"Struggling to Stay Composed: Paraeducator Opens Up About Challenges in Overwhelmed Classroom A paraeducator has taken to sharing their personal struggles in a 5th grade classroom, where students are struggling academically and behaviorally. With a complex behavior management system in place, the paraeducator is tasked with accommodating the needs of three students, including one with severe dyslexia, another who may have a cognitive disability, and a third who is at risk of failing the grade. As the class becomes increasingly demanding, the paraeducator is finding it difficult to maintain their composure, fearing that their own exhaustion and frustration may be negatively impacting the students. The paraeducator has shared heart-wrenching stories of students opening up about personal struggles, including suicidal thoughts and family losses, and is now questioning their own ability to provide the support they so desperately need."
I'm a para who's in a 5th grade class all day, and they're really struggling academically and behaviorally. My school (yay charters!) has both a really complex behavior management system and the tendency to wring education out of every single minute of the day. It's not working well for these kids and I'm struggling to keep my cool. My "main" assignment is bouncing between 3 students (1 has severe dyslexia, 1 I'm trying to get evaluated for a cognitive disability, and 1 who is in danger of failing the 5th grade), trying to modify or accomodate their needs, deal with their behavior, and collect data on what I'm doing, for 7 hours every day. All 3 of them are starting to slip in behavior--disengaging more, more distracted, and I'm starting to think it might be my fault? The rest of the class is getting more demanding too. This one kid is starting to basically become an emotional dump truck--today I had to listen to him talk about how cold his dying grandmother was. He came up to me Monday telling me he couldn't stop thinking about suicide. I obviously referred him to the social worker ASAP but now he's always asking to see her, or asking if he can just tell me instead. Then there’s the other kids, sneaking playing sounds on Chromebooks, getting out of their seats, arguing across the classroom...then there’s the endless bathroom passes, nurse passes, friend disputes, dean referrals, the fact that there's probably 2 or 3 more kids who need a lot of help, if not specialized support, and then the ones who just need "regular" help, and I'm exhausted. I'm just not showing up as the professional I want to. I'm getting short and snappy, am apparently visibly exhausted and exasperated, and the kids lowkey don't deserve that version of me just because their school sucks. I just don't know how or where to get that energy and composure from because if I'm not disengaged and unhelpful, I get overclocked and overstimulated. It's not quite always to those extremes (definitely will be this next week since their homeroom and math teacher will be out), but it's often enough that I feel bad and want to be better. So, uh, how do I do my job successfully without being a bad person to a bunch 10 year olds? submitted by /u/maybeteacher2023 [link] [comments]