Oh, the stories

When I ask about my wife’s day, I learned long ago to brace myself. She’s reserved and never uses the names of the kids in her class. But, oh when she gets started, she’s got some war stories. Real doozies in fact.

When we lived in Washington D.C., there were the stories about the young nonverbal autistic boy who would squat low on the ground. He would grab big handfuls of dirt and siphon it though his fingers. The self-stimulating behavior was his way of regulating the things around him and managing his emotions. For some autistic kids, it can be hand-flapping or body rocking. For him, it was playing with the dirt.

No one could reach him. Other teachers tried, but nothing seemed to help. My wife was new in her job, but she was determined. She worked for months with the boy. She would often come home with scratches up and down her wrists and arms from where he had flailed out at her.

She refused to give up, but one day things started to click. She found a way to connect and communicate with him. They built an unbreakable bond. For the first time, he started to sit in his seat and respond to those around him. She found a way to break through the rock like barrier.

A sight to behold

Then seven years ago, there’s the story of the visually impaired first grader who got placed in my wife’s Lifeskills Class. The girl showed little interest in school. She couldn’t wait to leave everyday. My wife worked with her and fought to get her an enlarger, an electronic video magnifier, specially designed for people with vision loss.

The girl who previously looked bored and annoyed could see pictures in books for the first time. She couldn’t wait to get to the classroom each day. She would grab book after book off the book case to look through the enlarger.

Can you imagine the joy she must have felt for the first time in her life to see pictures and words and start to read by herself?

Climbing the progress mountain

Of course her favorite stories are when kids who face incredible emotional and physical challenges start to make progress. Two years ago, she started telling me about a boy and a girl she had been working with on the alphabet and letter sounds. It was slow going at first.

To make matters worse, my wife’s school is in an urban city and the school often faces financial challenges. Despite the uphill climb, the two were starting to pick up what my wife had been teaching them. The work started to make sense. They were learning to read short sentences.

She came home one day on cloud nine. I thought she was happy about the sappy text I had sent her during the day. Oh, it was nice and all, but it was more than that. I was outdone by the two kids. They had read a challenging section of the book they were reading together.

Oh, the joys of teaching.

One more thing:

We’ve bought a number of things for her classroom this year — including books, art supplies, carpet — to help create an inspiring learning environment and supplement her school’s limited funds. It comes with the territory of being a teacher. If you’d care to contribute, please check out her Amazon Classroom Wish List. I know a number of current and former teachers are regular readers. Please feel no obligation or expectation! I’ve just been asked in the past if she has a wish list.

And because confidentiality is important in education, I’ve kept the kids names out and modified each of the stories above to protect the kids and families.

Thanks for reading.