Lisa Sauco

I would say patience. In a special education classroom, there's a lot happening at once. There are phones ringing, providers coming in, just a ton of things happening at the same time. The needs are intense at times, so I think just to have a lot of patience and to breathe. My wonderful mother always read to me as a child, and I had such a love for school early on. I loved going to school, I loved learning, I loved reading, I loved doing homework. So my mom definitely, as a stay-at-home mom, fostered that learning, always helping her in the kitchen, whether it was a recipe or just an activity, so she was very hands-on. I would also say integrity - I think that's the most important value in your personal life. I just think honesty and integrity are most important.

I would say just to really just do your best every day. The best advice was just to know that not to burn out, because this is the type of profession where you could burn out very easily. So just to do your job to the best of your ability. And I guess work smarter, not harder, is what I've learned as I've gotten older. I've learned to put certain practices in place, and I have my binders with all my materials, so that you're kind of not reinventing the wheel every year, because that causes teacher burnout. So as a seasoned teacher now, I think I'm able to do that.

I would tell her not to sweat the small stuff. It all works out by June. The kids remember the time spent, you know, don't sweat the small stuff. I think as a teacher, sometimes you just don't understand how you're going to fit everything in and get all this paperwork done and report cards and everything else that they throw at you every week, but it really does get done somehow. So, just to know that.

The biggest challenge I would say is that sometimes there's no consequences for student behavior. We have something called MTSS, which is basically modifying behavior, understanding where it comes from, what's the antecedent. We call it an ABC chart - what's the antecedent, what's the behavior, and how are we going to chart it or deal with it. And it's a lot of extra paperwork for the teachers today because of that. I think maybe most teachers would probably say that that's a struggle, just to monitor and modify the behavior. We have a lot of extra incentives in place, like dojo points that we give the kids every day, they get very excited, and then if they get a certain amount of points, like 25, then they get a prize, or they get to sit next to their best friends for the day, or an extra 5 minutes of recess. As for opportunities, I would say that the professional development that we've received every year is excellent. Every Monday, we have professional development. We have access to many different websites, many different programs. We just learned a new phonics program, and they offered me access to watch 5 demo lessons to see it in action. So we really do receive a lot of training.

I would say integrity. I think that's the most important value in your personal life. I just think honesty and integrity are most important.