jaylivg,
The situation your ds is in with this teacher simply sounds toxic - I understand you are very close to the end of the school year, but I would still recommend requesting an immediate teacher change. This is just me, so might totally *not* work in your situation, but if it was my child, I'd keep them home from school starting right now until the situation is resolved. We had to do this with our dd when she was in first grade and we were stuck in an unsafe situation in her classroom. We'd tried working it out through talking for several weeks and were getting totally stonewalled by the school - but keeping her home for simply 2 days worked like magic. We didn't call in sick or anything, we simply sent an email on the first morning saying we were not sending dd in to school until the situation could be resolved in a way that was safe for dd to attend.
Your situation is slightly different in that your ds isn't faced with a physical threat, but I'd consider that being with this teacher has the potential to cause long-lasting emotional stress and potential harm. My 2e ds was with a teacher who didn't understand him at all in 2nd grade and he was beyond miserable - and he still to this day will tell me about how horrible that year was for him.
The private behavior chart does concentrating on the positive behavior but the therapist said things like :
- use time and material wisely <-- this sort of thing is too vague , they need to say what it really is , and being bright kid as he is .. he can manipulate words and and being very technical if you don't say it clearly .
-be respectful to adults and peers <-- this was also considered vague by the therapist , she said it's better if the school said " use kind words , nice words to each other , using flat tone "
I agree with your therapist that more explicit instructions on the use of time and materials is a good idea, but fwiw, I do think that my kids even in early elementary would have been able to connect the dots on "be respectful to adults and peers" with behaviors that aren't respectful. I don't mean they were angels and were always respectful, just think that the "be respectful to adults and peers" in and of itself isn't unusually vague for a young child. I think it sounds like maybe your ds might need a little bit of help, maybe with role-playing situations with you that he might encounter at school that are causing him a bit of trouble with this.
DS did admit he push and he did wrong , but he found it's unfair that he got punished and the other boy didn't , it's not like he didn't admit he was also wrong . I don't know why the school just don't get this .
This is such a tough situation, because you weren't there when it happened, and you only have your ds who is going to give you any information, and his teacher obviously has some type of bias against your ds. The flip side of this is, the school can't and won't tell you what happens to the "other" child in situations like this, and you can't focus on the other child. That's a life lesson we go over frequently at our house - it's fairly natural for kids to want to see the "other" child be treated in a way that seems logical and fair, and it sometimes doesn't work out that way, and other times when things happen at school students aren't going to be let in on what does happen with other children. So I try to reinforce with my kids that the important thing is to focus on ourselves and our own behavior, and let the other pieces sort out however they are meant to. You have to stand up and advocate for your ds in the big scheme of things (ongoing issues with his teacher), but for one-time incidents, like the other child not being "punished" - it's usually best just to let go.
I hope your meeting this afternoon at school went well.
Best wishes,
polarbear
