This is a first for me. In all of my years of teaching, I have never had a student with a parent who has been deployed. I have had plenty of students whose parents were in the military but not on active duty in another part of the world.
Until now.
I have a student who's father was deployed to Afghanistan about a month ago; he will be gone for a year. I have been monitoring this student for signs of anxiety, depression, etc. Up until about a week ago, everything seemed to be going pretty well. However, this past week has been a different story. I have pulled this student to the side and asked if there is anything on her/his mind, if there is anything s/he wants to talk about, etc. The response is always "No." I can clearly see that there is something going on, but I think s/he is too embarrassed to say anything about how s/he is feeling.
I have asked the guidance counselor to stop in when she gets a chance, but she has been pulled to monitor (and provide make-ups) for our state standardized tests. She will be doing this for at least another week. In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out strategies to help my little friend.
Does anyone out there have any suggestions? Books to share? Websites to share? Techniques to share? I will be glad for anything you can send me! You can leave them in the comment box below.
No comments:
Post a Comment