As a teacher, she should know better, and, failed at being a teacher. She is now living life as a STUDENT in life, learning her lesson(s).

For every action in life, there is a REaction. You see the outcome of her actions.

There is also no excuse for this behavior from a teacher that hasn’t been given all of those!

“…Creating a tally chart of all the things the class dislikes about a peer?! There is no other way to describe this other than pure evil…”

I agree! It’s a horrible thing to do to any child, whether the child has a learning diability or not!

No, that child did not deserve to be treated the way she was. I didn’t deserve to be treated the way I was, when people bullied me, mocked me, beat me up and made me cry *for pure recreation* when I was a child. But, as you said, what happened, happened.

My fear is that we are so caught up in blaming, in hating, in demonizing the person who did this, that little will be learned by anyone, except Ms. Portillo who, if many people had their way, would never teach again (so anything she learned from this would be a moot point at best).

I have certainly had times when I have fantasized about the people who tormented me when I was a child being raked across the coals, and taking a morbid delight in that thought. At other times, I realize that I hated being hurt in that way, and I really don’t want anyone else to hurt, even if it is because of what they did to me. The one thing I wanted most in that day was for them to listen to me, to understand me, to know that I am a real human. And vindictive punishment does not further that end at all. It only polarizes and entrenches people further, makes them resentful of people we would hope they would come to know.

Teachers are on the defensive, vicariously, for Ms. Portillo, and the farther this is pushed the more resentment, naturally, those teachers will feel for “those Asperger brats.” Tackling this adversarially will only give more life to the “they’re just spoiled kids whose parents haven’t put their foot down” argument, and others like it. Myths that justify what defensive people want to believe.

I really don’t know too many Aspies who really want someone punished for the suffering they have undergone, even if it was at the hands of people who were unkind (unfortunately very often the case). At any rate, if my sentiment is any indication, what we really want is just to be understood, loved and appreciated for who we are.

So, you being an “Aspie” and all…You, above all should be able to see that THIS teacher does not fit the “Norm” of what a teacher should be, or, should be doing to students in class, correct? To excuse her actions would be just like someone excusing Adolf Hitler or George W. Bush for their actions. People need to be accountable for their actions. Now, having said that, maybe, if the School District AND the teacher would have admitted that their actions were wrong, the Mom would not have taken it this far. Remember, this was a KINDERGARDEN class. If this would have been able to continue, who knows how the rest of the children would grow up to be like. The school failed at doing their job. The teacher failed at doing her job. The kid did not deserve what happened, and, neither did the Mom. You can keep “Shoud have-Would have”ing all you want. What happened, happened. You can’t change it. You can only move forward and make sure it does not happen again.

And Ms. Portillo did not understand that her student had Asperger’s, and likely didn’t know that someone with such a different modality of learning and behavior existed.

I am saying that, having been in the teachers role teaching people who had fundamental neurological differences from me, I can understand how Ms. Portillo might have been unable to understand the significance of her actions, or the natural propensity her student had to actions that would, in a neurotypical child, be “bratty.”

“Now, I can understand how a neurotypical could misunderstand me, an aspie, so much as to view my behavior as a matter of choice, stubbornness, defiance, temper tantrums, et cetera.”

If even you didn’t understand you were an aspie at the time, then how were they supposed to understand you were an aspie at the time instead of thinking that you were a neurotypical teacher doing the things you did for the same reasons some neurotypical teachers do those same things?

I was also an Algebra teacher in a job that lasted all of 3 months.

I am not brilliant with math, but I have a great understanding of the principle and an affinity for the discovery of patterns. Most aspies do.

My students, to say the least, did not have any appreciation for this fact. I was trying to convey the patterns, symmetry and wonderful consistency of mathematics to them in what I felt were exciting ways, but I couldn’t hold their attention or make them pay attention. Responses ranged from ignoring me to open defiance. Sometimes I was the subject of complaints by teachers in neighboring classrooms, as I screamed to get the attention of the students, the only technique I had found that worked. But not for long.

Thus was the experience of an Aspie trying to teach neurotypicals (I didn’t know I was an aspie at the time – just that I was different).

Now, I can understand how a neurotypical could misunderstand me, an aspie, so much as to view my behavior as a matter of choice, stubbornness, defiance, temper tantrums, et cetera. It is hard for me to imagine using social rejection as a teaching tool, but perhaps this is because I have suffered severely from social rejection, and could not imagine it as having less consequence than it actually does. Perhaps her experience was different. Perhaps she could not comprehend the meaning of the young student’s behavior, or that which her actions would have to him.

Perhaps Ms. Portillo does not so deserve our vitriol. Perhaps, like many other areas in American experience today (in my humble opinion), the real answer lies not in a confrontational, adversarial approach, but in open dialog, understanding, and an attempt to learn from one another.

The day Portillo abused Alex and his classmates that way should have been her last day as a teacher. Ever. Anywhere.

I am not sure whether Douglas is a shill for Portillo or her lawyer, or whether he is emotionally disturbed. But he is clearly in complete denial of all the facts, and at best flooding comments with irrelevant anecdotes shows his judgment is almost as poor as Portillo’s.