DESCRIPTION OF THE SUCCESS STORY
I have been a headmaster in different schools for almost 15 years. The last 5 years I have been assigned a school in the centre of town. The school always had a very good reputation and it attracts children coming from above the average economical basis of our town. Actually, this was one of the reasons that I asked for my assignment there, after spending almost 10 years in less privileged regions.
I use to inform new teaches in the differences that our school has from other regions. Children finish their kindergarten in private schools and then they move to the closest primary school. Students in public schools are distributed based on the address of their homes, in order to reduce the physical distance from homes to school.
Private kindergarten are doing an excellent work in order to improve their fame in the local community. So there you can find children knowing how to spell their names, count or even read small phrases. Almost every parent sends their boys and girls to private kindergarten so that they get a basis for their education.
But economical crisis has changed a lot of things nowadays. Not everybody could afford to do the same thing nowadays. And this was the case for the family of a young boy, called Nickolas. He was a normal kid, a clever one that got a perfect preparation from his family for primary school and that was all.
A young teacher, Mr X, has been assigned the first class. It was his first time in the 1st grade. I had discussed with him what was the case for our region and for the children in our school. At the end of the first month, Mr X during our discussion at the breaks informed me for the change in attitude of this small boy, Nicolas. Based on his point of view, it was obvious that he did not want to follow the rest of the class. He mentioned to me that he had contacted his mother, since he was also absent some days of the week.
Mr X came and asked my permission to help the child. He had assumed that the boy could not follow the rest of the class and he has started to stay away from our normal school process. His idea was to give him some extra work, that no other kid would have and tried to give him an advantage compared to the other students.
To be honest, I was not so convinced that this process could get results. I had my doubts…my serious doubts. I knew the family, and I asked Mr X to be really careful for everything that he is doing, since it could cause more problems with the other kids and their families.
After a month, Nicolas seemed not to have problems. He was really playing with the rest of the classroom and he was improving himself. At the end of semester his grades were really excellent.
CRITICAL ANALYSIS
I was not sure that the whole situation will give a solution to the problem. I decided to let Mr X follow his instinct and the solution that he suggested, because I knew that he was in contact with the family and the whole process, at least, will bring in close cooperation the teacher with the family.
I am not quite sure that the situation is a good practice, but it is a success story from my point of view.
In a similar case, I will definitely look again at the solution. This process need to be carefully reviewed but the improvisation in most of the cases should be carefully allowed.
