Frustration Thread 4

[cheery_j.]

its hard to be the best teacher they CAN be to each and every child when your class size is 50.

I swear I'll never complain again!!! (Well, not for a couple of days at least). At the moment my largest class is 25 and the smallest is 17!! (which is NOT the normal size of classes in Germany, btw) I've even had classes as small as 12 students...

[Del]

They have a major room with two classes in it and two teachers... it means they tell the parent there is 25 to one teacher... but its more like a tag team.

[Catch-up]

Ghost, that is so horrible and I am so sorry that happened to you.

Batty, I dearly wish that were possible. I would love to see something like that happen, but I don't think it will.

His poor mom works for the school, but lives in another town. One huge perk was being able to send him to school here, which is a far better school system. She's addressing it, but is worried about how far she can go, wondering if she'll get fired. In which case, she would have to move him to the other school district.

I am having one of those moments when I am so angry that I almost can't see straight. I've always had absolutely wonderful experiences with the schools here in the past. Now that Ava is in middle school, I'm having a much harder time communicating. So... short version here... once we got Ava well (medically) we discovered she had severe anxiety from the whole experience. Once we tackled that we started seeing serious focus issues. Not traditional ADD symptoms, but close enough to try something for it. Two months ago we got a prescription for a new medication because what we were trying simply wasn't working. I let the school know about the change and asked them to take note if it helped or not. Really, truly, "yes" or "no". So here we are two months in and I've got nothing! This is something they should have been able to notice in the first couple of days, and fair to give an answer on after 2 weeks - 3 tops. In not being able to get this answer I've discovered that it's not just one flaky teacher. There's some sort of system break down at this place. I've been patient. I've been nice. I'm now done being both. The correspondence just keeps getting more surreal and unacceptable and is inching me ever closer to saying one of those truly ugly things.

[Del]

Dont do it catch-up. You will get nowhere being "the crazy mother" or "the abusive mother" or whatever other cliche they want to tag you with so they have a justification not to listen to you.

Write everything down and section it into concise bulletpoints.

Thing's condition.
Medications and their effects good and bad.
What has happened.
Your idea of a plan.
How you might be of help working with the school to enact a viable plan for when any confrontation might happen.

or something like that.... you know what you need better than I do.

Stay very calm... focussed and enthusiastic about how this can be resolved.

If you cant get any joy from the individual teacher then arrange a meeting with the teacher and the headmaster or whoever is the student councellor/liason officer or whatever works in your school structure, but make sure its someone higher than the teacher is present (if you feel its the teacher you are having the problem with). Good luck.

[Catch-up]

I've calmed down. I've made some concessions, (while hopefully making it clear what I expect moving forward) and have put forth a proposal. I've run out of enthusiasm - I use that a lot! But, I think I came across ok. Luckily, I've had face time in the past with everyone involved and it's always gone really well. Generally, people tend to like me and realize we're on the same team if I've had a chance to discuss these things face to face with them. Generally. Despite overwhelming urges, I have not used any bad words or threatened anyone. It wasn't easy. And, completely with you on involving other members of staff. If I think I'm getting stonewalled I'll do an end run around anyone in a hot minute. People love that.

[Catch-up]

Ok, have a meeting at 12:30 today with the principal and the teacher. I've accepted the fact that they completely dropped the ball in terms of tracking whether the recent change was beneficial. I don't want to discuss that further, but just establish where we're at right now and what we need to do moving forward. I've written up an agenda with bullet points, numbered items and everything. Here's a question: Do I forward the agenda to them before the meeting so we can all be on the same page? Or do I just bring my agenda with me? I don't want to look pushy, but I also know that they're very busy and we will only have a set amount of time and I want to make sure we cover what's important at this point.

[Batty]

It sounds like you have everything under control, Catch-up!

Personally, I'd give them the agenda in advance, with a note explaining that these are the points that you would like to discuss. If they have advance warning, then they can't tell you that 'they will have to get back to you' with any information that you have requested!

Well Done, so far!

[raisindot]

[Edited]I really wasn't copying Batty, honest! She got her response in first while I was writing mine. Clearly, deranged minds think alike!

I'd forward the agenda to them, Suzanne. That way you can send the message that these are the issues you want to talk about, that you're serious about this, and that you expect them to be prepared to discuss them. If only you hand it at the meeting, they'll be able to give excuses as to why they haven't prepared or they may try to bring in their own agenda. The more you look prepared to lead the conversation, the more productive it is likely to be. Good luck!

[Penfold]

I can't really add to what Batty and Raisin have said already except to add my best wishes for a successful outcome.

[Catch-up]

Thanks so much you guys! Batty, I love your point about removing the "we'll get back to you" option. I'm going to send it to them. I've had Derek look it over to make sure it sounds neutral and professional, or as he so charmingly puts it - "I just want to make sure you're not about to Hulk out on them."

I'm expecting it to go well based on past experience. Everyone is usually friendly, positive and professional - in person. The pattern that I'm seeing here though is that they are able to talk the talk, but tend to drop the ball on the follow through. So I'll take notes at the meeting, integrate them into the agenda and email that to everyone afterwards.

I'm trying not to be nervous.

[Bouncy Castle]

I don't suppose you can take a tape recorder to help with the note taking?

[Catch-up]

Yes, I believe you can take a tape recorder. Unfortunately I don't have one. And, I think if you do bring one everyone has to agree that it's ok to use it. What would be brilliant is a laptop! I can type as fast as anyone can talk - writing, not so much.

[Bouncy Castle]

Sorted!

http://www.amazon.com/Spy-Net-Voice-Rec ... io+spy+pen

[Catch-up]

That is so cool! I'm half thinking of ordering it.

[Bouncy Castle]

Bugger. Just seen this review from 2011.

These are on sale right now at K-Mart - 50 percent off. I got mine for 10 bucks there.

I'm a grown kid, and just love these kinds of things, especially when they're cheap. First, you'll need an itty-bitty Phillips screwdriver to get your battery in. Luckily, I packed one in my truck because I usually don't carry an itty-bitty Phillips screwdriver with me to motels.

The unit is cute! It takes 1 AAA battery. The speaker isn't anything to release the doves over...but it works.

I recorded 30 seconds of me just testing the pen. 10 seconds of my friend popping in to tell me the water blasts out of the messaging shower head! And then 4:30 of TV for quality test.

...and with that, the pen is almost full!!! I'm wondering if there is a way to hack this pen to add more time. I'm a journalist, so this would be great to sneak into meetings with my night-vision goggles resting on top of my head. Hah.

Otherwise, completely worth the half-off price I got.

Oh well. I thought it was a good idea at the time. I'm sure the more expensive ones have larger memory capacity, but you don't want to be spending thirty or forty dollars.