Tuesday, November 17, 2009

how much is too much, really?

well, we began the school year with a lot of behavior issues. one student in particular has had a history of severely violent and aggressive behaviors. he is in 5th grade and was diagnosed with a few things. among them, bi-polar disorder. well, the first week of school, we had a parent meeting, and subsequently did A LOT of paperwork to get more support for him. he just wasn't in the right setting. jumping students and teachers left and right...and very short triggers for his temper. poor kid has a ton of rage. but also attention seeking behaviors, as well as escapist behaviors. that includes running from the school almost every week. so we had to call the cops. i'm best friends with the district school police now. ;)
so now it's november. he was suspended a few weeks ago, but came back to campus. a family member came to get him and it got "out of control" violent. parents, students and staff were witnesses to lots of punching, hitting, and spitting. it was not pretty. he was taken into custody by the county foster system. i just learned that he had difficulties in his foster placement as well, and the police had to bring him back to a temporary holding center. now he is officially "in the system" and that kid is on my brain like a tumor. i can't get him out and i've worked with him enough to see so many sides of him. there's the sweet, vulnerable side, then the crying, attention seeking side, then the violent rage "i can't help what i'm doing" side. too much frustration, anger, trauma, loneliness, and sadness for a dude in a 10 year old body. it's pretty sad.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

i'm a school psychologist

i'm a school psychologist. "oh, so you can analyze my brain right now, huh?" "that's cool, so you're like a school counselor, right?" "so you must do a lot of therapy then..." these are the typical responses to the first statement. not many people actually know what i do. i don't think the people in the next office really know what i do. in fact, i didn't even know school psychologist's existed until about 6 years ago.
my friend's husband got me interested in the field (thanks Rob!). to be honest, i researched it and talked to many people, but i still didn't know what i was in for until my internship.
this is my first year doing what i do. so...what DO i do? i guess that is why i'm writing on this blog. but to put it in a nutshell, i work with students, parents, teachers, and school administration to make sure every student is learning to their potential. when they're not, due to learning difficulties, behaviors, or environmental factors, i also play a role in determining if they would be eligible for special education services. i do a lot of assessing for processing disorders and other things like emotional disturbance or autism. the catch is that school psych's go by california education code, and lot's of other clinicians go by the DSM-IV criteria...
anyways, this will be an interesting experiment - writing on this blog. it's mainly to be able to sort out my daily infusion of intense situations. i think if i get the stuff in my head out, then i will be able to function a bit better after 4pm. cause at the rate i'm going, i feel supremely overwhelmed with all the different student cases re-playing in my head from the past few months.
so my first step was to start this blog. my next step is to have a brain dump...when i have some more time. for now, i'm putting a bunch of websites here so i can remember them later:
alert.com
parentmagic.com
pent.ca.gov
interventioncentral.org
sparktop.org
feat.org
cfchildren.org
save.org
pbis.org
positivediscipline.com
worldstrides.org