"They're all out of step except my Johnny!"

That was the punchline to one of my grandmother's favourite jokes about an over-proud mother watching her son marching in the parade. I sometimes wonder what she would have made of T.K..

He came home with an assignment a few months ago, for science -- his favourite subject. The kids were to design and build a car (Lego was an allowed building material) which would be put on an inclined plane. The performance of the car would be tested with various materials added to the inclined plane, such as sand or oil.

T.K., owner of a very large bin full of Lego, was bursting with plans. He would add treads to his car. He would add a motor. He would add... "But T.K.," I said. "I think the idea is that the car will coast down the inclined plane, so it won't need a motor."

T.K. didn't miss a beat. "It doesn't say anywhere on there whether it has to go up or down." Blinking, I reviewed the form. Sonofagun, the kid was right.

"Sorry kiddo, but I still think we need to go back to the teacher on this one."

Mrs. E. was adamant. "The curriculum says it has to go DOWN the inclined plane." End of story. This seemed a bit of a waste of time to me, given that the kid is already pretty clear on the fact that gravity works, and that there would be nineteen other cars going DOWN, but that was the ruling. She grudgingly allowed that perhaps he could do an extra, bonus car that could go UP if they had the time, but the air was already out of T.K.'s metaphorical tires. He assembled a car in two minutes, took it to class, and it went DOWN. With all the others.

Later, I happened to relate the incident to T.K.'s grandfather, a highly intelligent man who also didn't have the most harmonious relationship with the elementary school system. A mischievous glitter came into his eye.

"If it's going DOWN, then it's not an inclined plane," he pointed out. "It's a DECLINED plane. T.K. was right. If it's an INCLINED plane, then the cars have to go UP, not down."

Well, I'll be.

They really ARE all out of step except my Johnny.

When good people with goodwill get poor results

This past year has been a real meat-grinder for T.K. and me. I think he's weathered it better than I did. It all started so well, with meetings and assessments and diagnosis and communication books and hey, new glasses thrown into the mix for good measure. And in spite of that, it was even worse than the year before.

I'd fallen off of the blog wagon, perhaps in subconscious hope that our truly difficult days were behind us. I guess that's the lesson of the day (year) for this edition. Don't make those assumptions.

As much as I would have loved it to be wonderful and harmonious and uplifting and all, I could see the seeds of frustration and disconnect even before the first pack of pencils was breached. I remember a bright, warm spring day in T.K.'s Grade 1 year, when I'd picked him up at nutrition/recess break (as requested by the school administration), and we'd spent 40 pleasant minutes having a picnic in the park and a bike ride to get T.K.'s ya-ya's out.

"I'm thirsty," he said, on the way back to school.

"No problem, bud," sez Mom. "You can get a drink at the school." T.K. locked up his bike out front, paused to pick up some litter and deposit it in the garbage can, and rattled on happily about his hopes to get one of the "caught ya" awards the school gives out for those who contribute to the school community. I signed him in and he zipped down the hall to his classroom.

I paused to tie my shoe. A fateful decision. T.K. hit his classroom and realized he'd forgotten to get his drink. With lunchtime ticking through its last minutes and no teacher to give permission, he turned around to zip back down the hall to the fountain. And ran up against Mrs. E, who was patrolling the halls.

"Get back to your classroom!" she snapped.

"But I want a drink," said T.K..

"Get back to your classroom!"

"But I want a drink!" wailed 6-year-old T.K..

"No you don't. Get back in your classroom!"

I was paralyzed. Mom can't countermand teachers on their home turf. Major faux pas. But it was like watching a train wreck in progress. T.K. panicking and getting "stuck", the teacher no less "stuck" on her insistence that he did not want a drink (um, whut? He just told you he does) and had to return to class RIGHT NOW.

Another teacher stepped out in the hallway. Mrs. N. Hooray -- calm, flexible Mrs. N. She'll help them resolve this.

"T.K., get back in your classroom!"

Sigh. Or... not. I hazarded a peek around the corner. T.K. was sitting on the floor in a miserable heap while two adults stood over him. Long gone was the cheery mood, the hopes for the kind of day that would earn him a reward. "I want a drink!" he wailed.

Then, rescue for the entire group arrived in the form of Miss T, his teacher. "Hi T.K.! Why don't we get you settled in class and you can have a drink as soon as we take attendance?"

"Okay," said T.K. unsteadily. He climbed to his feet and walked towards the classroom without a glance at the fountain. That's all it took -- someone who could hear his problem and promise him that it would be solved. The other teachers, their faces saved and their total authority intact, disappeared in other directions.

I wanted to barf. I'd donated an hour of my time and income to getting T.K. into a positive, relaxed, hopeful state for school, and here it was shot to crap within twenty seconds of getting in the door. Over a drink of water. The message for T.K.? The adults in here don't like you, don't get you, aren't interested in your needs, and will deny that you even have them. It won't make any difference. What a great basis for a trust relationship.

Aaaaaand, guess who he had for his teacher this year? You got it. Mrs. E. I tried to have the placement changed, but the principal insisted that Mrs. E. was just the thing for him. She's kind, she told me. She's committed. She's got loads of experience with special education.

I tried to protest but got exactly nowhere. The die was cast. So I shelved my misgivings and got on board. We worked up an IEP. We brought in resource people. We set up a communication book. And we had many, many meetings. And you know what? This year sucked even worse than last year. T.K. and Mrs. E. might as well have been speaking different languages on separate planets. Oil, meet water.

Make no mistake -- she IS kind and committed and experienced and all the things she was advertised to be. But she didn't *get* T.K.. And wasn't interested in even making the effort.

Two lessons: even kind, committed, experienced teams of people can still get bad results. And seeing the train wreck coming doesn't necessarily mean you can prevent it, no matter how hard you try.

Letter to T.K.'s principal

I promise that things will get lighter next round. But right now, right here, you have a cri du coeur from someone who hasn't slept decently in weeks, thanks to a chronic pain issue. Sounds like the kind of thing that presages a bungled suicide attempt, but I think I shall confine myself to another glass of wine and leave it at that.

I'm publishing it here not as a "poor me" kinda thing, but more in hopes that future weeks will have me looking back and saying, "Wow, things were pretty bad there for a while. I'm so grateful they're better now." 'Cos they're gonna be... aren't they?

Dear Mrs. L:

It really has been a heckuva week. I know that you believe that T.K. is
doing far better this year than he did last year, but I still feel that
Mrs. B is finding having my kid in her class unrelentingly painful and
annoying. I got two of those wretched Incident Report things this week. On
one, T.K. stuck his face under the partition in the bathroom and joked, "I
can see your bum!" to the kid in the next stall. He thought it would be
funny. In the other, Simon pestered T.K. to shake his hand, and when he did,
said, "I wiped my bum with that hand!!!" So T.K. hit him once, then
subequently apologized.

So... Simon plays a silly potty joke on T.K., and there are no repercussions
for him. T.K. plays a silly potty joke, and now he apparently has to wait
for an EA to accompany him every time he goes to the bathroom, for the
forseeable future. Um, WHAT???? Seems a little over the top, doesn't
teach him a darned thing, and I also assume that the EAs have better ways to
spend their time. (I *hope* they do.) And what are we telling the class,
when T.K. has to go to the bathroom under armed guard? T.K. finds it
embarrassing and annoying -- what an effective way to fill his frustration
beaker and make negative incidents more likely!! Yay us!!

Meanwhile, the "consequences" for T.K.'s single whack of Simon are that T.K.
had to eat lunch in the LRT's office. Which sounds all important and
consequence-ey, but how does it teach the lagging skill (moderating
emotional response in the heat of the moment) or increase the odds that the
skill will be exercised successfully on the next occasion? I put in a note
questioning that and the EA bathroom thing; it's been forwarded to the LRT
(I am told) and I haven't heard back anything. She went ahead with the
"lunch-office-consequence" anyway, for all the good it will do ("Mom, she
said I shouldn't do bad things, ever"), and I'll be surprised if I ever get
any response at all. Meh, it's just the mother again. Who cares?

It's all starting to feel so very pointless. I wanted to run screaming from
the building when you said the other week that his relationship with his
next teacher was likely to be the same. I can't keep this up.

Just to keep things interesting, it appears that things are heating up
between Mr. A and T.K.'s sister Kira. He was threatening to call her parents
because she was reading books at inappropriate moments in class; when I
found out, I used CPS at home and we solved it, and he was happy again. But
now he's threatening to have her write punishment lines and embarrassing her
in front of her peers when he catches her attention faltering in class --
um, that's not okay (or remotely effective) with an ADHD kid. I've offered
to come in and we can CPS that too. Still waiting for him to get back to me
with a time to do that; in the meantime I hear that they had a showdown in
class about... do I have this right... his insistence that she needed to
wear a bandaid on the little zit on her wrist?

And yes, as you know, it's hard to keep generating courteous, supportive,
problem-solving response when I'm in a state of sleep deprivation that's
outlawed under several UN anti-torture statutes. Can't work, can't think,
crying all the time but still there every G**D**N day, warming that bench
because I'm in detention as much as my kid. I don't know what to do. I
really don't. I hate that front walk. I hate that hallway. I want to grab
my weird mutant school-system-incompatible children and run away and be a
wild granola homeschooler or something. Burn the f****** communication book
with all its daily tallies of failures-to-conform, and sprinkle the ashes on
an organic vegetable garden. Except that I stink at gardening and I vax my
kids and eat meat so we wouldn't fit in with that crowd either.

I believe in the school system, I really do. I've turned myself inside out
to try to make this relationship go well. Showed up compliantly, week after
week, as the system helped itself to thousands of dollars' worth of my
working time (and hence my income.) Paid for evaluations. Taken kids to
therapy appointments. Taken courses. Gone on field trips. Contributed
books, materials, volunteer time, everything.

I wish I felt like it was making any difference.

It liiiiiiives!!!!

Boy do I have a lot of catching up to do. I was thinking, hoping, that T.K.'s path was smoothing out, and we were in for some less complicated parent-teacher conferences.

Um. Not.

I guess I'm finally out of denial, and crazy-busy or not, I need blog-therapy again. Time to bring this thing back to life.

Sigh.