Typical child being ignored in inclusion class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In MCPS they always have an extra teacher IME and they are typically smaller classes to begin with.

+1 My kid was in class in elementary school where the teacher had an advanced credential in special education and had a higher than proportional number of special needs kids in the class. It included a child who couldn't walk who was nearly blind who had a 1:1 aide. It was a great experience to teach my child empathy and about how kids deal with limitations (all students got a little card with their names printed in Braille) where they were taught how to write their names on a Braille printing machine), and more selfishly, we parents loved that there was nearly always a second adult in the class. The aide had her primary duties with her assigned child, but could easily step in to help a child if the teacher was busy with another student or if the teacher needed to run to the bathroom. And yes, often these classes are smaller than the norm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But, why are the teacher and her aid spending most of the period supporting, corralling, reporting issues about five or six students with learning or behavioral disabilities?

Shouldn't they divide their time equitably?

It’s impossible. The behavior issues overwhelm them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But, why are the teacher and her aid spending most of the period supporting, corralling, reporting issues about five or six students with learning or behavioral disabilities?

Shouldn't they divide their time equitably?

It’s impossible. The behavior issues overwhelm them.

OP - This is a teacher problem, not a problem of MCPS or the philosophy of inclusion. There are a lot of teachers who manage their classes just fine. DC had one who could not and it was a her problem. They brought in a sub at some point and suddenly no issues. She was an anxious person and just fell apart. She probably should not have worked in special ed.

[Anonymous]

I'm a teacher and the kids with the most severe behavioral issues are the one without IEPs or 504s because their parents are in denial. The ones who have diagnosed special needs usually have a lot of support at home and with private specialists. This is at a relatively well off school.

It might be different at a less well off school but when I reach out to parents the special needs parents are helpful and we also have the resource teachers to turn to. When I reach out to parents whose kids probably have SN but are not diagnosed the parents are defensive and start making up excuses why their child is having challenges. I wish these schools would be more accepting of special needs and parents would not feel so judged. It's parents like OP who create this kind of bad environment and then their own children suffer.

[Anonymous]

I would like to ask that we all start making a distinction between students with IEPs and students who have behavioural problems. I understand these things are sometimes co-occurring, but they're not the same.

My MS student has an IEP and very much needs extra academic support. DC is always placed in the inclusion classes, as it should be, but the problem is that DC is grouped with a handful of students who have such pervasive behaviour problems that my kid can't focus, gets very little extra help that is effective, and is miserable due to constantly being bothered by these kids.

OP, I understand your frustration, but I don't imagine you would be bothered because my child is handed a worksheet of sentence starters to help their essay writing or is given 3 minutes of time to go through a math problem one-on-one in the corner of the classroom. The problem is not due to inclusion per se. I think you would get more positive and helpful feedback if you appreciated the difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But, why are the teacher and her aid spending most of the period supporting, corralling, reporting issues about five or six students with learning or behavioral disabilities?

Shouldn't they divide their time equitably?

It’s impossible. The behavior issues overwhelm them.

OP - This is a teacher problem, not a problem of MCPS or the philosophy of inclusion. There are a lot of teachers who manage their classes just fine. DC had one who could not and it was a her problem. They brought in a sub at some point and suddenly no issues. She was an anxious person and just fell apart. She probably should not have worked in special ed.

I’m glad that you feel there were not any issues once the sub was brought in, and I agree that some teachers may be anxious. However, in my 25+ years working in education, the behaviors have gotten out of control the past 10 years and have reached crisis status the past four-five years. We have multiple students at our school that are not toilet trained, need constant support to complete daily tasks and have explosive anger issues, partly because of their inability to effectively communicate (due to autism or other issues). Some of these students are identified as special needs, and some of them are not. This is at an elementary school with all Gen Ed classrooms.

It is an MCPS problem when the person from Central office in charge of special education placements denies our (identified autistic) students one on one aides and insists they do not need to go to a special program or school that will better serve their needs. In one second grade classroom at my current school, there are 3-4 students that will destroy an entire classroom (swiping books off bookshelf in 20 seconds, throw chairs, etc.), hit and kick other students, take their shoes off and throw them across the room, roll around on the floor, etc. how is the teacher supposed to handle these situations when there are students raging out? You can have the best classroom management strategies in the world with multiple incentive programs but when you are dealing with these severe behaviors in addition to multiple students having huge academic needs (not reading in 2nd grade and unable to add or subtract…thanks MCPS/Benchmark and Eureka), how can one person effectively teach and manage a class of 20+ students?

When done right, inclusion has the power to be a positive experience for all involved. However, when you combine ineffective curriculums and lack of actual consequences with students who have severe behavioral needs and students who have severe academic needs (without enough support!), you get frustrated and overwhelmed teachers and neglected neurotypical students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would like to ask that we all start making a distinction between students with IEPs and students who have behavioural problems. I understand these things are sometimes co-occurring, but they're not the same.

My MS student has an IEP and very much needs extra academic support. DC is always placed in the inclusion classes, as it should be, but the problem is that DC is grouped with a handful of students who have such pervasive behaviour problems that my kid can't focus, gets very little extra help that is effective, and is miserable due to constantly being bothered by these kids.

OP, I understand your frustration, but I don't imagine you would be bothered because my child is handed a worksheet of sentence starters to help their essay writing or is given 3 minutes of time to go through a math problem one-on-one in the corner of the classroom. The problem is not due to inclusion per se. I think you would get more positive and helpful feedback if you appreciated the difference.

This is 💯 spot on (I’m a teacher who posted right after this one). The paperwork / documentation takes longer for students with IEP’s and 504’s if you are correctly documenting and collecting data but that isn’t even an issue - I’m happy to document because I WANT to see students making progress on their goals. It isn’t even a huge issue to work with students in my class that are several years below grade level. I’m happy to provide modifications and accommodations that will support my students and give them the best chance of success. What I can’t do is accept that this is the new norm. ALL of my students deserve to learn, and it’s not fair that the actions of a few completely dominate my entire class and there is nothing that can be done about it.

[Anonymous]

12:12 poster and wanted to clarify I am saying I can not accept the lack of consequences and extreme behavior issues (regardless of IEP / 504 status).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:12:12 poster and wanted to clarify I am saying I can not accept the lack of consequences and extreme behavior issues (regardless of IEP / 504 status).

I’m the PP you quoted. Thank you for your sincere dedication to helping all students learn. I’m in a tough spot right now, wondering if I’m going to need to pull my DC out of MCPS but honestly having no idea where else they could attend (we can’t afford McLean, etc.). A parochial school seems like a viable option but then there will be no IEP at all and that sounds like a disaster academically.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child landed into a section of inclusion *advanced* (haha) 7th grade English. According to her, the teacher and a nice but ineffectual aid spend most of the period supporting, corralling, reporting issues about five or six students with learning or behavioral disabilities. Several of the kids are the most known issues in the school. I feel nothing but sympathy for the teacher, especially because a couple of the disabled kids are really awful. Probably the teacher is fine, but who knows. My child who is good at math, but English is not her strong suit. She feels like she can’t get any support. Were the non-disabled students specifically chosen for this class? If we talk to the counselor, could she be switched to a gen ed section?

Happened to kid in 6th grade. A whole year wasted of "advanced" ha English. What the f is the school district trying to do with this nonsense? Not all families can volunteer to get special treatment for their kid, yep you heard that PtA.

[Anonymous]

Which school did this happen at? There are all sort of programs and this seems unusual.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But, why are the teacher and her aid spending most of the period supporting, corralling, reporting issues about five or six students with learning or behavioral disabilities?

Shouldn't they divide their time equitably?

It’s impossible. The behavior issues overwhelm them.

OP - This is a teacher problem, not a problem of MCPS or the philosophy of inclusion. There are a lot of teachers who manage their classes just fine. DC had one who could not and it was a her problem. They brought in a sub at some point and suddenly no issues. She was an anxious person and just fell apart. She probably should not have worked in special ed.

I’m glad that you feel there were not any issues once the sub was brought in, and I agree that some teachers may be anxious. However, in my 25+ years working in education, the behaviors have gotten out of control the past 10 years and have reached crisis status the past four-five years. We have multiple students at our school that are not toilet trained, need constant support to complete daily tasks and have explosive anger issues, partly because of their inability to effectively communicate (due to autism or other issues). Some of these students are identified as special needs, and some of them are not. This is at an elementary school with all Gen Ed classrooms.

It is an MCPS problem when the person from Central office in charge of special education placements denies our (identified autistic) students one on one aides and insists they do not need to go to a special program or school that will better serve their needs. In one second grade classroom at my current school, there are 3-4 students that will destroy an entire classroom (swiping books off bookshelf in 20 seconds, throw chairs, etc.), hit and kick other students, take their shoes off and throw them across the room, roll around on the floor, etc. how is the teacher supposed to handle these situations when there are students raging out? You can have the best classroom management strategies in the world with multiple incentive programs but when you are dealing with these severe behaviors in addition to multiple students having huge academic needs (not reading in 2nd grade and unable to add or subtract…thanks MCPS/Benchmark and Eureka), how can one person effectively teach and manage a class of 20+ students?

When done right, inclusion has the power to be a positive experience for all involved. However, when you combine ineffective curriculums and lack of actual consequences with students who have severe behavioral needs and students who have severe academic needs (without enough support!), you get frustrated and overwhelmed teachers and neglected neurotypical students.

You're doing it again. You're not differentiating between kids with behavior issues and kids without them. Many neurotypical kids have behaviors and many kids with SN do not have any. Our child does not have any behaviors but is completely neglected due to being really quiet while all the loud kids who cause disruptions, talk back, throw things take up all the teachers' time. Most but not all do NOT have special needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would like to ask that we all start making a distinction between students with IEPs and students who have behavioural problems. I understand these things are sometimes co-occurring, but they're not the same.

My MS student has an IEP and very much needs extra academic support. DC is always placed in the inclusion classes, as it should be, but the problem is that DC is grouped with a handful of students who have such pervasive behaviour problems that my kid can't focus, gets very little extra help that is effective, and is miserable due to constantly being bothered by these kids.

OP, I understand your frustration, but I don't imagine you would be bothered because my child is handed a worksheet of sentence starters to help their essay writing or is given 3 minutes of time to go through a math problem one-on-one in the corner of the classroom. The problem is not due to inclusion per se. I think you would get more positive and helpful feedback if you appreciated the difference.

Can someone please listen to this poster especially some teachers who are acting really discriminatory and ignorant. I'm also a teacher and the documentation I have to do for kids with 504 plans and IEPs is really time consuming but I find it much easier to work with students with identified needs because there is a clear process and help from other parts of the building. Resource can come in and help. When a child does is neurotypical then no one wants to help so those cases get more out of control and many times the parents even ignore emails or respond in a negative way that their child could not have possibly be acting like that. It's exhausting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:12:12 poster and wanted to clarify I am saying I can not accept the lack of consequences and extreme behavior issues (regardless of IEP / 504 status).

I’m the PP you quoted. Thank you for your sincere dedication to helping all students learn. I’m in a tough spot right now, wondering if I’m going to need to pull my DC out of MCPS but honestly having no idea where else they could attend (we can’t afford McLean, etc.). A parochial school seems like a viable option but then there will be no IEP at all and that sounds like a disaster academically.

We know kids who were neglected in public but did really well at parochial schools due to the teachers being less overwhelmed and not having a huge bureaucracy to deal with. There are good ones out there. You should post your area so people can give recommendations.

[Anonymous]

this is unfortunately the direction public school is going. Mcps doesn’t have a place for these unruly kids to go so they go in inclusion classes. Of course it’s impossible for any other kid to focus when the unruly ones haven’t been taught not to act feral in public.

Don’t bother complaining to anyone, there’s NOTHING anyone at the school can do about it. Nobody can take your child out of a class. Sure the counselor has access to the scheduling program but they’re not actually allowed to do this so you’re wasting your time and the counselors time. If your child is being bullied or harassed then report it to the principal but other than that there’s nothing that can be done. It’s a terrible situation with no solution because mcps doesn’t provide actual resources to help with unruly kids, just “restorative practices”