M8U2A2

Thu Nguyen

Cohort 01/2016

M8U2A2

REFLECTION ON STUDENT CASE STUDY

My case study is about the behavioral issue of a 4^th grader. Briefly, Bella is a 10 year-old girl, born in UK, in an English and Cameroonian family. She joined this school starting from the 1^st grade and continued up to 4^th grade. Bella is a skinny girl who likes hands-on activities. Bella shows interests in music and art, and like helping teachers. Bella lives comfortably with her parents and one kindergarten sister in a villa compound near the school. The family caregivers are often responsible for sending and picking the girls to and from school.

Behavioral issues – Interventions – Progress versus pending

While Bella’s academic record showed no significant concern, the numbers of Bella’s office referrals drew my attention. Bella was reported to engage in hiding or stealing things of others. She often made noise during the focus lesson and distract her peers at work. She rarely aligned with others when working in assignments. Especially when being alone or in circumstances of less adult supervision, she was often engaged in some unexpected or off rule actions. One time, Bella poured two containers of paint into the running water when it was her turn to be a sink helper with the curiosity to see how colors were mixed. In another painting lesson, she spread paint all over her two hands and pretended to bump on other’s T-shirt. When being reported, Bella often denied her responsibility. Not only taking actions unexpected, Bella’s posture and gesture also showed her uncertainty. When being asked to present her idea in front of the class, she couldn’t stand straight, often hid herself behind others, avoided eye contact with teachers, and spoke in a low voice.

What came to my serious attention was the incident, which was called a lost and found story. Bella found a glucose supply container of one friend in her class who had a serious level of diabetes and had to self-carry an emergency kit around her belly 24/24. Instead of returning that part of the friend as instructed by the PE teacher, Bella noticed me in my Art classroom that she found it inside my paper shelf! After meeting with the school nurse and the related teachers, I found out the truth of the story made by Bella and this was not the first time Bella involved in such cases.

Some interventions were applied immediately such as meeting with her parents, scheduling her in a lunch program with the school counselor, and engaging her in activities that she is interesting in especially music and art. Via the meeting with her mother, one of the active and supportive members of PTO, we got to know more about the family situation that the mother just miscarried a baby and Bella and her younger sister were often taken care by nannies instead of parents. The mother also admitted that she used to have a similar behavior during her childhood, a desire to grasp things from others.

I thought one of the reasons of Bella’s behaviors was to draw the attention of adults and I believed she would be more responsible given the trust and the opportunities. My solutions consisted of rearrange the seat chart, assigning Bella in helping jobs under supervision, pairing her with peers who had less conflicts with her, praising Bella every time she showed an improvement. As its result, her performance in the 2^nd and the 3^rd quarter jumped and showed a big progress. She was engaged in class activities and her artworks were remarkably creative and impressive. She also volunteered to help one peer in the mask unit, and their both artworks were extraordinary. Surprisingly, Bella was a careful and extremist. She never gave up even with a tiny stain on the floor when helping cleaning, a job that she loved to help with. Bella’s influence and inspiration to others were remarkable. She was able to call many friends, including boys and girls, to help cleaning the room after each lesson. Her group also created a lovely song called “Rescue” and sang it cheerfully. When receiving the certificate award, the best helper of the month, she was motivated and became more confident when sharing about why and how she liked helping the teacher. Her mother was also happy receiving my report.

For whatever reasons, Bella was reported to steal a portion of modeling clay in my classroom in the last quarter, which really saddened me. Since I did not see her taking it, I had to refer Bella to the counselor. After two meetings with the counselor, Bella finally admitted she took it without asking for permission.

My presentation at VC dated 16 Oct

I did expect to share more about the case and was ready for the interactive Q&A session in this VC. Unfortunately, the Internet connection was not at our side. There was always a delay every time I spoke and the screen was reported frozen. Thanks to the flexibility and the well role defining of the instructor and my fellow cohorts, I got all questions recorded by one cohort, some were answered on site and the rest will be shared in the later part of this paper. What I liked about this interactive Q&A was that everyone had to review the case presented via Prezi, VoiceThread, Screen Recording, or video before the date we met. During the session, we had one time controller, one facilitator, and one note recorder so both presenter and audiences interacted actively while the instructor was a participant.

Questions and suggestions received

1. Katherine: How do students respond to her since her behavior seems socially unacceptable?

- During the first quarter, very few peers wanted to be in the group with Bella, and Bella seemed not to fit in any group in her class, and she seemed being isolated.  When her improvement was shown, she gained more confidence and was observed having friends around and more network, especially when she voluntarily helped one boy in the mask unit.

2. Jeffrey: Are her parents brought in for the many incidents that were referenced, stealing, etc...   Can her father be brought to be part of school-life?

- Rarely unfortunately, but mother is an active PTO member. She also admitted to having similar issues when she was younger. I think there are tow reasons for the disconnection. Firstly, the father is too busy with work and travel to attend meetings with teachers. Secondly, living in a too much comfortable zone having so many caregivers around the kids or leaving kids in the hands of helpers, parents will somehow lose the impact and education on kids.

3. Katherine: My thoughts:  attention-seeking child, what is this about? 

- Your thought confirms my point above. Bella’s symptoms appeared around the time her younger sister was born, and it worsened when the mother miscarried another baby. Both parents seem having no time or attention for her. It needs to mention that her younger sister was an opposite of Bella, a very well behaved girl.

4. Ralph: The behavior is escalating-possibly because of something at home possible conflict (sibling, father)

- There is no conflict with parents and family, but she spent a lot of time with nannies instead of with her parents. Perhaps, it relates somehow to the focus or appreciation of parents to the younger sister or the pregnant period the mother had gone through.

5. Katherine: I wonder if she can be given specific tasks jobs each week that give her a sense of belonging and importance?  If the dad is gone a lot is there a way to utilize a notebook, not necessarily a behavior chart, but a notebook where Bella could once a week write her dad a letter about what she's learning, looking forward to, etc....and he could respond? 

- This is a genius idea. I wish I could share it with Bella and the counselor.

6. Brittany: Thu, are there specific consequences for her behavior at school and does she clearly understand her impact on other students? Similarly to my friend "Andrew" she seems to be acting out with no regard for others

- Yes, there are. We had classroom and office level. Bella received six office referrals not only this year, but also in the previous years. What I surprised was no official record in the school behavior system so that we could keep track and align ways of interventions. I seemed to be the first teacher using this tool and was not receiving the full support from the principal.

7. Katherine: Before she is set off to be independent, can’t there be a review or a set of prompts that are given to her regarding expectations?

- There are clear set and agreed rules, consequences, and expectations in each classroom. I believed the homeroom did a good job in managing the overall class. The teacher and I did meet and share many concerns plus interventions regarding to Bella.

In conclusion, Bella has two extremes. One where she is helpful, caring and responsible when being supervised, but when unsupervised she is engaged in these unexpected and disruptive actions. She has met with the counselor, but the behavior continued. I think behavior prompts, office referrals and detentions many time over years did not solve the problem, stealing still exists in here and there and Bella is not the only case. The long-term approach must be the perception and responsibility education and perhaps along a school wide campaign saying no to stealing, similarly no to bully. The school administration must also strictly apply detention as indicated in the handbook for the sake of the majority of student body. Her parents seem essential to her improvement and behavioral success. Teacher’s supervision and motivation are equally important.