Pregnant teacher
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Anonymous
| My child will be starting kindergarten next year and one of the teachers will be out for part of the year with a new baby. My child is pretty sensitive and takes awhile to attach to new people so I’m stressed out about him potentially having to get used to a substitute teacher when the originally teacher is on leave. Should I request that he not be in the room where this will be happening? Am I totally overthinking this? |
Anonymous
| I think your anxiety stresses out your kid. |
Anonymous
| Most schools will not allow you to make teacher requests. |
Anonymous
I think nobody likes this situation. Your request may not be honored. But you can state your child's personality in the new student form and maybe the school will put the two and two together and not assign him this teacher. |
Anonymous
This is what you need to do. Say (if it's true) that your child doesn't deal well with change etc. Don't ask to not be with this teacher - everyone is nervous about starting K and you will be labeled as 'that parent' before your kid even starts school. DO NOT let your kid pick up on your anxiety. I struggle with this also, so I get it, but it's critical. |
Anonymous
|
OP this is something that happens pretty often in schools. My child went through it in first grade. Our experience with the long-term sub was better than our experience with the returning teacher.
It's really important that you project confidence to your child. They take their cues from the adults around them. |
Anonymous
|
This happens quite a bit. We have had two long-term subs with my son's classes.
One was terrible. One was not too bad. Interestingly, we have learned that the subs do NOT have to have any sort of training in education. One of our subs had zero teaching experience (other than being a sub for MCPS). He had a degree in something totally different. But, not much you can do. Lots of teachers are females. They have babies! |
Anonymous
| Yes, you are totally overthinking this. It can be stressful to have your child start kindergarten, especially if you're a person who can get anxious about things. This is a case where, in my opinion, you deal with a problem when/if it arises. |
Anonymous
|
NP here.
Correlation is not equal to causation. Mom might he stressed because she knows how her child reacts to situations that cause her child anxiety. Not that her anxiety causes the child stress. |
Anonymous
If you want to survive public education, repeat after me: My child is not a special snowflake I can not ask for special accommodations for my child, just because I don’t like the situation (as I am sure every other mom there doesn’t either) My child is sensitive because I am overbearing, fear the worst, and want to navigate his entire life The less a mom engineers their child’s life, school, and friendships; the stronger, more independent, and healthier my child will be. |
Anonymous
| OP here - thank you everyone for the helpful perspectives. |
Anonymous
|
I know very few parents who haven’t expressed this concern, OP. Frankly you will be one of a hundred parents who call. If your child has in IEP or 504, you might get some consideration. But otherwise, probably not. And you have to remember that schools hear this every time a teacher gets pregnant but in reality few kids have difficulty with the change to the long term sub.
So I guess like others, I suggest that you relax and manage your own anxiety and not project concern to your child. |
Anonymous
OP, we have a couple kids in our grade who have pregnant teachers every year for the last 4 years. What are the chances, right? My kids have had their share of pregnant teachers, and horrible long-term subs and have survived unscathed. There was an instant when the long term sub was even better than that teacher. I think the worse really is when teacher disappears in the middle of the year. If the absence is beginning or the end, it's not as bad for adjustment purposes. |
Anonymous
| You might be able to ask the school what they usually do to plan for a teacher's maternity leave (if you can ask in a neutral tone rather than accusatory tone). Our school had a long-time kindergarten teacher retire a few years ago, and now when there is a need for a kindergarten sub she is the go-to request. Often she is available and willing, especially for the longer-term maternity leave assignments. Other schools may also have particular subs that they try to line up for maternity leaves. |
Anonymous
| Most of our teachers all try to have summer babies. |