Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: Technology Fun and Books for Songs!

As I started working more and more with teachers and students, I embraced technology and what it could do for me in the way of making customized visual supports. Many teachers were working with children with little or no language. They relied on pictures for their students to use to communicate. Other teachers used pictures for schedules, stories, etc. I knew how important using visual supports were for our children with special needs, especially our children on the autism spectrum.

For a while I struggled with low tech paint programs like the free one that comes with Microsoft Office. These programs drove me crazy! Not very flexible, it took me hours to put pictures together or to change colors, etc. And then I discovered Paint.NET. Oh my! Did my world change! This is a free program that is like PhotoShop "light". It may not be quite as extensive, but the things I can do with that program! I can layer, rotate, change colors, sharpen, soften - you name it, I can do it! And thanks to my son Mark, I learned what "tolerance" means as related to a paint program!

This new ability allowed me to go crazy! Suddenly I was able to make books to go with favorite children's songs like I Am A Pizza, Slap Those Mosquitoes, and Five Little Ducks. Favorite poems or fingerplays also turned into books like Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear and Ten in the Bed. I shared these books with all of the teachers I worked with. Preschool teachers, kindergarten teachers, and primary special education classroom teachers loved these.

And it wasn't just fun songs with books that got made. I also started to make social stories and scripts with my new found technology. Social stories and scripts are social lessons that help children with autism navigate difficult social situations. Originally developed by Carol Gray, these stories and scripts can be written about anything a child is struggling to learn about or understand. These books also help children with other behavior issues, so soon I was getting requests from many teachers to write stories for them.

Then one day I was meeting with Cori Valley, and she told me about Cathy Bollinger. Cathy is a singer/songwriter who writes many kinds of educational songs, but has at least two excellent CDs of musical social stories. These are fantastic and fun! Wow! I got to work right away making books to go with eleven of the songs that seemed most appropriate for the students and teachers I was working with. Here are a few of them.

Today I have about 200 books, social stories, poems, fingerplays, and musical social stories illustrated and saved. These books are being used by Head Start and ECEAP programs as well as Montessori and special education preschools on both sides of the state. Indeed, some of the teachers I've worked with who have moved to other parts of the country are using them in those new places as well. I am proud to have helped produce some strong visual supports that are fun as well, and help so many children make sense of their world.

And I am now also having fun sharing these books with my own grandson Eddie! He thinks they're great!

Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: Behavior is WHAT now?

Now after over twenty years in the classroom, you would think that I would have learned something about behavior and children with and without special needs. Indeed I had figured out some things. For instance, with young children with little or no verbal skills, you could get them to stay with you and respond to you if you followed their lead; that is, did what they did or what they showed an interest in. This was the classic James McDonald social communication model. That was (and still is) one of my great "soapbox" messages.

However, what about the children who scream at Circle Time when they have to sit and participate? Or the children who rip up their papers every time you give them a writing task? And then there are the children who hit others or hurt them for what seems like no reason at all. Throughout my classroom experience, I pretty much used a "time-out" approach to all behaviors. Sometimes this worked and the behaviors got better. Sometimes it didn't work at all.

This started to change once I became an education specialist. And the reason; I had the chance to work with some pretty awesome people who really understood all about behavior. There was Tom Weddle and Liz Pechous who were (and still are) experts in working with children with autism. I had many opportunities to work alongside these two and pick up on subtle nuances in the behaviors that children with autism demonstrated. Bonnie Peters, Cori Valley and Michelle Gwinn worked as behavior interventionists and taught me the most important lesson EVER: All behavior is COMMUNICATION; and all behavior has a FUNCTION. I'm passing this on to whoever is reading this blog as you will need to use this whenever you are dealing with anyone exhibiting behaviors you can't figure out!

What a novel idea! Behavior is communication? And it has a function? Here's the quick and dirty explanation: people will exhibit behavior as a function to get or get rid of something. It could be to get attention, or something tangible like a toy or food. It might even be to get some kind of sensory feedback. Or, people might exhibit behavior to get rid of something; attention, an unwanted demand or activity, or unpleasant object or food. Wow! Seriously? Why didn't someone explain that to me while I was still a teacher in the classroom? Or when my own personal children were growing up? That means all of the times I might have put a child in time-out when they were protesting being at Circle Time, I was reinforcing their behavior because they got to leave this unpleasant (really? All of my Circle Times were stellar!) demand. And it also explained why the children who were seeking attention by acting out actually got better with time-out, because we were taking the attention away.

I loved this! I began to look at students and behaviors in a completely different way. Working with Cori, Michelle and Bonnie really improved my skills. Cori has a very humorous and fun way of dealing with behaviors. We might be problem solving a particular student's behavior, and she would always find the funny side of things. Her laugh is entirely infectious so you can't get too bogged down in the problem when Cori is helping you out! Michelle is extremely clinical in her approach. Schooled in Functional Behavior Analysis at Gonzaga, she wanted to make sure we analyzed behavior using a full functional analysis! Yikes! Sometimes when all of us ladies got together and talked behavior, I would "smile and nod" hoping that they thought I knew as much as they did! These ladies are what my son Matt refers to as "big brain boxes".

And then there was Bonnie. Before I met Bonnie, she had been a classroom teacher working with students with disabilities at Stevens Elementary. Gifted in changing student's behaviors, she was drafted into a behavior interventionist position for the district. Bonnie and I got to know each other as we worked with our first integrated kindergarten program (often referred to as "baby BI"). We found out that we had both received our under graduate degrees at Central Washington University, and while attending college there, we had both worked in the same group home for children with disabilities. We compared notes on the children we'd worked with and on the professors and classes we'd taken. I really liked Bonnie and her down to earth approach to behavior. When group conversations about behavior started to get too lofty and theoretical, you could trust Bonnie to bring us all back to reality. Sadly, I didn't get to spend enough time with Bonnie. She died of cancer in November of 2005.

However, she leaves a lasting legacy to all of us who worked with her and the children whose lives she helped change. About two weeks before she died, she asked Michelle and I to lunch at a little diner called Hogan's on the south hill. We chatted and tried to keep our spirits up. Bonnie said to us, "Now tell me about the bad boys. Which bad boys are you working with? How's it going?" That was Bonnie! She loved hearing about the "bad boys"! This was the last time I saw Bonnie.

On the night Bonnie died, I had a dream. In the dream we were sitting in the diner and having something to eat. It was night time and we were the only people there. Around the table were Bonnie, Michelle, Milena, me and a woman I worked with that I really didn't care for, LK. After a while, Bonnie gets up and leaves. We continue chatting and then LK gets up, is gone for a minute, and then returns to the table. She says, "Bonnie's not coming back. She is gone forever now." We are all in shock and very sad. Slowly we leave and the diner is completely empty and cold.

I woke up from this dream and felt sad and confused, mostly because I couldn't figure out why LK had been in my dream. The next day was Monday and I was sitting in my office when LK came to my door. She said, "Did you hear the news? Bonnie died last night." Chills went up and down my spine. I was so shocked that I couldn't say anything. Not because this was unexpected news, but because it was LK who came and told me.

Do you believe in messages from the other side? Well sometimes I do, and this seemed like a clear and clever one directly from Bonnie herself! Gosh I miss that woman!

Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: 2004; Hitting my Stride

By 2004 certain aspects of my education specialist role started to change and solidify. For one, the other ed specialists were thrilled by my early childhood background and petitioned to have me be the support person for all of the preschool programs. This suited me just fine! I loved working with the preschool programs and teachers, and was energized by all of the different programs and support staff I had the privilege to work with. This was the first time I had the opportunity to work with integrated early childhood programs. Spokane's CAPE programs integrated preschoolers with special needs into Head Start programs. These programs were and are excellent examples of what early childhood should look like. Strong beliefs in learning by doing, family style meals, homey features in the classroom, and social workers to help support families. I learned a lot from these programs. I also worked closely with the Head Start support staff to expand their knowledge of special education and how to provide programming for students with behavior concerns. We worked well together, providing many programs with professional development on topics like Behavior as Communication, the McDonald ECO model, and autism just to name a few. So it was a big surprise and honor for me in February of 2004 to be awarded Early Childhood Professional of the Year by the Eastern Washington Association for the Education of Young Children (EWAEYC), our local affiliation of the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). To this day, the letter and plaque I received hang in my office at home. I will cherish these forever.

The other aspect of my job that began to become more important was working with assistive technology. So many of our young children with disabilities struggled with communication and having the ability to really be a part of their peers' worlds. By 2004,we had two people in our district hired to find, adapt, and try out systems to help support all of these students. John and Carmen are amazing technology geniuses! And this year, John wrote a grant that raised enough money to send several support staff to the largest assistive technology conference in the states. This conference, Closing the Gap, takes place in Minnesota every October. This was such a great experience! I had a chance to see Linda Burkhart, one of the most amazing teachers to ever work in our field. The devices and switches she designed to help children become more a part of the non disabled world took my breath away. She has the most stunning before and after videos of children with and without the technology to support them. Seeing children without technology sit and do nothing and then to see them moving through their environment,  greeting people with voice output devices, and actually doing some jobs; well it's hard to put that into adequate words.

Now the other reason I was so happy to be going to Minnesota that October, was to  get a chance to go and see the Prairie Home Companion store in the Mall of America. Those of you that know me well, know that Garrison Keillor is one of my heroes. I started listening to these radio programs in 1976, doing my lesson plans for the week as it played in the background. So one night, Melany S., an SLP who came on this trip with me, and I went to the Prairie Home Companion store. I knew that we wouldn't still be in Minnesota on Saturday for the live broadcast, but thought it would be fun to go and see what was in the store. As we browsed and I found some things to buy, I told the clerk that I was sad not to still be in town for the live broadcast. She said, "Well you know that they do a dress rehearsal on Friday nights don't you? There may still be some tickets available." WHAT?! Oh, I was so going!

That Friday Melany, Heidi, and I got in a taxi and went to the Fitzgerald Theater to see the dress rehearsal. We sat on the stage in back of the action as those were the only seats left. I had such a great time! Singing the familiar songs like the Powdermilk Biscuit theme, marveling at the sound effects guy, and listening to Garrison's monologue. WOW! I couldn't believe our luck! The other ladies that came along didn't really know much about Prairie Home Companion, but they enjoyed watching me! Afterwards as we started to go, we noticed some people gathering down in front of the stage. We walked down there and one of the ushers told us that sometimes Garrison would come out and sign autographs. I asked the other ladies if they would mind waiting to see if he would come out that night. They did not mind. So we waited and little by little, more and more people tired of waiting and left. We were talking to one of the ushers and she said, "It looks like Garrison won't be out tonight. They have too many revisions to do and it is getting late. But if you wait for a few minutes, I can take you back to your hotel so that you won't have to get another taxi." This was incredibly kind and although I was disappointed, I understood. So we walked to the lobby to wait. I struck up a conversation with Garrison's sister and as we chatted, I noticed Melany going up to different ushers and theater people and talking, gesturing, and then they would shake their heads, and off she would go to someone else. I thought this was strange, but kept chatting and then all of a sudden, everybody got quiet. I stopped talking and turned around. OMG! It was Garrison himself! I was speechless, truly speechless! He said, "Well hello there young lady! Someone has been telling me that you've been listening to this program for about 30 years. I just thought I would come out and thank you." That's what Melany had been saying to all of these different people! And finally someone went back and persuaded Garrison to take a few minutes and meet us. I am forever indebted to Melany! This was one of my biggest thrills ever. We all chatted for about fifteen minutes and he signed my program. After that we piled into the usher's car for a somewhat scarey ride back to the hotel (this involved the driver going the wrong way on a one way street and having very dim headlights!) However, we made it back in one piece and went to have a glass of wine to celebrate! Good times!

Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: Quirky People Make Great Stories!

If you do anything for long enough, you will meet lots of different kinds of people and have many great stories to tell. And that's what this blog is all about. Last week at the end of the blog I said that ed specialists really ARE that smart. So here is the story behind that statement.

We had a psychologist named Dave that worked his way up and into a job that really suited him. Technology and computers were making things easier for teachers and changing the way that they wrote their Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) and collected data. Dave was a quirky kind of guy, shy in social situations, and somewhat lacking in other social skills. But he was a computer whiz and knew software programs well. When I started as an ed specialist, Dave had designed a Word template that helped teachers merge information about their students into an IEP form. This template was sacred, and God help you if you forgot to save each IEP with the student's name so as not to mess up the template! There was also a bank of goals that could merge into these forms, and so at that time, it was pretty impressive.

I took a look at these forms and talked to Dave about designing a data sheet that could also merge with the template information. He looked at me like I had three heads. He said, "Ed specialists are not that smart. You would never be able to figure this out." And with that, I was dismissed. Well, that is exactly the wrong thing to say to me, and so I set out to prove him wrong! I worked with Word and learned all about merging, form fields, etc. I designed data sheets, wrote more goals that could be used by preschool teachers, and set out to give it all a try.

I asked the other ed specialists if I could show them what I'd done. They gathered in one of the conference rooms with me, and I showed them what I had designed. They were very impressed! One of the ladies, Susan R., said, "Have you shown this to Dave yet?" I said no. She started laughing and went and got him. He was reluctant to come, but Susan told him he wouldn't believe what he'd see. He came into the conference room and I demonstrated what I'd come up with. He was at a loss for words. He finally said, "How'd YOU figure this out? Ed specialists aren't smart enough to do this!" We all laughed and said, "I guess we are!" I gained a lot of respect from Dave that day, but it didn't stop him from ignoring me when I came to ask him something in his office. After a while I would say, "Dave. Dave. DAVE! Turn around and make eye contact!" He would be slightly embarrassed, but would turn around with a smile.

And then there was Joanie. Joanie was an intervention specialist in charge of supporting the self contained special ed programs in the district. She was tall, very tall and muscular. She could be somewhat imposing at times. We also had other intervention specialists who dealt mostly with behavior issues. One of them, Bonnie, was amazing. (I will have more to say about her later). Well we were dealing with one young boy with major tantrums, especially related to riding the bus. His mother was agoraphobic and didn't like leaving the house herself. To make matters worse, she told him that the loose straps on the wheelchair buses might turn into snakes!  Unbelievable! Indeed I had written a great Social Story to try and help him overcome his fear of riding the bus, but it wasn't helpful enough.

One day we get this call from the boy's mother. She is at her wit's end. She cannot get him on the bus and we can hear him screaming at the top of his lungs in the background. She is asking for someone to come and help her get him on the bus. Bonnie, ever the behavior specialist, says she will go. However, at this time, Bonnie was very weak and battling terminal cancer. Susan B., one of the coordinators said she would send Joanie instead. Susan calls Joanie into her office and tells her she wants her to go and help get this boy on the bus. Joanie wasn't happy about the request but when Susan told her that Bonnie was wanting to do it, Joanie said okay.

Joanie got in her car and drove to the house. She got out and told us later that she could hear the screaming all the way down the sidewalk. She walked up to the door and knocked. The door opened and there was the kicking screaming little boy refusing to leave the house. Joanie looked at him, pointed to the bus and in her deep booming voice said, "Get on the bus NOW!" The boy stopped, looked up at this towering woman, stopped crying and said, "Okay," and walked to the bus!

Truly, if Joanie asked me to get on that bus, I would! After that I thought we should make a life size cardboard cutout of Joanie that we could use to get students to do what we wanted. All we would have to do was stand behind it and in our deepest voice say, "Get on the bus!"

Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: Transition, ACES, and "Rainbow Bunkers"

August of 1999 was a month of waiting and wondering. What would it be like to be an itinerant employee? How would I like not being "tied" to one school? Would the teachers I'd be working with like me? I'd been doing preschool straight for the past 13 years. How would I help resource teachers? Lots of anxiety!

When school started, the area coordinators, education specialists, and the special ed director all met to discuss school assignments and other sped business. These would be regular meetings and were referred to as ACES meetings (Area Coordinators, Ed Specialists).
That was a clever name and the meetings were great. Everyone brought problems to the table and discussed them. If new professional development opportunities were available, we discussed how to deliver the training information or who should attend.

At that first meeting I found out which schools I would have and provide support to. They included six schools that Susan B., one of our coordinators, referred to as the "Rainbow Bunkers", rainbow because they all had rainbows painted on one side, and bunkers because of their low concrete designs. During the 1980's and early 1990's, many of the older elementary schools in Spokane were torn down and replaced with these schools. All of these schools were identical in shape and size and only varied with different colored roofs and could be mirror images of each other on the inside. Indeed, I'd already spent three years in one of these schools when I'd taught at Woodridge. These schools are about as ugly as you can get and have all sorts of ventilation problems that cause people to get very ill. Over the years the heating and ventilation systems in all of these schools have had to be replaced. Nasty.

Having six out of my seven schools be the Rainbow Bunker style school wasn't that bad except that five of these were all on the upper northeast side of the district. When I drove to one of these buildings, got out and started to go inside, I'd have to pause and think, "Where am I?" Frequently, until I got to know my way around, I would turn around, go back outside, and look at the name on the building to make sure I was where I really needed to be!

Now the real work began. I started by going to each of my schools and introducing myself to the principals and special education teachers I would be supporting. Everyone was friendly and welcoming and two of my schools, Logan and Lincoln Heights actually had preschool programs in them. The teacher at Lincoln Heights would let me come and hang out for awhile when I was really missing preschool! Things started slowly partly because I wasn't really sure what to do, and partly because in a few of my buildings, I was replacing an education specialist, Susan R., who had been doing the job a long time and really knew her stuff! I have to say, I felt pretty inadequate to begin with!

And then the dreams started. To this day, fifteen years later, I continue to have these dreams. They go something like this: It is nighttime and I am looking at this big brick school building from the outside. Inside is all lit up and this school looks like an elementary school I attended in fifth grade. But in my dream it is Reid and I am going inside and then walking down the hall. All the rooms are brightly lit and parents are walking with their children. It seems like this must be conferences or a carnival or something fun. I walk down to the preschool room and walk inside. Kay is there but she looks confused. I say, "Is it time for Circle? What is our theme? Did I forget to do lesson plans?" Kay looks at me and says, "You don't work here anymore. We have a new teacher. You work in Spokane." I am devastated and as I turn to leave, the Reid teachers all close their doors. I am standing alone in the hall.
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Next week: Yes, ed specialists ARE that smart!

Years 23 to 34: Education Specialist for Spokane Public Schools: The Interview

In the summer of 1999, after ten years with the Cheney School District as a preschool teacher, I was told that there was an opening for an education specialist in Spokane. I looked at the posting for the position and decided I probably had the right credentials for the job, and so gathered all my transcripts, updated my resume, and applied for the job.

When I moved to eastern Washington in the summer of 1986, the first job I interviewed for was a resource room job at Salnave Elementary in Cheney. The interview lasted about 15 minutes. I knew that wasn't good, but every time I started to answer a question, the principal of the school would say, "Great, yes," and I would stop talking. Needless to say, I did not get that job. After that experience, I decided I always needed to have a lot to say. Those of you that know me well are thinking, really Kathy? When are you EVER at a loss for words!

So when I went to the interview in Spokane, I decided to take some things with me to share. During my masters program in early childhood, I worked on putting together a portfolio assessment for preschool. Over the years I had been exposed to several great curricula including the ERIN, High Scope, Creative Curriculum, and others. I took parts of each of these and then added information from my specialists and came up with a pretty complete assessment. In this assessment I included samples of children's work, photos of things they built, audio samples of things they said, etc. I had only just started to test this out with my students, but had high hopes for the information I could gather with it. This seemed like the perfect thing to bring with me.

Early in August, I got the call to come in for an interview. I was very nervous. This would be a very different job for me. No classroom. No attachment to one school. But I went in and thought, I just need to try my best. In the room were six women, these were the special education coordinators for the district. Each one represented a different part of the district and one of the women represented the middle and high school programs. They took turns asking me questions and I answered them all. At the end they asked me if I had anything I wanted to ask or share, and I brought out my portfolio assessment and talked to them about its' creation and how I used it. They asked if they could keep a copy and I said yes. The interview ended and I got up to leave. As I left the room and started down the hall, I could hear a lot of laughter coming from these ladies. All I could think of was I must have really bombed! Why else would they be laughing? My heart sunk.

My preschool portfolio assessment

But a day later, I got a call from the special education department offering me the job. I was surprised! (Years later I was relating my impressions of the interview and asked one of the coordinators why they had laughed when I left. She said, "We were so surprised by all of the things you shared, we couldn't believe it!")

A few days later I met the rest of the ed specialists at a luncheon at The Elk. These were (and still are) a great bunch of women, many of whom I would be spending the next twelve years with! I felt out of my depth, but knew I would be learning a lot from them, so I should pay attention!

Years 13 to 22: The Reid Years: Transportation; the Good and the Not so Good

My bus driving friend, Jerri!

Happy New Year to all of you! Today I'm going to talk about my years at Reid as they relate to the Cheney School District transportation system. I'm going to tell you the "good" and the "not so good" about my experiences with this system. First, the "good".

Field trip to Kay's farm.

The best part of the transportation system is my friend Jerri. She is a long time bus driver for Cheney and when she is not driving bus, she is a wheat farmer and rancher. She has the most impressive driving skills of anyone I've ever known or probably ever will  know! She can actually park a combine in her barn! Whenever we went on a field trip, we requested Jerri. One time we wanted to do a field trip of nearby farms. Kay, my instructional assistant, was also a rancher and had some cattle on her farm. Between Jerri and Kay, they knew nearby farmers who had goats, sheep, horses, cows and pigs. This was going to be fun! Jerri drove the bus and we sang songs including her favorite, Mr. Sun! Now at one point, we had to go over a small drainage ditch to get to the pasture where the cattle were. Over the ditch were two planks of wood. I would not have the nerve to drive over these planks with a bicycle, but Jerri sized them up and said, "No problem. We can get over those with the bus!" Yikes! I crossed my fingers and like the expert she is, she drove straight across those blanks with her big yellow bus! Amazing! The other impressive thing that Jerri does every year is what she calls the "one great day of sharing," or something like that. Here's how it works. During the school year, she collects things from friends and relatives. Anything really; knick knacks, toys, clothing, household items, etc. The students on her bus know that she is collecting things to give away. In a sense, Jerri has set up a token reinforcement system for her riders. Their good behavior ensures that they will get to have a chance at what she has collected. Genius! Jerri is such a great person and she takes the time to develop and keep rapport with the students she buses. There are not many like her!

And now the "not so good". What some of you might not know is that the Cheney School District has the largest busing area in the state. I'm including a map to show how extensive the district's boundaries are, but the real reason I'm mentioning it is because of how it affected programming and busing for my preschool students.

The extensive size of the district meant that all students, preschool through high school, were bused together. It also meant that preschool and kindergarten sessions were split into two full days and one half. So you would have a M/W session for 6.5 hours, a T/TH session for 6.5 hours, and Friday would be split between the two. Later, preschool would not come on Fridays at all, leaving us time to do assessments for new children qualifying for the program. This was a big shock for me having only taught in half day sessions before, and having each session daily for the entire week. What I noticed right away was that children with behavior problems did not make much progress in changing their patterns of behavior. Think about this: you come on Tuesday and Thursday, then you are off Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Old patterns of behavior are very hard to change on a schedule like that. And then there was the all day part. Newly qualified three year olds would fall asleep at lunch, and sometimes sleep for the entire afternoon. So the youngest session really only had a two half day program. I fought this for ten years, but never saw it change. But that wasn't the part that bothered me the most.

The other part that really bothered me was that all of the children were bused together on one bus. Worst of all, when I asked if the preschool children could at least sit in the front of the buses, near the drivers, I was told that it would be against their "personal rights" to dictate where they should sit. Now I don't know about you, but I believe that young children with disabilities probably need someone to look after their "personal rights"! But again, I didn't win that battle. So here is a something that happened my second year.

It was November and time for conferences. This meant shorter days. It was a very cold and snowy November that fall of 1990. At the end of one day, I received a call from a very worried parent. Her little boy had not yet returned home. I said, "But he didn't come to school today." The worried  mom replied, "Yes he did. We put him on the bus this morning. And today is his birthday. Where is he?"  Now I too was worried. I said, "Don't worry. I'll look into this and call you back." I called transportation. I said, "I have a little boy who didn't come to school today, but his mom says she put him on the bus. Could he still be on the bus?" The head of transportation assured me that all of the drivers check their buses before departing them. Therefore, the child could not be on the bus. I insisted that he go and look. He wasn't happy, but did it. What he found was a cold and frightened crying child, banging on the doors of the bus. He had been there for four hours! This little boy lived at one of the edges of the district, near Liberty. He had been sitting in the back of the bus and had fallen asleep. A quick glance around the bus didn't alert the driver to his presence.

I was livid! The parents came and picked him up and I encouraged them to go and talk to the superintendent. They called him and told him what happened. The superintendent blew them off and told them things like that happen sometimes. He was sorry, but that was all. I couldn't believe this! In retrospect, I am thinking someone should have called the newspapers or television stations, but that did not happen. Instead, the parents pulled their child out of our preschool and enrolled him in one in Liberty. They didn't want to take a chance on something like this happening again.

Several years later, I had a family move into the district with a little boy who qualified for preschool. He was a cute little guy, full of smiles and extremely chubby! Mom and dad came for the IEP and during the course of the meeting, the mom used foul language and seemed to have some tics she couldn't control. She told me later that she had Tourettes, a syndrome that can manifest itself with both abusive language and tics. At the time of the IEP, I asked the family if they would be interested in having the child bused to school. They told me they only lived a few blocks away and that they would be happy to walk him to school.  I told them that if they changed their minds to let me know, and I would give them the number to call to set up transportation.

About three weeks into the child's coming to preschool, mom called and said they would like to have a bus transport him. I said that would not be a problem and told her to call transportation and get it set up. I told her that she could give them the pertinent information and they could tell her when the bus would pick up, drop off, etc. So she gave them a call. . .

Well you might guess how that went! The mom, being nervous like she was during the IEP meeting, let a barrage of colorful language loose on the head of transportation! He was shocked and angry and called my principal to complain, claiming I had done this on purpose! Yeah, right. I explained to the principal (and later to the assistant superintendent), that this mother had a disability and could not help or control the language. This did not seem to matter to the man in charge of transportation. I thought to myself, seriously? You can get all worked up over something this minor, but a four year old child with disabilities being left on a bus for four hours in extremely cold weather isn't a problem? Somehow I thought it was poetic justice.