I'm gonna be an teeture

Walter, do single teachers get paid differently than those who are married?

Today I was elbowed in the gut (full force), kicked in the shin and spat at through a straw. Weeee!

Tenured government officials, which includes teachers in Germany, do get a somewhat higher base salary when they are married. On top of that, married people in general pay lower taxes, and pay health insurance only once. (Because dependents are insured automatically at no surcharge, one spouse can free ride on the other's policy.)

What Thomas said was valid until recently (and still is for those who get pernsions or have some special regulations in their tarifs.).

But since 2006/7 there isn't a difference anymore, no matter if teachers are sold as civil servants or employees.


Taxes make still make a (larger) difference, though. And health insurance. What Thomas said.

Details, details, k!

Yes, details. I hope that you got some support from administration. This type of behavior must not be tolerated.

That was by the administration...






...just kidding, of course. The administration's behavior is generally less
physical but more painful. I agree with Swimpy. Their job is to assure
that you can do your job without this kind of crap.

Walter and Thomas - are those public policies to encourage marriage and child birth?

Details.....? I worry about putting too much online here.

Grade 2, age 7 or 8.

Unstructured time is difficult for BigBlueEyes (BBE). Transitions are ok, unless they involve unstructured time (which they often do). BBE seems to do best with his schedule arranged in short chunks of time for each subject. He has a hard time keeping his hands to himself and often uses inappropriate language and play in order to get and maintain (or try to) the attention of his peers. He's obsessed with bottoms and penises. And he has taken to taking to swinging his hands (open or fisted) into the face-space of others - especially me. Sometimes he makes contact.

The class has a morning recess and a recess in the early afternoon just after lunch. He was playing with a group who play war-games. usually they are kept to one side of the play ground, sort of segregated. They were mixed in with their classmates on the play structure. the leader (always the same kid, but that's another story) told BBE to block the girls from going on some part of the structure. One girl tried to talk her way around the blockage and BBE slapped her (gently) in the face. He later said, "she was talking too much!"

I told him that since he had broken playground/school/personal rules, he had to come inside. He refused (as he always does) and I put my hand on the center of his back and applied consistent pressure - I wouldn't call it a push, but it wasn't ambiguous. He leaned against my hand. I took a step forward to stand next to him and as I did, he elbowed me in the gut. It was more shocking than painful. I really barked and he knew that he had totally crossed the line and we went in without my having to say another word.

I let him unwind and cool off in the conference room by himself and watched from outside the door. Eventually I went in and we talked. He elbowed me "in self defense"! We discussed when self-defense was appropriate. Took our half hour and went back to the classroom because the principal wasn't in the building to discuss further action. She never even called the parent about this incident.

Lunch about 1.5 hours later was going fairly well until he shot a spit ball, point blank, into my face. He knew again that he'd crossed the line. But, he was more concerned about missing an activity that he likes to do (occupational therapy - OT) than with the fact that he spit a ball at my face. He spent the rest of the day in the conference room, well mostly. The Principal had returned and had gotten the scoop on the earlier incident from someone else (the behaviorist). She took him for my lunch. She saw his anxiety and excess energy and brought him to the OT. So, he was rewarded for his bad behavior. She didn't call his parents.

After lunch as I called the classroom teacher to tell her that BBE would be out of the room for the day, he kicked me in the shin. He also threatened to poke me in my penis (HAHAHA!).

But, he got school work done, so it was considered a mixed bag of a day. I think an elbow to the gut pretty much equates to a bad day, regardless.

Sounds to me like you need to do a better job of hiding the bulge. Tuck, tuck, tuck.

did you teetch him about the birds n' bees?

Well, I have certain guesses re his background but could be cold wrong.

Are you operating in a vacuum? Surely there is a psychologist/psychiatrist around for this child. Grimaces, I bet not.

Keep notes, even if they're here, but perhaps in a wordfile, whatever.

Principal seems lame, but this is from miles away.

I don't really think so. The salary of tenured public officials in Germany ("Beamte") rests on an ancient philosophy. When the status was created centuries ago, the idea was that officials owe loyalty to the state, and the state owes compensation of their cost of living to the official. The idea underlying this, in turn, was that public officials had to make enough money so they could afford not to be bribed. And in practice, "enough" means more money to a spouse or a parent or both than it means to a single without dependents.

As for taxes, I think the logic is similar in Germany as in America. At least for my federal taxes in the US, I had my filing as "single" or married, so I assume that married people in America pay lower taxes if their spouses stay at home. This is not usually described as a pro-family policy in the US. Neither is it in Germany

The same is true for health insurance, I think. I have never heard German institutions or politicians defend or attack our system as a pro-marriage-and-family policy. It's just that when the system was established in the 1880s, most families were single earner households. Leaving wives and children uninsured would have been considered socially unacceptable; you could not make them pay because they had no income; so you just ensured them out of taxes on the income earner's (usually the father's) income. (It's called an insurance premium, but it's really a tax.) The system works, so nobody has mobilized enough opposition against it to alter its fundamental structure.

All that said, it's probably true that above the mechanics of all this, there hovers Article 6 of our constitution: "Marriage and the family shall enjoy the special protection of the state."

It is exactly like the way what Thomas said.

Teachers were all civil servants and got all those benefits .... due the the above mentioned reasons.
The same was true to employees in the public service - what most -new- teachers are nowadays.

Civil servats aren't allowed to strije - the other side of the coin is that's 'reductions' in tariffs are much easier be done with them. (They've an enormous lobby, though [civil servants, not teachers], since many law makers are civil servants.)

Interesting, thanks guys.

That's appalling, k. I'm shocked that there were no repercussions for this boy. His behavior was way out of line. He should have been removed from the class immediately & the parents called in after the first incident, say nothing of the second! Good grief!
You should not have to put up with what is basically a physical assault in the process of doing your job.
The principal, in my opinion, was negligent in letting the boy off the hook after what he did. Then to reward him for his terrible behavior, too!
The clear message to him is that "the rules" apply to the other students, not to him! I'm really disgusted with the lack of support you received. I'd document the incident/s. (& give a copy to the principal to put on file) You never know what might happen next time!

I agree. K, Is this the kid you are charged with? Is he autistic or BD?

He is diagnosed with ADHD and PDD - Pervasive Development Disorder (something like that). The later is a large umbrella including autism (which he has).

I have a meeting with the psych and behaviorist on monday (postponed from last week). I'll take it up with them. The behaviorist felt strongly that the principal needed to do something and spoke with her. I don't know why the lack of action happened.

Good.

Be really firm & clear about what happened .... & include everything!

(I'd still document the 2 incidents, k. While it's still fresh in your mind. Gotta cover your back, just in case!)

Have a good week littlek! No more ellbow incidents.

/*Well....... the frustrating thing about working with a kid with special needs and a special schedule is that the schedule always changes! At this time of year, specialists are sitting in on review meetings pre-progress reporting (before grades go out). So, we rescheduled last weeks meeting during his occupational therapy session which was canceled due to a meeting. We tried to reschedule the OT session for earlier, but he was in a reading group then. So, we met during the reading group which didn't work for the psych (she was in a meeting). I had more over-arching issues to talk with him about in our 20 minutes.

Hi littlek. I've been following your thread and want to say congrats on becoming a teacher, one of the hardest, underpaid, underappreciated and ..MOST rewarding jobs you'll ever have.

I've been teaching special ed for 23 years and know that the job you have taken on is a tough one. You have all kinds of "specialists" on this little guys case, yet you are the one who is doing front line battle all day everyday. Paras, especially 1:1's are Godesses!

I'm just curious, has this little guy had a functional behavior assessment or anything that has resulted in a behavior plan? Is there anything in place for consequence for the behavior incidents that you described? Kids on the spectrum really need the kind of consistancy that comes from a plan that everyone can follow, something predictable. If he doesn't have one, you should approach his case manager ( in a very nice sort of way :wink: ) and insist that he have a plan.

Has anyone ever done any 'social stories' with him? These work well to teach appropriate social and behavior skills and help with perspective taking. That is generally very difficult for a child on the spectrum.

Also I was wondering if you have been given any training in self defense sort of things? One that I know of is Crisis Prevention Intervention (CPI) training. It's not difficult and you do have to re-certify every year, but I think it's worth it. It teaches non violent ways to intervene, and protect yourself. It also teaches ways to safely physically restrain a child if it has to come to that. CPI also provides legal protection for people who have been certified in the program, which is a nice bonus in our 'hands off' world. I'm sure there are lots of other programs out there as well.

I don't want to seem overly pushy, these were just some things that came to mind as I was reading. Good luck with your charge.