First term break
(or Christmas break) is soon over and I'm slowly looking forward to get into
daily life routine again. I would like to look back at the first term of
this school year.
First of all I would like to be honest: It
has been a challenged starting at my new job. This is my first ‘real’ full time
job (a challenge on its own), everyone is speaking my second language (and no
one understand my first) and suddenly I had the responsibility for an 11 year
old autistic boy‘s school development and with that a lot of new things I had
to learn. That was at least the feeling I had the first month or two.
During the months of September and October
I was the only one working with my main student, let’s call him A, and that was
a full time job! As per the job description I joined in every last one of his
academically school lessons by sitting next to him, but it quickly became clear
that A needed support to settle in and handle all the other situations at
school too. I met with him at the reception first thing in the morning to walk
with him to his classroom and at the end of the day to the school bus. He ended
up eating lunch with me since the canteen was too big a challenge. I followed
him to enrichment classes and tutor time (break class in the middle of the day
with a group of students from different age groups) often I even had to stay
there to make him stay in the room. I handled every worry that came to his mind
(could vary from “I’m afraid the school building will collapse” over “The
security guard might not be at the zebras so I’m afraid I can't walk to the
other building myself” to “I can’t take my pencil case out, because I might
lose stuff from there”) and I spent a lot of time arguing that A has to attend lessons
like everyone else.
In the end of October just before mid-term-break
I was mentally starting to feel fed up. This job was not only eight hours of
work every day, this was mentally challenging and needed a higher level of
engagement than I ever experienced before. My superior and I made the most
important decision together: I needed someone to share the responsibility and
develop strategies with, a break to regain new energy and some new input from
working with other students. From mid-November L, a new LSS, took over A’s
lessons Monday and Tuesday. It was a pleasure and I was immediately relieved.
As time progressed A learned a lot of
things in school and he is now much more comfortable, confident and independent
compared to the beginning. He still needs full 1-to-1 support and will always
rely on that to be able to learn in mainstream school classes, but he now knows
where the boundaries are and doesn't have to test them all the time. He now knows
how to find the different classrooms, the bus and the day before break he even asked
if he could eat in the canteen with his classmates.
During the first term I became more relaxed
and happy with my job, I learned that I’m definitely not the only one with responsibilities
towards A’s development and finally I’m more comfortable with the role as a
learning supporter. I’m looking forward to experiencing A’s development during the
second part of the school year, to push him and support him in being as
independent as possible.
