Two Days Until Lift-Off

I finally finished all my Elluminate Training without too many hitches. Although there was one point when I was listening to one teacher and another one came in to my audio world. It was rather bizarre - I imagined that this was what it was like to take Meth and begin hearing voices in your head.

Humor is, as you know, a disguise for many things. My humor is a disguise for the fear I'm having regarding this year-long committment.

I'm worried I won't be as good a teacher to my son as I was to other people's children. I'm worried I'll yell at him or become frustrated or angry or irritated or any number of negative emotions.

Ian and I worked on setting up his "study space." He insists that it be in his room. We spent the morning rearranging furniture, setting up his computer, getting his books arranged and making file folders.

The first meltdown was when we had to move his bed. He insisted on one way - I insisted on another. This is, perhaps, the crux of the issue - that we both insist on something. Since I'm the adult I'm supposed to be able to bend and I will promise to work on this throughout the year.

The second meltdown was when I started designing file folders for him. It makes sense to me (again, probably another "crux of the issue") to have folders for every class and sub-folders in the class for work to be done and work that is done. No, he yelled, I can't handle all those different folders.

Again, another crux of the issue.

Now I have to begin my role as a teacher and figure out what will work best for Ian - not a mother just trying to get him to do something, anything, so we can move on to the next "something anything" we're supposed to do.

I'm starting to regret all the years in public schools when Ian would cry or be angry about how there's "too many things I'm supposed to do. Just when I get into something we're supposed to do something else."

I figured this was a skill Ian needed to learn. After all, we all need to do many things, many different things, sometimes at the same time, in order to "get something done."
50 minute classes seemed fine for me, especially when I taught high school and I didn't particularly like one particular student. But for Ian, 50 minutes probably feels like 10. Just when he's beginning to understand, or get into it, he has to change gears.

So this is what I'm looking forward to on Monday - letting Ian decide when he wants to change gears. I think this just might work...for him....I'm the one who's going to have to learn something/anything new for Ian.