Tonight, I'm just going to get into what happened at the school to make Emmett want us to pull him out. I'm too tired to deal with all the Cleveland Clinic stuff tonight as well. I'll get to that a bit later.
As the school year enters its forth week, we've noticed Emmett is becoming increasingly more distressed. His tummy aches are back and he's not wanting to go to school. We didn't know there was a specific something going on that was causing these issues.
Emmett's no stranger to tummy aches in the morning and while it's generally a sign that he's stressed out, the cause of that stress could literally be anything. More often than not, he's never able to tell us what's bothering him and it takes time to get to the bottom of things.
Kids with Autism, can struggle a great deal with communication.
We learned the other day, that Emmett was distressed because within his classroom, the teachers had implemented a *group consequence, group reward *strategy. This is something you see fairly often in high school sports. One person screws around, the entire team does laps.
I don't disagree with this in theory, if it's used correctly.
What's happening however, is that there are a couple of students in Emmett's class that are very problematic. I don't know specifics of their behavior but there's fighting and disruptions. Basically, these kids are always getting into trouble. What's been happening is that when these kids act up, the entire class is getting punished.
Emmett is the kid who has never once gotten in trouble at school and I mean never one single time in his five years of schooling. He's never lost a point or been anything other than a class leader (those are his teachers words, not mine).
What's happening is that everyday this year, the entire class is getting punished throughout the day because these same problem kids are causing problems.
In Emmett's eyes, it doesn't matter how well he personally does because he's getting punished for the actions of students who are habitual offenders.
Emmett takes great pride in his reputation at school and to some degree, his identity is wrapped up in there as well.
In his eyes, no matter what he does, he's going to be getting in trouble because these two kids continue to be a problem. For a kid like Emmett, this is devastating and he was so stressed out over this that he no longer wanted to return to school. He actually wanted us to pull him out.
Lizze and I met with his teachers on Wednesday morning before we left for Cleveland.
We went into this assuming that we didn't know the whole story and needed to hear what the teachers had to say.
As it turns out, Emmett was essentially correct.
There was a bit more to it but basically the class sizes have increased this year, there are problem kids and there a lot of bullying issues.
They explained that there are some legit bullying issues but that many of the kids are reporting everything as bullying. They had to address this with the kids by talking about the differences between bullying and kids being kids.
The reason for the group consequences were the problem students but also the bullying issues.
While there are kids like Emmett, who aren't a part of this problem, everyone was being held accountable. Truthfully, this isn't fair.
Group reward, group consequence isn't something that can be applied to every situation. When a policy like this begins hurting those who are innocent (for lack of a better word), that's a problem.. If two kids are a problem, the two kids should be the ones paying the price.
If the whole class is constantly being punished for the actions of a few, it's sorta like the kids causing the problems are not being held accountable for their actions.
Anyway, the teachers didn't realize Emmett was feeling this way. They also said they realize that this needs to be adjusted and they're doing that but they've been struggling to figure out the best approach. It's not an easy situation and while Emmett was correct, it was more complicated than that.
It was clear that the teachers were not malicious or lazy or incompetent. To the contrary, they were trying to address the bullying issues and the kids with behavioral issues as best they could. They had no intention of upsetting the kids that did what they were supposed to do.
Emmett was able to speak his mind and while he was clearly upset, he was very respectful.
The teachers were awesome. They listened and immediately made changes, so that rather than punishing the entire class, they're going to reward those who are making better choices.
The issues in the class have also spilled into lunch in the cafeteria and playtime outside.
Emmett's class has assigned seating at lunch now because of the same group of problem kids not getting along. For some reason, Emmett has been assigned to sit by himself at lunch, while the other kids sat with at least one other person. This was confirmed as well and we were very upset about that.
Emmett and a few other kids were essentially forced to sit and eat lunch by themselves. They've done nothing wrong and I'm still not understanding the logic behind this move but it's fixed now. The teachers didn't know about this until we brought it to their attention because it was the cafeteria supervisor that was responsible for this.
Emmett is no longer sitting by himself and he feels much better.
What bothers me about this is it appears that rather than putting the problem kids back in their place or holding them accountable for their actions, kids like Emmett are the ones paying the price.
Anyway, the teachers genuinely didn't realize it was creating problems for Emmett. They were very sorry and they immediately addressed the problem.
I feel like this was a very positive outcome, at least thus far.
Emmett feels better about school and is excited to return again in the morning.
I wish this hadn't happened but the teachers were awesome, Emmett was able to express himself and I'm comfortable with the outcome and explanation.
We did good and I'm thrilled that Emmett feels better about everything.
I seriously have to go to bed now. I'm struggling to stay awake.
