u/Rare-Adhesiveness522

I have the opportunity to serve on the hiring committee for a last-minute replacement of our principal who took another opportuniy relatively unexpectedly.

I have my own thoughts and ideas about what I'd look for and ask, but I'm actually curious to see what others in my place would prioritize--I'm pretty spoiled being in a strong union state in a very small district with strong culture.

I'm not asking you to tell ME what to do--I'm pretty set on what I'm going to ask/what my priorities are. I'm just curious how my personal experience measures up to the general populace.

What would you look for in a leader, and what questions would you want to ask in an interview setting?

What the title says. We don't have $30k in cash lying around but some of the posts on here show at least some work being done by contractors/landscapers. How do you afford it? Do you finance it?

My Boomer dad and I have been arguing about this for 15 years.

I watched the movie in 2015. He watched it in theaters and rented it in the years shortly after its release.

In my view of the movie, the romantic story was ONLY the nurse and her Seikh friend. The patient, his woman who died in a cave, and her fiancee were all entirely unsympathetic.

I didn't view the story of The Patient as some kind of tragic love story. I thought they were both disgusting and horrible, they drove a man to suicide, and I felt like she deserved to die alone in that cave.

My dad thinks I'm insane and missed the point. Is this just an artefact of Boomer sensibilities and my generational way of thinking? Like, I get why they fell in love and all that. But the fact that they snuck around, fucked "in secret" but like blatantly and inconspicuously, and absolutely betrayed and manipulated the poor man who was engaged to that lady.

I didn't find it romantic at all. I found it horrifically selfish and awful.

For those who are older: truly, what was the intention of this movie? My dad and I have a humorous debate about this shit and neither of us can agree. Did I misinterpret the intention of the love story of the Patient?

Okay so I had 2 does exposed to a buck for months. One is a first freshener, had 2 healthy babies about 9 weeks ago.

We rented out our buck about 2 weeks after the first babies dropped.

I expected my other doe to be pregnant, but after several weeks, I thought I was hallucinating. There were times her rumen seemed full and happy, so maybe that's what made me think...? She's had 5 kiddings and I swear I'm not crazy when I say that her udders seemed to be slowly developing after 2 years of not kidding.

I took her to the vet, they did an xray, the vet said she couldn't really see anything. That was 3 weeks ago.

Today, I still have that feeling like I'm seeing things. Her udders seem to be continuing to develop and her rumen continues to be very happy.....

My first freshener and her doeling were rehomed about 10 days ago, and it's been her and the little buckling.

Last week I tried to squeeze her udders, and nothing came out.

Just now I did it again, and she is producing milk.

There is the outside possibility that in the days when the first babies were born, my other doe got pregnant and was too early to show up on the xray....but that just seems so illogical? But not impossible? That would make her, at MOST, 8-9 weeks along at this point, time of xray maybe 4-5 weeks?

Is there ANY other explanation for this? She's never produced milk except when pregnant or having babies. She's about 8 years old, she's had 5 kiddings, but I didn't breed her for a couple years. The buck was pulled literally at most 9 weeks ago. If she is pregnant, she would have had to gotten pregnant like, THAT WEEK?

Have any of you had mature does produce milk without being pregnant???

Even the vet noted her mammary development, which only seems to have gotten more pronounced since the xray. I feel like I'm hallucinating.

Registered mini alpine for reference.

Hi folks!

Teaching is my passion, communicating with parents is my passion, and I'm a 6 year first grade teacher. (Student teaching in kinder and started my career in kinder, but most of my experience is in 1st grade).

Most of y'all are wrapping up kinder in the next few weeks.

While there are different curricula, teaching strategies, and district/building cultures, I'd love to share some insight that we as a first grade team look for and encourage parents to lean into when thinking forward to next year!

First, some seemingly silly ones:

- Please practice at home and teach your child to put caps on markers. I know this sounds so petty, but I swear it's a crucial skill. We ask that kids come with 2 sets of markers. I switch the pack out after Xmas break. Some kids will literally ruin half their marker set in a matter of days, haha. It's just one of those small, practical things that helps make life easier!

- Encourage tracing, drawing, dot-to-dots, and fun activities with pencils that encourage some fine motor control in the context of art or puzzles/games. It gets them used to handling a smaller writing instrument and gives them practice with that fine motor control, but it doesn't have to be "handwriting"!

- Ensure that they can open their lunchbox and the items in their lunch.

Some fine motor stuff:

To encourage handwriting, I'd suggest starting with gross motor practice first! Teach them how to form the letters "properly" with sidewalk chalk and big arm movements! Show them to trace the letters with some butcher paper taped to the wall and using a paintbrush! Practicing the "proper" strokes with gross motor movements in the context of a fun game is super helpful if you want something to work on! Kids struggle with the "down, around, then BACK UP/BACK DOWN" motions. Doing this with paints and sidewalk chalk using big movements is so helpful!

Reading:

Most kids are assessed at the end of kinder having mastered most of the alphabet, but backslide is very common. We expect some confusion with b/d, g/j, u w and y. We reteach that. But some lighthearted daily practice on identifying letters and sounds over the summer will be instrumental in starting the year off on a strong foot!

Play games with sound! Driving in the car: "I'm thinking of an animal. It starts with /k/ and has whiskers--what is it?" Okay now your turn! -- "oooh I'm thinking of the word 'cat'. Can you tell me what sound it starts with?! okay now you give me one!"

Buy some "BOB BOOKS" or rent them from the library. Practice reading every day or almost every day. Even if they do a word and you do a word. Just model it, make it a habit, make time for it. Truly there is not magical wand or substitute beyond practice, practice, practice. It shouldn't result in meltdowns or fights and you start with the amount of time and pressure your child can handle and build from there. Praise praise praise praise!

Social skills:

Play board games that are simple like Candy Land. Teach turn taking. 1-1 counting. And model how to lose. "SORRY" or "Trouble" is a great introduction into counting, turn taking, and learning how to lose or handle a setback. When they make a dirty move on you, make it funny and dramatic. Have a good laugh and show good sportsmanship. Have language that you use when frustrated: "AWWW MAAAAN!" and then make it lighthearted and keep the train moving.

Playdates.

Unstructured play at home. Your child will not know how to cooperate or play nicely with friends if they boss you around in Barbies every day.

I'm not saying ignore your child of course! But there should be time every day where you model that you aren't immediately available to solve their boredom and enforce unsupervised, undirected play. And if your child is unaccustomed, it may come with whining and fits. Hold firm and stay the course. When you're playing Barbies, don't let your child just boss you around. Have your own ideas and gently challenge them. And give them feedback if they aren't listening or getting agitated: "we are playing this game together, and this is MY Barbie. If you want to play, we need to work together. Otherwise I will need to take a break".

Screen time:

I'm a mom. I'm not here to shame people who use screen time. But please, DEAR GOD--do not let them take your phone to scroll tiktok or short form videos on Youtube. PLEASE. And their brains do best with some kind of time limit in the day-to-day schedule.

Don't get me wrong--you're on a 9 hour road trip? Do what you gotta do. On a plane? Do what you gotta do. I'm not here to judge because lord knows my kids have had PLENTY of screen time outside of what the pediatricians of America recommend!

Screen time on personal devices with games shoud absolutely be limited. As much as possible, direct it to a TV. And emphasize shows over short form content or Youtube when possible.

My kids are older now, but when they were young I DREADED the 2 hour slog to bed--I'm cooking, my husband is trying to clean and do laundry, the kids are tired and bored....I GET IT. Be strategic about the screen time, fight the battles when it matters. If you need an hour to get things settled for the evening, that's their time to do Minecraft. If you have a 2 year old that desperately needs a fucking nap and your off-the-wall 6 year old is crawling the walls, okay, that's the time for a show or something. I'm not a purist over here!

The games and youtube and short form content is a scourge, it has REAL consequences, please try your best to be mindful. Most of us on Reddit already do this.

Independence:

Your child should be working along side you during laundry-folding time. Assign them some towels, show them how to do it. Tell them that 1-2x weekly this is their chore. Provide modeling and help at first, and gradually fade away. Hold your ground when the whining and fits happen, I promise you aren't traumatizing your kids. They will test your boundaries and they need you to be a leader.

They can make their bed in the morning even if it isn't perfect!

They can put the cups and silverware away from the dishwasher.

Gradually introduce chores, model and work together, and then those simple tasks should become and expectation: they are part of the house, you're a community, and we work together to get things done. I discourage allowance or bribing at this stage. Set the tone after you know you've modeled it and they can do it on their own. It's time for them to take some small responsibilities that are now expectations. Again, the whining and fits will happen. Stay strong, I promise it pays off!

Any other questions? The community here seems to be like very involved and loving parents. This is the first year where your child is officially stepping out of the realm of "Early childhood education". They are properly growing up now! help them develop those skills.

I remember my parents hyping me up but also preparing me for the expectations of first grade: you're a big kid now, you'll have a desk, etc etc. I was excited! But I also was mentally prepared that I was gearing up for "big kid" stuff.

Hi all,

I could easily just buy one from Walmart, but the current one we have from Walmart never was that great to begin with, it's been 6 years, and it basically just pushes the dirt around while smelling as if it's about to catch fire.

We need a new vacuum, but maybe now's the time to make a poverty decision (low quality but cheap, meets the immediate need) rather than get something of decent quality? You tell me.

We have mostly laminate wood floors with area rugs. Current vacuum has never been good on the laminate, and these days I'm worried it's just going to cause scratches and gouges since it just drags stuff under it.

We have pets and live in the country, so our floors get a lot of stuff tracked in--pet hair, grass, pebbles, hay, dirt. The fucking pug is the biggest culprit of hair and dust I swear lol out of all the animals we have! But we also have budgies who are so messy!

The main living room sees the most traffic and has a low pile rug that is, shall we say, "well loved". She needs someone to take better care of her.

Sadly, our budget is limited. Like, we absolutely cannot afford $500 and I know that's basically the baseline for the premium, will-last-you-a-lifetime favorites on this sub.

IS there ANYTHING out there that will do better than fuckass walmart vacuum cleaners on a tight budget? OR should we get whatever we can right now and save up this year for a better one?

Hi all,

I was at a recent board meeting where our superintendent shared some powerpoint slides.

We are facing some major staffing cuts.

I have a screenshot of one of her slides where she verbally also said, quote:

"All IEP obligations will be met. Para support hours are reduced but not eliminated. IEP teams will review and amend any IEPs where service delivery is affected by staffing changes" --

I live in Washington state. Our state law explicitly says that IEP minutes, services, and setting decisions cannot be made due to staffing, budget, or administrative convenience.

We are veterans of budget cuts and mismanagement, 4 years ago up to 10 IEPs were "rewritten" under unclear circumstances resulting in the unexpected placement of highly imacted children full time into gen ed classrooms. No gen ed teachers attended those meetings, and we even had some parents who showed up to school the first day who clearly didn't understand: "I guess my daughter is supposed to be in X teacher's classroom now..? Where do I go? What does that mean?"

That resulted in significant upheaval, stress, and lots of documentation about how our "inclusion" kiddos were essentially not getting any help, support, or services. We were told to distribute worksheets with the answers pre-traced in highlighter so these kids could simply trace the highlighter. Some of these kids didn't even have the skills to sit in a desk or access most of our instruction.

We've clawed our way out of that, but it did cost the district money. So this was the most recent board meeting.

Am I just emotional? Am I crazy? Or does this sound like a blatant attempt to amend service minutes and settings based on staffing, NOT based on need?

I have a screenshot of the slide. Who do I go to? The union reps were there and equally outraged and skeptical. Do I share it with the new SPED coordinator? For all I know, she was hired to go along with this like the one we had before.

Do I reach out to the office of civil rights? The state superintendent's office? Or do I have to wait until action is taken specifically?

(For context we have an AMAZING model now! We have so much supports and procedures in place for our highly impacted kiddos that maximize time in gen ed, but also maximize their time in a more appropriate setting to aggressively target their areas of need. ALL CHILDREN are welcome in my room! It's been a joy collaborating with our SPED team the last 2 years. Kiddos needs are met, but we can work together to keep the included and support each other in BOTH settings to keep them in gen ed as much as possible with the long term goal of inclusion!!! It's been INCREDIBLE. The growth I've seen in my special friends has been nothing short of amazing. I finally feel like we have a model that meets their needs early with a clear plan to get them back into gen ed incrementally over time with appropriate plans and supports for everyone involved!)