Ben has been applying to attend the Aurora Quest K-8 program for middle school. The past few years he has not been admitted. His family feels that this not a fair representation of his abilities and requested that representatives from the school come to observe Ben in the classroom setting. The representatives visited for about an hour and observed Ben in a small literacy group, in community circle, and in his one-on-one math instruction time.
Ben seemed very aware of the fact that people were there to observe him, and intentionally acted silly throughout the hour they were there by shouting, bouncing a lot on his ball, and giggling. During community circle Ben was talking over his peers and contradicting the teacher. He would often look over at the observers after acting out, as if to see if they were watching. I later asked him how he was feeling and he responded "I feel silly. I'm being silly because they're watching."
Thursday 3/3
Today I observed Ben at lunch and recess to see how he interacted with his friends/peers. During lunch, Ben sat with another friend in the class whom he has known for several years. This friend has been loyal to Ben since the third grade and really tends to look out for him, trying to guide him to fit in with others and make the right choices. Lately, this friendship has been strained because Ben has taken to openly and directly criticizing his friend, and his friend feels frustrated when Ben shouts out in class and is disruptive. I was happy to see that Ben and his friend were eating lunch together. Ben did not initiate any conversation, but answered questions when asked something by those around him.
At recess, Ben played by himself, mostly pacing around the outskirts of the playground and field. Ben has many conversations with himself about Minecraft and Gemstones. I asked the paras on the playground about what Ben usually does on the playground and they said this was his usual behavior.
Wednesday 3/9
Ben was absent today. No field notes were taken.
Thursday 3/10
Today was my last day with Ben's classroom. The class was testing in the morning, so Ben was pulled out for extended time and a quiet environment, both part of his IEP specifications.
In the afternoon, we swapped classrooms with another teacher for extenuating circumstances and the sudden schedule change was difficult for Ben. When we arrived to the classroom he struggled getting refocused on what we had been working on and repeatedly requested/demanded a break. I offered to go for a walk around the school with him, but only when he was able to use one of his strategies to calm his voice and body. He used a breathing strategy and told me he was ready, and we went for a walk around the building. When we returned Ben was able to successfully return to the classroom and complete his work.
Thursday 3/17
This was the week that I switched out of Ben's classroom, but I did stop by to say hello and check in on him. It seems that after a meeting with the family, they have come up with a new behavior chart to successfully track behavior patterns and to ease communication between school and home. The chart looks like this:
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