The little girl in my class who recently had brain surgery has been released from the hospital and is at home with her family where she should be. I heard the news that she would possibly be released from the hospital on Friday, and it was hard for me to decide how discreet to be with that information. I was excited to tell the rest of my class because they ask me about her every day, but I was worried that I would tell them that and if it didn't happen I would have to deliver another blow of bad news on Tuesday. I did make the decision to tell them that she would most likely be released this weekend and to deal with the events as they unfolded. Praise God, she was released and news is good!
This whole thing has been a tough balancing act for me between being discreet with information, being honest about circumstances, and protecting children from this as much as possible.
The wonderful news is that the surgery appears to have been successful and I can now report on this child's healing instead of her sickness. We still don't know when she'll be back in school or able to have children visit her, but I am just glad things are on the track of healing.
Now, will come the part where I will have to make some difficult calls. I'll be trying to send work home and eventually trying to catch this child up, but because this involves brain trauma I cannot put stress on her. How does that look? It is too soon to tell, but to be honest I am wondering if I ought to start looking into retention now in case that is the best path in the end. My district makes it really hard to retain and really easy to cancel it. I don't know how it will end up, but I really need to start looking at the options. All of that is small potatoes, though, after a child wins the battle for her life.
2 comments:
Does your district offer home teaching? We had a student several years ago with a tumor in her spinal column close to the brain. She missed all of kindergarten and a few months of first grade. She was VERY ill and it did effect her academic progress, but the home teacher worked with her as much as possible and was extremely compassionate. I honestly assumed that all school systems did that for sick kids.
The regional nurse for the district told me that my student would either be on a chronic health condition plan which means I sign a contract with the family and send work home or she would be on a homebound plan which means the district is obligated to provide someone to come to her home and teach her. To impliment either plan we have to communicate directly with healthcare providers and we haven't recieved the permission slip yet. Right now it doesn't matter because she is not well enough for work or a visiting teacher, but it will be based on whatever qualifiers the state has designated as I understand it.
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