Are we including or excluding?

I was a kindergartner when I was hospitalized for pneumonia. I obviously didn’t know at the time the seriousness of my illness.  What I do remember was that I received so much attention!  My mom, who was usually very busy taking care of me and my five siblings, spent hours just with me.  She held my hand, read to me, and told stories.  My dad who worked long hours stopped by the hospital throughout the day to check in on me.  This small town hospital in the South Dakota had one room with a TV.  I was the special patient assigned to this room.  I recall my room being very busy with many people wanting to check in on me and also see what was on TV. I remember thinking that kindergarten must be closed since I was in the hospital.

After a couple of weeks, I was able to go back to kindergarten.  It was obviously an emotional day if I can still recall it decades later.  To my surprise, kindergarten had gone on without me!  My assigned desk had moved.  My buddy was assigned to another buddy.  The bulletin boards had changed.  Classroom art projects had been completed and displayed with my classmates’ names attached without me.  I felt lost and like an outsider.  As an adult, I look back on this memory and think, “Wow!  Five-year old Kristin was such a baby!”  On the other hand, to five-year old Kristin, this was a painful, emotional time when she felt lost and excluded.

I can’t help think about all of the students who come into our classrooms and feel lost and excluded. How often do our students enter our classrooms and feel overwhelmed by what has passed them by?  What about those student who join our classrooms and don’t understand the language?  How about those students who miss 10% or more of their school year?

Our students miss school for many reasons.  Whether it is a day of illness, a day missed for waking up late, or a day of suspension, schools keep moving forward without them.  It is difficult for educators to adjust and support students who miss school and simultaneously keep the rest of the class moving forward...but isn’t it our job to be inclusive?

I heard of an instance this past week in which a middle school student entered her classroom only to be told by the teacher to get out.  The student was told she didn’t belong in the class.  Apparently, the student had received an additional day of class suspension.  A teacher in California has a right to suspend students from class.  This suspension serves as a time-out or exclusion from class.  I often wonder if a class suspension, or exclusion, continues even after the student is allowed to come back to class.  Is the student welcomed back?  Is there an effort to use suspension as a means of corrective action or is it a form of punishment?

Being inclusive is so important.  Being inclusive combats bullying.  Finding ways to include everyone build friendships.  Making positive, inclusive relationships builds culture.  Everyone wants attention.  All students want to feel important and as if they matter.

Back to my kindergarten memory.  My teacher must have recognized that a child who misses two weeks of school would feel lost and anxious.  She asked me to share my story of the hospital with the class.  I became the hospital expert.  Suddenly, I was included and important.