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Thursday, September 24, 2009

I Promise You, Its "E" not "I"

I'm having issues with Zach's teacher.
  1. I started off the year on the wrong foot with his teacher. At the Kindergarten Parent Orientation I found out one of my best friend's nieces is in Zach's class. Her mom (my friend's sister) was there with her fiance, and she was trying to get him to remember who I am. We were sitting in the crowded class right in front of the teacher when my friend's sister announced to her fiance, "She's the one who went drinking with Katie and I on my birthday, and then threw up in our yard." Yeah, that's not something I want announced to my son's new teacher. I don't drink often, hardly ever, nor would I have drank as much as I did that night, but they kept ordering drinks. Stupid excuse I know, but come on, I'm allowed to act like the typical 21 (at the time) year old every now and then if my kids aren't around. But does Zach's teacher know that? After my friend's sister made that comment I got ugly looks from the teacher (and other parents) often.
  2. Also, at the end of Orientation, I went up to Zach's teacher to explain to her about Zach's soap allergy and that he's primarily left handed. Her reaction to the soap allergy was "You're kidding, how can someone actually be allergic to soap?" and she gave me this look like I must be joking. I swallowed what I wanted to say, and told her that I'm also allergic to most soaps, so is my grandmother, and my great-grandmother was too. She then asked if Zach was aware that he's allergic to it. I told her yes, it'd be hard for him not to since it makes the skin on his hands crack and peel and is extremely painful. I also told her Zach has special scissors that are meant to be used with his left hand, but they aren't made for young children, but he knows how to use them and is careful with them, but she said that was fine.
  3. About 3 weeks after he started I'm going through his folder and there's a project he had to cut and paste for. I'm looking at it and he did a horrible job, and I'm noticing his handwriting is much worse than usual. I sit him down and asked why he's doing so messily on his work. (He takes a lot of pride in making his school work look nice.) He said his teacher said he can't use his scissors and that he needs to use his right hand because his left hand gets too dirty when he writes and colors with it. I sent his teacher a note reminding her that Zach is left handed, and if his hand gets too messy for him he can clean it with a wipes or rinse it off. The next day and he comes home with green paint all over his hands. I ask him why and he says they made hand prints. I asked why he didn't clean off his hands, and he said he couldn't because he can't use soap. I asked him why he didn't just rinse it off with water, and again he said his teacher said he couldn't.
  4. Zach had strep last week, but went to school Monday because he didn't have a fever yet and we didn't know he was sick. I pick him up Monday afternoon and he's miserable. He's coughing a lot, and they just sounded painful. His eyes were all glossy and he was soooo hot to the touch. I take his fever and it's almost 102! I asked if he told his teacher he felt bad, and he said yes, she told him to just put his head on his desk. Then when we discover its strep and that he'll be out the whole rest of the week I email her (the way she told us to contact her) to tell her what's going on with Zach and to ask her if she could send Zach's work he'll miss to the office so I can get it and to please email me back so I know when I can go get his work. It gets to Friday with no word from her. While my phone is off while we're at the doctor's his school's secretary calls and leaves a message asking where Zach is. I call back and tell her he's had strep and will be back Monday. While I have her on the phone I ask if his work is in the office and she said no, but she'll contact his teacher and call me when his work arrives. His teacher didn't send his work there until dismissal on Friday so we only had 2 1/2 days to make up a week's worth of work.
  5. Now, the final straw. Yesterday I'm going through Zach's folder and everyday they have a sheet where they have to write their name 10 times. Yesterday's had his first and last name, but instead of putting the "en" that our last name ends with he put "in" on the whole sheet, and on every other sheet he had to write his name on. I'm sitting there confused because Zach knows how to spell his whole name, and has since last year. I ask him why he spelled his last name wrong all day and he told me he wrote his name on the first line and the teacher checked it and told him it was wrong and erased his last name and spelled it out to him to write, and sure enough you could see where he had written it correctly and it had been erased. She told him that "in" was the correct way to spell it. Um, hello? Maybe this would be okay if it was still close to the first day of school, but he's been in school almost 2 months now and all of his paperwork has his last name spelled "en."
I don't know what to do. John is furious with his teacher. In his opinion enough is enough. Even if she thinks poorly of me because of the drinking remark that's still no reason to completely disregard anything we try to tell her. He wrote her a note this morning (not that I got to read it) about everything she's been doing, and he told me if she continues this way after getting the note he's switching Zach out of her class. I told him I don't want to do that. While Zach might not like her a lot, he has to learn you won't always like your teacher, but you still have to do as they tell you, and just try to make the best of it. I told John if she keeps it up I will call his teacher from last year and ask her to speak to his new teacher.
But honestly, I'm getting really frustrated with his teacher, and I too would like to pull him out of her class, but I just don't think that would be sending the right message to Zach.

1 comment:

Nicole M. said...

I'd kill her. I am sorry I was done after the second point you made. I feel so bad for your son. I am not sure how he is with others criticizing him, but that can be such a serious blow to his self confidence and self-esteem. :(


Oh! Thank you SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (should I add more 'o's?) for the box of clothes! I cannot believe Bella has grown out of all of them. Heck I cannot believe she was that small! I am so greatful for the many NB onsies, all the onsies I have (which is TONS!) are 0-3 mos, but I have been nervous about that 1st month both my boys have fit in NB (3 wks for Thomas, 6 for Collin)