Looking back at first term

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.