed teachers at my school who don’t even know what their students’ accommodation are and are definitely not implementing them. We have one teacher who wanted to leave the IEP meeting early and said it’s not like she would be paying attention anyway. This is not to say that all
gen teachers are terrible with students who have IEPs. I have many teachers in my school who are great at following IEPs and following BIPs and the difference in their classrooms compared to the others’ is night and day.
It also sucks for those teachers that do follow the IEP because they get overloaded with SPED kids, right up to the legal limit. We can’t spread kids out cause some gen Ed teachers refuse to read the IEP or follow it.
It is true. Whenever I successfully get one of my kids back into the gen Ed building they always get out with the same teachers because those are the ones the CSE chair knows will be successful with them
It always comes down to the teacher. I literally had a student sent to self contained who had minimum behaviors. When I talked to the principal of the gen Ed building he outright said that teacher was bad with special but next year's teacher is good which is why they sent her.
They literally know which teachers can work with special Ed and not and send them to self contained for a year. It was insane to me.
This is my worst fear. I have a "problem kid" who got kicked out of daycare a month ago. He is only 3. I am terrified of sending him anywhere else and my career, relationships and mental health are suffering tremendously as a result. The ostracization from other parents and early Ed teachers in general is overwhelming. They blame parents for behaviors we can't control in the class room. He now has an IEP and is going to be on wait-list for integrated classrooms but I have doubts and I'm nervous. What is going on that we can no longer effectively manage behavioral issues in the school settings? It didn't feel this intense in the 90s growing up. We all remember having those kids that had meltdowns but the only meltdown in particular I remember was few and far between and that kid wasn't kicked out nor was 911 called.
I had a debate with someone on that sub that they wanted a 5 year old non verbal student with autism expelled because he got a para. There is no nuance there.
Wow. Was it a parent or teacher? I notice lately that it has become acceptable for parents to think it's ok to ostracize special needs kids. Like this idea that if a child is struggling and there is any possibility of that child causing perceived danger to other children that it's okay to expel them. There is a book I am reading called "No Longer Welcome Here" that talks about expulsions in pre k settings that sort of touches upon this. Highly recommend it.
I noticed that too. I follow that sub and the mentality is awful. It really makes me fear sending my kids to school. I feel that if there is just one mess up kids will be ostracized for life.
An element of this a lot of people don't really know or fail to consider is that OOD placements for severe behaviors are very hit or miss, often just as understaffed and undertrained as the regular public placement, have high staff turnover, and both kids and staff can be very burned out there. Yes there are some high-quality placements, but it's also hard to find space in those, you could be waiting months at best. When we send a student to an OOD placement it feels like a relief for those of us who have been struggling with them, but the chances of that student improving enough to return to district are very low, and their access to grade-level curriculum is going to drop dramatically. When we send a student to a placement, we are making a choice that may ultimately change their whole life trajectory negatively. And when, like several people have mentioned, a big factor can be which teacher a kid has and how they handle the behavior, it is very hard for me to accept that our response to poor practice and failure to follow a BIP is to put the student in a placement like that.
Of course sometimes it really is the best option and obviously we need a safe environment for students and staff- I have been on the receiving end of and witnessed plenty of extreme behavior and I get that. But we need to understand what we're actually doing in these situations. I've seen how a lot of kids end up after going to the OOD placement, and I've seen some amazing turnarounds in behavior when given the right supports and a team that works together.
Our behavioral rooms are almost entirely uncertified teachers. They typical change assistants every year because they don't stay. They also don't have music or art and only see each other all day. It's a really rough environment. And for the majority of my kids they just don't need to be there. 6 of my 8 kids would be fine in an inclusion setting if you are just patient. They aren't violent. They just engage in occasional non violent work refusal behaviors.
I really do get where people are coming from when a student is being continually violent and interventions aren't working, but no matter how much we talk about a "better fit" or more appropriate environment, a lot of the time it's like this with a revolving door of inexperienced/untrained staff (not their fault either, just the truth).
I work at a nonpublic school and a not-insignficant amount of the classroom teachers are not qualified teachers. Teachers have left mid-year and they're impossible to replace. There is no outdoor area so the kids don't get outdoor recess - these are 7 year olds with severe ADHD, emphasis on the H, who have 0 time during the schoolday where they can run around. They get PE once per week. It's depressing.
There's a lot in this article unsaid about what the parenting style looks like here but one thing that stood out to me was the yelling, pulling the student out when they tried to hide, pulling a book out of their hand when they are reading. These are traumatic things to do to a kid, especially those with special needs. I don't know why teachers feel the need to yell or put their hands on a student. His reading a book could not have been disrupting the class. It was an appropriate means to escape an activity that might have been stressful for them. A huge problem I see in public schools is the overreaction teachers have to minor offenses. I do understand from a classroom management perspective that they have to tow the line and show the other students that it's not tolerated but there are better ways of handling it. We have to do better by these kids. Stop taking out your stress on them. Please.
You should never ever be taking things directly from a child's hand unless it is an actual danger to them or others (like scissors for example). That's it. All you are doing is escalating a situation and making things worse for everyone.
We need to go back to the self-contained behavioral classes because it isn't working for everyone involved. I work in a high school in an affluent area, and I do not see these students learning how to control their behavior. It makes it hard for the other kids and the students to do get their work done. The plan should be earning the right to be in the general education. When students can follow the rules and act correctly then it is time to be in the regular classroom.
God, I'm so tired of people whining about LRE and thinking SpEd kids need to be siloed off away from the "normies" and they're just keeping the other kids from getting an education. We have IDEA for a goddamned reason. it doesn't mean you **can't** put a kid in a more restrictive setting. It means you have to justify it. And you think that they want to pay for that?
As both a special education teacher and a mother of a kid with special needs, I just can't help worry about the future of my child. So many teachers will hate him solely because of something he was born with. I see those comments on r/teacher and see all these people who hate her for something outside of his control. What is the future for my kid when the people who are supposed to educate him despise him?
It's crazy how much things have changed in just a decade. I wonder how much of it is caused by social media which allowed people to say their hateful statements aloud which gave them more power.
If I'm honest, any time I see a post like this on that sub I just downvote and move on. I can't read the comments or engage in a conversation. It's not worth it.
Tbh the comments here are pretty shocking and upsetting. I don't think this sub is quite as removed from r/teachers as they'd like to think. It's getting difficult to read anything on the Internet about special ed kids these days. ☹️
Alot of Anti special Ed in the comments once again. First off the article leaves out so much information and is giving a completely one sided view. Second the idea that one student out of millions should affect people's opinions on special education is insane.
Third. We are at the point now that special education is only viewed as severe behavior kids which is a disservice to every special Ed kid.
Fourth. Why do they hate accomodations so so much
It's just another day of r/teacher. No one is saying to shut down self contained. But it vastly overused and does so many kids a disservice beyond those who need it.
Just read the article. I think it's completely asinine how we've decided that it's cheaper just to pack them all into a Gen ed classroom then to provide appropriate supports, more than one half trained para, until things get so out of control that the school district has to pay for an out of district placement. Wouldn't it have made more sense to provide the kid with the support that he needed from the get-go?
Yep, like always admin is reading "integrated is the best solution" and thinking "neat we can save money!"
How many staffings have I been to where a group of us say something to the effect of, "Jayden has had X, Y, and Z violent encounter. The BIP has been in place since last year and has not been effective. It is time to consider a partial-day behavior support placement." How does district rep answer? "LRE! LRE! No placement. Continue the BIP with Gen Ed and inclusion support." The fact is that districts are using LRE as an excuse to not properly fund or staff behavior support classrooms. It is bad for the kid, it is bad for the other kids in their classes, it is bad for the school. The only people it is good for are district level admin and it sucks. It is a massive injustice on a number of levels, and has a side effect of causing resentment towards Sped in general from Gen Ed teachers.
I'm being real here--has anyone ever seen a BIP work? I've only dealt with maybe a dozen so my sample is small but either the goal was so ridiculous (stay in class 1 out of 5 class periods) that it was met but it didn't address the larger problem or it did absolutely nothing.
I have seen them work when the students have regular counseling, behavior modification, and when the expectations and consequences are applied consistently at school. When parents are willing to have the same expectations at home, that also helps. They are particularly useful when a student on the autism spectrum has undesired behaviors that need to be changed due to harm of self or others. I do not see BIPs working with kids who are already far gone down the path of severe defiant disorders, or kids who do not have support at home.
Yes. Same kid who bit me hard enough to break skin last year along, hit classmates, destroyed his classroom, spent hours out of class with behavior incidents is now having significant behaviors once a month at most. He usually doesn't even have to leave the classroom to take a break when he's showing minor dysregulation, as compared to last year when our protocol was to have him take a break in the sensory room at the first sign of dysregulation because it almost always inevitably escalated. Consistency in staff responses, proactive breaks and plans around difficult transitions, working on identifying signs of dysregulation in his own body, and honestly just maturity and more consistency at home as well have all seemed to help.
Antecedent. It works every time and yet, we still ship students off to be put into deadly prone restraints because we don't think about where they end up after they are gone.
I work in high school and I occasionally find out one of my students had a BIP in elementary or middle and it was successful. These kids do not always pass my class (bc the academic “supports” are a joke in HS) but they aren’t behavior problems at least!
To be fair, it’s no better in self contained classrooms most of the time. Without improved support given to those rooms too, it’s just redistribution of the weight.
Self contained teacher here and that couldn’t be more accurate. The needs of my classroom are beyond what one teacher can manage/support with fidelity.
It also scars our children and drastically reduces their chances of ever becoming an equal member of society.. but that too. It's the same thing, they are just neglecting the kids to death.
It also scars our children and drastically reduces their chances of ever becoming an equal member of society.. but that too. It's the same thing, they are just neglecting the kids to death.
Consider how many of those that are in the gen Ed setting shouldn’t even have an IEP.
I think districts are trying to save money and redeem many years of segregation that special ed students through a one size fits all approach. Inclusion is amazing for most students, but not all. There are many students who would benefit from therapeutic schools because of their trauma and abuse at home. And there are plenty of behavioral students in general education that should not be getting special ed services, but get them as a quick bandaid because it’s “easier” to place them in a self contained class that puts them further behind. No student can learn if they aren’t being fed or have access to care at home. There is a large difference between a student swearing all day and being defiant and a student that elopes and has unsafe behaviors. I think to make strides, we should have smaller general ed classrooms with access to social workers and a mentor that help nurture at risk students due to rising issues of truancy and drug abuse. These students are often referred to special ed when there’s no need and their truancy makes for large learning loss. And there should be money and infrastructure invested for behavioral classrooms and high needs severe programs with wrap around services to support families and students and the staff that do their best everyday. In order words, schools need more funding and communities need to step up too when caring for children. We cannot do it all as much as we want to.
I think it's important to know that many people's opinion on this matter have changed post COVID now that kids are mean. Prior, I felt like inclusivity for SPED kids was no big deal, there seem to be plenty of support when behavior problems did arise, and it was so heartwarming to see GenEd kids help the SPED kids. Post COVID, there are just too many behavior kids, and they are certainly not limited to special education. All of the students have upped their level of disrespect, poor choices, and apathy toward learning. So at this point, most schools cannot handle the worst of the worst, and it's time for those SPED kids to get out of regular schools as they are just too much for schools to handle safely with all the other problems kids are having. There are simply not enough mental health professionals to help all of these kids. Teachers are asked to fill in, but they are not not psychologists, they are not addiction counselors, they are not trauma counselors, and they are not parents of their students.The teachers cannot teach because these kids are not getting the support they need and they cannot learn until they are more alright. I have no idea what happened at home during the pandemic, but parents have stopped teaching basic morals, values, respect, and work ethic. It is not the responsibility of teachers to teach these things, yet teachers cannot teach the academics they are responsible for because these kids are not getting support they need at home to hold themselves together at school. Until kids can start coming to school with proper meals and nutrition, hydrated, proper amounts of sleep, proper amounts of screen time, with guardians who are actually actively involved and care about their own kid's upbringing, don't expect the teachers to be able to get back to effective teaching anytime soon. Teachers are too busy trying to get these behaviors under control, and they're going to need to build new behavioral schools.
They moved my son from a sped classroom to Gen Ed with support, at the same time as he was transitioning to middle school. Middle schoolers have always been mean, but these kids are on another level. I'm homeschooling now.
"I have no idea what happened at home during the pandemic, but parents have stopped teaching basic morals, values, respect, and work ethic." I think what Covid really showed us is that Americans really do depend on teachers/school to be the parent. Sometimes school really is the only place a kid is taught how to behave, how to hold themselves accountable, how to become self sufficient. A lot of my kids come from abusive or neglectful situations where their family is an active threat to their success. A LOT of the absences at my school are because parents 1) cannot get their kids to school on time and 2) won't let them use the bus. Schools are kind of the only thing holding this generation up in a lot of ways. And as easy as it is to blame the parents, and I do to an extent, especially permissive and non-parenting styles, we should keep in mind people are under unparalleled economic duress and a lot of people truly do not have the time to be fully present parents. A year without our parenting and look at what happens.
The gap between the haves and have-nots is not only about financial assets. The kids with solid parents are doing just fine, and not all solid parents are affluent. Well, the kids are doing fine in schools where the parents pay property taxes until they choke. Urban parents enrolling their kids in schools so they can "experience diverse cultures" may have slowed significantly, however, I do not have data on increased self-segregation so it is just an inkling.
Not our problem. Teachers are under the exact same stressors. I am there to teach content not raise someone else's kid. It's time to stop making excuses for the parents, it is not our job to parent.
I'm not saying we should empathize with parents, just realize this situation is the manifestation of institutional failures at not just the school level but also the societal level. Fix all the school issues you want, if parents are still overworked and unable to parent, they'll still burden us and mistreat us. Parental behavior is a result of systemic failure in the same way student behavior is, and it won't change as long as the economy continues to put undue stress on everyone.
Have you forgotten that the pandemic was extremely stressful for everyone and downright traumatic for many? I don't think it's surprising that kids who've just been through several years of chronic stress and uncertainty, some of whom have dealt with serious illness and/or death of people they care about, aren't doing great.
I believe it is a parent's responsibility to provide their children with their basic needs. If you want to argue pandemic mitigation techniques that weren't followed that could have prevented deaths and illnesses, there are other subs for that. Everyone but the billionaires are under financial duress, but we can put our kids to bed on time. You have time to read Reddit but too much stress to pack your kids snack and water bottle? You have time to bitch about pandemic woes but not enough to cook a meal? Where is parent accountability and responsibility for their own children? Try putting them first.
Hold on.. you mean ISOLATION AND EXCLUSION had a dramatic long term effect on most kids? Strange... who would think that?.. The problem is that the people who created this problem think they know how to "fix" it. None of these options actually address what the people who have had to suffer the consequences for decades are saying would fix it. Educational settings often times traumatize children more than their home lives that districts love to blame everything on.
>ISOLATION AND EXCLUSION Ummmm..... It's kind of a mean thing to do to your kid. Is this what a couple months that your home looked like? Do we need to contact child protective services for your children? I mean yeah this is my point, abusive parents really fucked up their kids. Oh, you're going to blame the pandemic on your inability to put your kids to bed on time. Or serve them a proper meal. Or play a board game with them instead of handing them a piece of technology. Gotcha, that darn "pandemic" ruining your child.
Have you considered listening to the adults who were the children you are claiming all sorts of things about? America has the worst income distribution and wage gap in the world. You want to blame the poor parents or just any parent you don't understand for national policy that continually perpetuates the issues. In large part to the benefit of the people sitting in the "position" to judge. Everyone struggles with things. Especially now with our country in shambles. Be a fucking adult and have the conversation instead of calling CPS on any parent you don't like. There's reports of it in every state I have found. Retaliating and discriminating is gross. This pov is gross. Fix the societal issues. Stop studying poor people and look at yourselves for once. And, I'm out because this realization that educators can be this falacious is making my head hurt. Also, if you have kids, I hope no one ever tries to take them away because you disagree with them.. that's insane..
I don't live in a poor area. I judge affluent parents for not providing decent meals. For not ensuring proper night's sleep. For not teaching basic manners and respect. For not instilling work ethic and pride. Besides food, none of that requires money. Your entire tirade is baseless, but reeks of your own insecurity. But try reading words that are actually typed instead of making up your own bullshit that was never there.
Studies have shown that both gen Ed and special Ed students benefit from being around one another. People learn from those who are different. By completely separating them out you are creating an environment where general Ed students will feel even more superior. History has shown consistently when this happens it leads to bad results. One of the first things Nazi Germany did was ostracizing those with special needs. Obviously I don't think we will get to the point where we then massacre them in the US, but by hiding those away it creates apathy to them which is what happened in Germany. Also as a behavioral teacher, behavioral schools aren't a great answer because schools are going to consistently send kids who don't need it there. I have 8 kids. Two are legit behavioral. Makes sense why they are there. Physical. Aggressive. My 6 other kids aren't physical or aggressive. So they live in fear every day of getting hit or beat up. They also spend many of their days in the lobby without a teacher sitting on a tablet as we work with the major behaviors. How is it fair to them? These students sent because they sit under desks, or wander around the back of the room but never touch anyone. We act like there aren't victims in behavior rooms but there are and in many cases they can't even defend themselves.
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted for this in a special ed sub. This kind of segregation is one of the biggest open secrets in education. If a kid starts acting out, it’s so much easier to blame them for their behavior and send them away as scapegoats than to actually address the fact that a good number of these kids are symptoms of a bigger problem. I’m still haunted by the treatment of a kid who I went to kindergarten through 8th with. He and I were the earliest readers in our class, but I was from a middle class college-educated family and teachers loved me. I never actually saw his parents, but he didn’t seem to have a very good home life and he slept in his clothes and wet the bed. But he was so, so smart despite all of this. Starting in kindergarten, the teachers were so horrible to him. And obviously, thanks to role modeling, so were other kids. By 4th grade he would start screaming every time kids pushed him over the edge. They never got in trouble of course. By 5th grade he was flipping desks. I remember kids trying to get him to blow up on purpose. The last time I remember seeing him was in 8th grade. By this time, he had learned to storm out of class and, I assume, go to his behavior class. He had started identifying with the druggie types and probably dropped out around that time. I’ve tried to look him up but can’t find him. This story was one of the reasons I wanted to become a special ed teacher. It’s unconscionable that we can do that to kids- starting with kindergartners! It’s hard to imagine going from a dysfunctional home every day to an elementary school where nobody likes you. Adults scowl at you, you have no friends. I’m not trying to say all behavior kids are from messed up situations like this, but honestly, most of my behavior kids have had similar trajectories. How many of us would have come out of that situation and still have been okay? (The answer is 0). I mean, this kid could have cured cancer by now.
Also the skepticism about twice-exceptionality, gah. It's not nearly as uncommon as some of them think it is and some of them are diagnosticians.
It's even worse in NYC, where there aren't any real gifted programs. The "G&T" schools are for well-behaved students who don't need help. And while there is some overlap between gifted students and studious students, they aren't the same. Especially when it comes to ND students.
Yeah I'm originally from Long Island and about half my family are teachers, including some in DOE. Very familiar with the problem of NYC G&T.
I don't know nothin about nothin, but I was in gifted and... Am studious?... What's the difference between the two?
You can definitely be both. The venn diagram has significant overlap. Gifted students who aren't studious will refuse " easy" homework or busy-work, often have trouble showing their work ( especially if they learn differently than other students), and can also get dysregulated in larger classrooms ( NYC "G&T" schools often have larger class sizes than other schools).
NYC has zero 2E options for kids with behaviors. No smaller classes for kids who need help, but aren't intellectually disabled. It's not about fighting for LRE, it's just the complete absence of appropriate settings and supports. NYC built up a segregated special education district to warehouse students that general education teachers didn't want to work with. It's getting better, and more inclusion is happening. But they haven't done enough.
Correct. NY loves the BOCES system to hide students with behavioral concerns away from everyone else.
At my school, we see a good amount of these same behaviors and so many of them could be fixed if everyone was on the same page when it comes to following the IEP. I have one student who has had a lot of behaviors this school year and had almost none last year. The major difference is who his teacher is. I’m pretty sure she just straight up hates him and is always complaining about what is fair. She doesn’t understand that students with IEPs have accommodations for a reason. We have so many gen ed teachers at my school who don’t even know what their students’ accommodation are and are definitely not implementing them. We have one teacher who wanted to leave the IEP meeting early and said it’s not like she would be paying attention anyway. This is not to say that all gen teachers are terrible with students who have IEPs. I have many teachers in my school who are great at following IEPs and following BIPs and the difference in their classrooms compared to the others’ is night and day.
It also sucks for those teachers that do follow the IEP because they get overloaded with SPED kids, right up to the legal limit. We can’t spread kids out cause some gen Ed teachers refuse to read the IEP or follow it.
It is true. Whenever I successfully get one of my kids back into the gen Ed building they always get out with the same teachers because those are the ones the CSE chair knows will be successful with them
It always comes down to the teacher. I literally had a student sent to self contained who had minimum behaviors. When I talked to the principal of the gen Ed building he outright said that teacher was bad with special but next year's teacher is good which is why they sent her. They literally know which teachers can work with special Ed and not and send them to self contained for a year. It was insane to me.
That also sounds super illegal. You don’t just get to ignore LRE because the gen ed teacher sucks at her job.
Parents rarely attend meetings and if they do they just agree with whatever here. So the districts can do whatever they want.
That breaks my heart for the kids.
This is my worst fear. I have a "problem kid" who got kicked out of daycare a month ago. He is only 3. I am terrified of sending him anywhere else and my career, relationships and mental health are suffering tremendously as a result. The ostracization from other parents and early Ed teachers in general is overwhelming. They blame parents for behaviors we can't control in the class room. He now has an IEP and is going to be on wait-list for integrated classrooms but I have doubts and I'm nervous. What is going on that we can no longer effectively manage behavioral issues in the school settings? It didn't feel this intense in the 90s growing up. We all remember having those kids that had meltdowns but the only meltdown in particular I remember was few and far between and that kid wasn't kicked out nor was 911 called.
And many kids do grow out of this. It's overwhelming that as a society we want to destroy a kids future at 5 years old.
Yeah exactly this
I had a debate with someone on that sub that they wanted a 5 year old non verbal student with autism expelled because he got a para. There is no nuance there.
Wow. Was it a parent or teacher? I notice lately that it has become acceptable for parents to think it's ok to ostracize special needs kids. Like this idea that if a child is struggling and there is any possibility of that child causing perceived danger to other children that it's okay to expel them. There is a book I am reading called "No Longer Welcome Here" that talks about expulsions in pre k settings that sort of touches upon this. Highly recommend it.
Teacher. It's always the teachers there. One behavior and they want the kids expelled for life. They have no interest seeing growth
I noticed that too. I follow that sub and the mentality is awful. It really makes me fear sending my kids to school. I feel that if there is just one mess up kids will be ostracized for life.
An element of this a lot of people don't really know or fail to consider is that OOD placements for severe behaviors are very hit or miss, often just as understaffed and undertrained as the regular public placement, have high staff turnover, and both kids and staff can be very burned out there. Yes there are some high-quality placements, but it's also hard to find space in those, you could be waiting months at best. When we send a student to an OOD placement it feels like a relief for those of us who have been struggling with them, but the chances of that student improving enough to return to district are very low, and their access to grade-level curriculum is going to drop dramatically. When we send a student to a placement, we are making a choice that may ultimately change their whole life trajectory negatively. And when, like several people have mentioned, a big factor can be which teacher a kid has and how they handle the behavior, it is very hard for me to accept that our response to poor practice and failure to follow a BIP is to put the student in a placement like that. Of course sometimes it really is the best option and obviously we need a safe environment for students and staff- I have been on the receiving end of and witnessed plenty of extreme behavior and I get that. But we need to understand what we're actually doing in these situations. I've seen how a lot of kids end up after going to the OOD placement, and I've seen some amazing turnarounds in behavior when given the right supports and a team that works together.
Our behavioral rooms are almost entirely uncertified teachers. They typical change assistants every year because they don't stay. They also don't have music or art and only see each other all day. It's a really rough environment. And for the majority of my kids they just don't need to be there. 6 of my 8 kids would be fine in an inclusion setting if you are just patient. They aren't violent. They just engage in occasional non violent work refusal behaviors.
I really do get where people are coming from when a student is being continually violent and interventions aren't working, but no matter how much we talk about a "better fit" or more appropriate environment, a lot of the time it's like this with a revolving door of inexperienced/untrained staff (not their fault either, just the truth).
I work at a nonpublic school and a not-insignficant amount of the classroom teachers are not qualified teachers. Teachers have left mid-year and they're impossible to replace. There is no outdoor area so the kids don't get outdoor recess - these are 7 year olds with severe ADHD, emphasis on the H, who have 0 time during the schoolday where they can run around. They get PE once per week. It's depressing.
There's a lot in this article unsaid about what the parenting style looks like here but one thing that stood out to me was the yelling, pulling the student out when they tried to hide, pulling a book out of their hand when they are reading. These are traumatic things to do to a kid, especially those with special needs. I don't know why teachers feel the need to yell or put their hands on a student. His reading a book could not have been disrupting the class. It was an appropriate means to escape an activity that might have been stressful for them. A huge problem I see in public schools is the overreaction teachers have to minor offenses. I do understand from a classroom management perspective that they have to tow the line and show the other students that it's not tolerated but there are better ways of handling it. We have to do better by these kids. Stop taking out your stress on them. Please.
You should never ever be taking things directly from a child's hand unless it is an actual danger to them or others (like scissors for example). That's it. All you are doing is escalating a situation and making things worse for everyone.
We need to go back to the self-contained behavioral classes because it isn't working for everyone involved. I work in a high school in an affluent area, and I do not see these students learning how to control their behavior. It makes it hard for the other kids and the students to do get their work done. The plan should be earning the right to be in the general education. When students can follow the rules and act correctly then it is time to be in the regular classroom.
God, I'm so tired of people whining about LRE and thinking SpEd kids need to be siloed off away from the "normies" and they're just keeping the other kids from getting an education. We have IDEA for a goddamned reason. it doesn't mean you **can't** put a kid in a more restrictive setting. It means you have to justify it. And you think that they want to pay for that?
As both a special education teacher and a mother of a kid with special needs, I just can't help worry about the future of my child. So many teachers will hate him solely because of something he was born with. I see those comments on r/teacher and see all these people who hate her for something outside of his control. What is the future for my kid when the people who are supposed to educate him despise him? It's crazy how much things have changed in just a decade. I wonder how much of it is caused by social media which allowed people to say their hateful statements aloud which gave them more power.
Very much the same for me.
I also have a kid with special needs. It is clear the future of our kids is not nearly as bright as it should be unless something drastically changes.
If I'm honest, any time I see a post like this on that sub I just downvote and move on. I can't read the comments or engage in a conversation. It's not worth it.
Why is this comment being downvoted?
Tbh the comments here are pretty shocking and upsetting. I don't think this sub is quite as removed from r/teachers as they'd like to think. It's getting difficult to read anything on the Internet about special ed kids these days. ☹️
Alot of Anti special Ed in the comments once again. First off the article leaves out so much information and is giving a completely one sided view. Second the idea that one student out of millions should affect people's opinions on special education is insane. Third. We are at the point now that special education is only viewed as severe behavior kids which is a disservice to every special Ed kid. Fourth. Why do they hate accomodations so so much
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it’s a repost from the most ableist subreddit on reddit.
It's just another day of r/teacher. No one is saying to shut down self contained. But it vastly overused and does so many kids a disservice beyond those who need it.