First post!

Hi there!

I'm Ms. B. I'm a special education teacher at a medium-sized high school in a smallish town in America. At my school, I'm called a Resource Teacher, which means part of the day I'm teaching a study skills/study hall class, and part of the day I'm co-teaching English and Algebra. I have mostly 9th graders on my caseload, with a sprinkling of 10th and 11th graders. I'm definitely the new gal in town and sometimes I love it, but sometimes I feel like I'll always be an outsider.

It's my first year at this high school. My family and I moved to this area from an expensive, overpopulated city. I was a Resource Teacher in an affluent suburb of the big city. At the Old School, we had every resource we could have needed. More pencils? No problem. An iPad for a group of freshmen? Sure. A caseload under 28? Of course--anything more than 28 would mean a chat with our union rep.

At the New School, I've got a caseload of 39, which is really good compared to the elementary Resource Teachers, who've got numbers in the low 50s.  Our Resource Room has few pencils, not much paper, no stapler, a broken pencil sharpener. We don't even have a printer in the classroom. I always knew that we were lucky at the Old School, but I had no idea to what extent.

This blog will be a mix of many different things: part new girl/fish out of water story; part musings from special education land.