Telling on myself...

Admittedly, this is shameful, but it's humorous, too. I have a student with Autism who is by OCD. Anything I touch, he comes to touch both the object I touched and the hand I touched the object with. For instance, if I tap the table with my right hand, he would immediately tap the same area of the table and then tap my right hand. Every time, without fail. Even if her was across the room. This particular day, he was very distracted. I was trying to get him started on independent work so I could begin direct instruction with another. Bless his heart, he couldn't stay remotely near his station and was certainly not working independently. I didn't know what else to do. I went to his station and touched every last thing at the station - the desk, the chair, the books, the pencils, the worksheets, the wall, everything. Over and over, I touched everything. He spent five minutes touching everything I had touched, in the order I touched it, and was at least quiet. Lo and behold, he went to work afterwards. Oh how I hope that was not reported on my dispositions! I think there is a level of meaness in this; not cruel but mean. I'm not proud of this, but I can laugh at it. Desperate times, desperate measures!

May Term

This May I have a May "mini-term" which is a practicum for Special Ed. The requirement of the class is to log 90+ hours in the classroom for observation, plus a few papers on teaching and observations. In this class, I write lesson plans, teach them, and am graded by my cooperating teacher (CT) as well as my professor. I will also begin the behavioral instruction unit, observing and recording behavior data to use in other classes this summer. This concentrated class will be a lot in a little bit of time, but I'm very excited!