Worst bell schedule ever...

When I came to my school the week before school started, I had the chance to talk with the Special Ed facilitator. When we went over the bell schedule, she said that this school has one of worst bell schedules because every day can be different! Therefore, it can be a bell schedule nightmare for students who have issues remembering where to go and when. It is also difficult for students who have Autism because they are very time oriented and need a set schedule and routine. Therefore, you can see how students who need a consistent schedule struggle when their class schedule changes so often!

So, Monday and Tuesday are block schedule days. Monday has periods 1-3, and Tuesday has periods 4-7. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday are regular periods (1-7).

Today was my first experience with the block schedule.
Saturday night when I was preparing my lessons for Monday, I realized that it was a block schedule. It's nice because I don't have as many classes to prepare for, but I have to prepare enough material to take up 85 minutes.
Period 1 went pretty well. They are a chatty bunch though, so I need to work on that habit.
Period 2 was a bit more tricky. Like I said previously, 8th graders are just too cool for lots of things. BUT, they are all such great kids, I just need to hound my rules!

I'm getting a little frustrated with myself because I know I need to have better follow-through with my classroom rules. My students DO NOT STOP TALKING and it's hard to get anywhere when you're waiting for your students to stop talking. Sheesh. So, my goal this week is to follow though with my rules! I need to teach my students that I mean business!

We had a team meeting today and it lasted almost an hour. I really like my team, but I realized that when I have stuff to do, it's so hard for me to stay focused on what else is going on. I definitely need to work on that...

Other than having an awfully chatty group, my day went pretty well. I finally organized which teacher has which of my students. Now I can start collaborating and meeting with other teachers to see how my students are doing and get work in advance. Let's keep our fingers crossed that everything runs smoothly when it comes to me collaborating with and getting information from the general education classes!

-Audryn-

Oh! I almost forgot. In my 2nd period class, I was telling my students that later on this week we would be working letters to their general ed teachers. The previous teacher gave me that great idea and I've heard lots of positive feedback from other teachers regarding these letters.
Well, when I mentioned this to my students, they told me that they hate writing those letters because their teachers single them out and treat them like babies afterwards. This threw me for a loop because I never thought of that.
My students said that they hate it when a teacher comes up to them and asks, "Did you get all of that?"
"Do you need me to read this for you?"
Now, it's good that these teachers are checking up on their students who need a little extra help, but my students explained that they feel stupid when that happens.

So, the million dollar question is how do I talk to my students about how to properly convey that they need help? I brought this situation up in our team meeting, and they suggested I tell my students that considering they are older, they need to figure out ways to let their teachers know they need help. They can figure this out and need to be responsible for informing their teacher. Hopefully I can figure out some way to help my students understand this.