Home Visit

I went on my first home visit this week. One of my students has always been a behavior problem. She is repeating kindergarten this year, and I am her third school so far. (Her older brother is in 3rd grade, and in his 9th school.) She came in with a lot of trust issues. Just to paint you a picture, she called someone a B**** the second day she was there. She constantly pinched, punched, and slapped students when she was upset about something. Also, she wore the same jumper (with no shirt underneath) for the first two days. I gave her 3 shirts on her 2nd day.

I gave her the tools to show emotion in an appropriate way, and gave a ton of positive reinforcement and logical consequences, and always said, "I love you," after discussing her bad behavior. Ihave had an amazing result. She is a different person. She hasn't physically hurt a child since about her 2nd week of school. She always tells me how she feels, and had become an average student, behaviorally, for me, and my favorite student, because I just have a soft spot for her. However, she is still awful for every other authority figure - bus driver, related arts class teachers, substitutes, cafeteria workers. I've had a sub twice this year; both times, they had to send her to the office because they couldn't control her. The bus driver has recently stated that if her behavior doesn't change, she is going to be suspended from the bus. She gets notes sent home at least once a week in related arts classes. It's a mess.

Then about 3 weeks ago, I caught her stealing, for the 2nd time this year (although I now know there were several other times that I just didn't catch her). It was the same day that she had gotten in trouble on the bus (for the 1000000th time this year, it seems) for hitting kids, cussing at them, and yelling "NO!" at the driver, when she would tell her to sit down. Also, her brother brought a knife on the bus that same day.

Then last week, her and her cousin (who lives with them due to parental incarceration and abuse in his own family) came all week, disgustingly dirty - worse than usual - and wreaking of urine. And she started stealing food from my classroom. It broke my heart. I threated to buy a secret house in the woods and begin stealing children, to give them a better life. Obviously not going to happen, but it just eats me up inside to send them home after school, when I don't know what they're going home to, but I know it's bad. It kills me. And poor Brenton gets the brunt of it, because I come home sobbing to him. These are my babies, and they don't deserve to be living the way they are.

So on Thursday of last week, I went to the assistant principal and I just said, "I don't know what to do. She's so dirty and smelly, and there is obviously something going on. She has now started stealing food. All of the kids at the school from this family have started acting out more than usual, and I can't just sit by and wonder if everything is okay." So, she suggested we go on a home visit to mom. I was so excited. I have never met mom before. We scheduled it, and the social worker, guidance counselor, and I went on Tuesday.

We showed up with bags of canned food in hand, and prepared to see the worst. No one answered when we continued to knock over and over. Eventually, we saw someone walking back and forth, but still, no one answered. Someone started yelling, "come in!" Although, we weren't really comfortable with that, so kept knocking. Eventually, we gave up on being greeted, and let ourselves in. I wasn't prepared for what I saw.

The kitchen was piled 2 feet high with trash. Old food, dirty diapers, and who knows what else. Surely small to medium sized rodents. It smelled terribly. But, just like my student. We kept walking in until we reached the back of the house (about 5 steps). Mom was asleep on the couch. She sort of awknowledged us (sort of), with a grunt. We stood there for the longest minute ever, before she finally sat up and invited us to sit. If you know anything about my germaphobia, you'll understand how I felt about that. But I did it. I sat.

After talking to her about progress and problems, she began to wake up more. Eventually, she opened up. I mean, really opened up. She told us all about how she loves children and family and has never been separated from any of her kids. She told us about the specifics of the abuse that my student's cousin suffered. She told us about how hard it is to work the graveyard shift at the hospital (ironically cleaning rooms), because she doesn't get to see her children. She told us about the other child she has living with them, who is 13 years old and due in January. When the social worker asked her if they had decided what they would do with the baby, she replied, "We're keepin' it. I keep everyone. Family's the most important thing." I couldn't understand. That baby could live such a better life with an adoptive family. But that is not her mentality. Somehow, the mentality that people like that have is that if they have to give up a child, they've somehow failed, when in fact that child would have such a better life if given up. Also, if done through an agency, she could be getting prenatal care paid for and be learning how to take care of her body for this child.

Anyway, there were definitely the positives and negatives about going. I learned that she is loved. This mother works (unlike a lot of single mothers in this situation), loves each of her 9 biological children (ranging in age from 17 to 2) and all of the others she's taken in. She wants her kids to succeed, but just doesn't have the resources or knowledge to make it happen. But I left knowing that my student is loved.

On the other side, I still hate what I'm sending her home to. It's not appropriate for a child (or 11; 12 in January). And the worst part is that there is very little I can do about it. This is what she knows. She doesn't realize what an innapropriate home this is. I mean think about what you would do if your child's teacher was coming to your home. I know what I would do, "Okay, I need to vacuum and dust and make sure I have a list of questions. Maybe have some tea brewing incase she wants some." She was asleep, and her home was a disaster, with 4 children running around. She didn't know that this was bad. She wasn't aware that the fact that she had to kill a cockroach crawling up her leg, 1/2 way through our conversation, means that her home is not suitable for children.

So, I hope to do something small - help out with their Thanksgiving. And focus on the student that I can hopefully continue to give some tools to. And other than that, I have to focus on the positive. She is loved. At home, and at school, she is loved.