hilltopics images people features wednesday, march 28, 2001 for comments, contact kristi elliott at 864-4924 or features@kansan.com
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Lawrence senior Amnesia Tubbs walks a child out to the bus after a hard day of work. Tubbs works at Prairie Park Elementary School, 2711 Kensington Road, with autistic children. Autism is a disorder that impairs a person's ability to communicate, interact with other people and maintain normal contact with the outside world.
lessons in patience
good teachers helped Ameshia Tubbs realize her potential now she's trying to help others reach theirs
story and photos by mindie miller kansan managing editor
meshia Tubbs winses as a child lets loose a high-pitched howl.
*Tubbs* 'pulse quickens, and her muscles tense. It's her body's natural response to something that happens every fifteen minutes where she works.
Yelling and screaming children are par for the course at the autism room in Prairie Park Elementary School, 2711 Kensington Road.
Tubbs' students cry or scream when they get frustrated. They have bitten, hit and kicked Tubbs. In some instances, she is forced to restrain students to protect them, herself or other students.
Tubbs, Lawrence senior in education,
spends about 20 hours a week at the school,
teaching children with autism, a disorder
that impairs their ability to communicate,
interact with other people and maintain
normal contact with the outside world. She
works in the autism room with six of the
seven children, who range in age from
kindergarten to fifth grade.
She said she'd learned to take a step back and calm down before she started working with these students again.
"I have learned how to be really attentive to my threshold," she said. "There are days when it's like, 'Why do I do this?' ... But it's really rewarded."
Part of what makes it rewarding is the chance it gives Tubbs to influence her students' lives the way past teachers have influenced hers. Things were rough for Tubbs during high school, when she said she lived a "pretty unhealthy lifestyle." But her faith in God and a few teachers who challenged her to think bigger has set her on her current path — one she intends to continue following.
"I always want to be working with children with special needs," she said.
Patience — a necessary virtue
She reads each number in a commanding, deliberate tone. Sometimes the fourth-grader repeats after her; other times he bends his head toward her hand and rests his forehead there. The gesture looks sweet, but it's discouraged. Tubbs constantly must remind David not to stim, or fixate on objects or actions, a characteristic behavior in children with autism.
David fidgets in his chair and does everything he can to avoid paying attention to Tubbs, who's trying to get him to recite his phone number.
Carol Danner, lead autism teacher at Prairie Park, said working with autistic children required a great deal of composure.
"You have to be very, very patient," she said. "Ameshia is willing to work with any of the students. She has the patience to work with the kids."
Just about every day, a student will exhibit a behavior that catches Tubbs off guard, and she'll have to think quickly to come up with a way to redirect the child's behavior. The
challenge of working in such an environment — one that's constantly in flux — is part of what draws Tubbs to her work.
"I like it because you never know what to expect." she said.
It's that same unpredictability that keeps Tubbs and the nine other para educators at Prairie Park's autism room on their toes, ready to fend off physical attacks.
Tubbs: teaches autistic children at a local elementary school
In addition to Tubbs, three other University students work as para educators in the Lawrence School District, said Joe Nyre, adjunct professor of education as well as assistant director of the district's special services and co-director of the Kansas Psychological Training Consortium.
Standing 5-feet tall with a slender build Tubs is very much aware that her size is a disadvantage when working with children who sometimes have aggressive outbursts.
"Some of our best paras are students working on their education degrees," he said. "They're very motivated, and they bring best practices to the table. It's mutually beneficial."
Helping the helpless
Tubbs' size likely will be an ongoing concern.
She expects to graduate in May 2002 with a degree in middle-secondary education—a degree she hopes will land her a job teaching special-needs students at an inner-city middle or high school.
But even working with elementary school children can be physically challenging, Tubbs said. Sometimes they're stronger than she is, and if there's a behavior problem, it gets hard to handle. Teaching older
students will pose an even greater challenge.
students will pose an even greater challenge. But Tubbs is determined to give it a go. She has her eye on J.C. Harmon, a large high school in Kansas City, Kan, where a high percentage of students speak English as a second language, qualify for free or reduced lunch and come from single-parent backgrounds.
"That's really my heart as far as teaching." Tubbs said. "I'd like to be in an urban area."
Ihos said. "I like to be in an urban area."
Her own educational experiences have led to that attraction. Though Tubbs grew up in Lawrence, the demographics at the schools she attended were similar to those at larger, urban schools.
She started at East Heights Elementary and moved through Central Junior High the schools with the lowest socioeconomic status and highest diversity of any of the 20 elementary schools and four middle schools in Lawrence.
Since graduating from Lawrence High School and coming to the University, Tubbs has participated in several alternative break programs, which took her places like Detroit, Cleveland, and Compton, Calif., to work with children in large, urban school settings. Her experiences have made her realize that she can help people who feel like they can't help themselves.
"One thing that I'm learning is that there's always access to resources," she said. "I think, a lot of times, people just don't know how to go about getting the things that they need for their school."
Unleashing inspiration
Tubbs has taken her inspiration, in part, from her own teachers.
Her kindergarten teacher employed techniques that weren't being used on a large scale in education at the time. She also knew how active kindergartners were, Tubbs said, and she came up with a way to release some of that energy while developing her students' motor skills.
"My kindergarten teacher taught me how to break dance," she said, laughing.
The teacher who had the greatest impact on Tubbs came into her life when she needed her most — in high school. The three years Tubbs spent at Lawrence High weren't her best.
"I led a pretty unhealthy lifestyle," she said. "My focus was getting out. I'd been blessed with the ability not to have to work too hard to do pretty well."
So she didn’t — until Fran McNellis challenged her. McNellis, who taught histori and
politics, had a reputation for being the hardest teacher at the school. Tubbs said, but she also had a way of getting people on track without pinpointing their faults. Tubbs chose to take three classes from McNellis.
Tubbs entered the University's School of Education her junior year. When she graduates, she'll be certified to teach social studies, but she'll have a provisional special education endorsement as well.
She knows working with special-needs children will be challenging. And although prayer helps get her through tough moments, she knows she may eventually burn out. For now, however, she relishes her work.
"I guess my thing is that I don't give up on anybody," Tubbs said. "I just see so much potential in those kids sometimes, and it's just a matter of helping them to see it and then getting the resources so that they have access to opportunities."
Fubbs holds up one of the children from the autism room while Betty Ware, a fellow para educator, plays with another child on a bouncy toy. Nine part- and full-time para educators work at the autism room in Prairie Park.
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