As many of you know, when it comes to my kids, especially Teddy, I am a very optimistic kind of dad. I have this belief system that things are going to work out and Teddy is going to have great experiences in whatever  direction life takes him. I treat Teddy exactly the same way as I treat Cooper and Cade as evidenced by the Lord of the Flies picture associated with this post . My little guy is going to get the opportunity to live his ceiling-less life and we’re going to help him achieve as much as he wants.

Teddy started kindergarten last week. For a parent who has a child with special needs this is obviously one of those life watermarks that you anxiously anticipate from the very beginning. So … on his first day Rebecca, Teddy, Cooper, Cade and I all walked my big boy to his first day of school. I have to admit that I was very anxious and had a very difficult time when his aide took his hand from mine and walked him into his new classroom but this is just another milestone in his life and one that all my other children will also have sooner than I would probably like — I was prepared and was secretly very pleased and proud of him and am excited about this new stage in his life.

Fast forward a week; everyday my little guy walks with Momma to school and every evening I wait for a report from Rebecca or a note from school letting me know how he did that day. From what I could ascertain, all was going very well. He is adjusting to his class, getting along with his peers, his teachers like him, etc. Most impressively, he actually began school with a much larger corpus of knowledge than just about all of the other kids in his class. Teddy has a fantastic vocabulary (hundreds of words), knows his letters, numbers, sounds, colors, animals, concepts, phrases, etc  (thanks Sesame Street ) His teacher is very impressed as she is amazed that he knows so much at this young age — I could not be prouder of my little man.

So, being very enthusiastic about some of the reports coming from school, I wanted to get a little more insight about how he was doing in other areas, specifically socialization, comprehension of in-class material, and behavior. We scheduled a meeting with his teacher, speech therapist, and special ed coordinator for this afternoon and Rebecca and I went to his classroom  and I sat in a chair that looks like it should be in a doll house (I’m about 6’3” so this was a pretty funny site I’m sure:) ) Going into the meeting, I had the expectation that we would confirm the things that we already knew about how he was doing but unfortunately we left the meeting with much more to think about.

Providing a little context, Rebecca and I are very strong believers in full integration of Teddy into his educational environment — We worked with our team to write up a perfect IEP that meets all his needs and is inline with how we want his educational experience to progress. It is so important to me that he is immersed in his environment and his environment is immersed with him. The more familiarity kids have with our children, the better opportunity they will have to live in accommodating and encouraging communities.

We began our meeting with the teacher in a very positive manner. Her name is Devon and she seems wonderful. She has a great personality with a sense of enthusiasm that is refreshing. But she also teaches a class with 29 kids (thanks State of Arizona — let’s make sure we build a few more prisions instead of hiring a few more teachers) and she barely has enough time to breathe let alone provide the really intensive amount of attention that Teddy requires when in a classroom. We should have seen some of it coming but of course some of the really difficult behaviors that we experience at home are accentuated in his classroom — he also seems to digress with some of his social skills that is very concerning not only to us but also his educational support group.

Teddy is having difficulty “modeling”, paying attention, sitting still and understanding what is appropriate in his environment, relating to other kids and just in general fitting into his new environment. The meeting was very positive and cordial with everyone optimistic about his future but I could tell that something just wasn’t right. There was an underlying concern among all of us that he may not be able to do exactly what we want him to be able to do. A teacher with 29 students cant spend an inordinate amount of time with any one child. Its simply not fair to the other kids and parents. I have to admit that I am concerned. Rebecca and I have our homework and we know what we need to work on with him but there is now a seed planted in all of our heads and it pains me to even think that he may not get to experience the type of educational experience that I have wanted for him since day one.

We’re certainly not even close to giving up or changing anything but I needed to share these feelings with my friends here and of course ask for any advice, help and encouragement.

Thanks for letting me bend your ears