Summer School

Summer school is definitely interesting in my school district. Students who failed or who had a potential of failing were not required to attend. Instead, students who would like to attend, do. So typically, we get the higher students anyways. But I was able to convince a few of the parents to sign their child up and how much it would benefit (and that I would be teaching it) :) The one student I spoke about in my last post is attending. He is very high in math, but very low in Reading. At the end of the year, I gave him "The Most Improved In Reading Award". I'm wondering if this is why his mother signed him up?

At the school I went to, parents had to pay and we definitely didn't want to sign up and extend the school year. What about at your school?

Educational Concern

I decided to blog about a more personal issue, and that is within my school instead of perhaps nationwide or statewide. Currently, as many of you know, I am teaching general education, but this does not mean that my heart isn't with the students with special needs (which is most in my urban school). This is the way my school handles referrals: You write up your referral and turn it into the SST (Student Support Team). After about 2 months they get back with you and you have a meeting to discuss accommodations and modifications for the child. After about 3 weeks, you are supposed to have another meeting and decide if these are working, if not, then the referral for CST (Child Study Team) is made. This is not technically how the procedure goes. You see, I had a student that was reading at about a 1st grade reading level- IN 5TH GRADE!! So I referred him in October. We finally had the meeting in February and discussed the different strategies that I was using (which were many, especially with my Special Ed background) and we never had another meeting for the rest of the year. I asked the SST if I could go ahead and test him, but they said that we would have to wait to find out about his glasses- that he rarely wore. Special Ed is not taken seriously and I'm not happy about it. Thankfully, me and the other classmates worked so much with this student that he is now reading at about a 3.5 grade level, which is an improvement; however, he is now going into 6th grade. I was even thinking about asking if I could be on the SST, because we actually only have 1 person right now, and he is the special educator for the 1st-4th grades. So I think I"m going to ask if I can perhaps represent the Middle School (we are a PreK-8 school).

Hi everyone. My name is Breanne Edmonds and I am a teacher in Baltimore City. My husband and I moved here about a year and a half ago from Michigan. We just bought a house and are truly learning a lot about ourselves and needing to fix everything ourselves (well, mostly him).

I'm about half way done with my coursework at MSU. I taught 5th grade all subjects this year. I enjoyed working with my class so much, that I will continue teaching them next year. This time Science and Social Studies. But my principal also included 7th grade (who I had when they were in 5th grade) so it should be an exciting year. So far, I have taught general education but I do plan on going back into Special Ed within the next couple eyars. I wanted to get the gen ed teacher aspect before I went into special ed.

In my free time, I am usually outside gardening or watching movies.