Homemaker enjoyed solving crossword puzzles
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| Photos by Alex T. Paschal/Telegraph Rosslynn Shaw and her dog, Bailey, help a student with his math work Tuesday morning at Amboy Elementary School. Shaw is one of 79 local foster grandparents assisting scores of struggling students through the Tri-County Opportunities Council's Foster Grandparent Program. |
BY SAM SMITH
SVN REPORTER
ssmith@svnmail.com
When Grandma Dorothy Tobiaski walks into the room, it's all hugs and math - not exactly the first subject "Grandma" brings to mind, but an important one for special needs students at Amboy Central Elementary School.
Tobiaski is in her 60s, with no children or grandchildren of her own, but for seven hours a day, she's one of 79 local grandmas and grandpas assisting scores of struggling students in the Tri-County Opportunities Council's Foster Grandparent Program.
Nationally, 264,000 children receive support from 30,500 volunteering seniors, but the number of volunteers has stagnated, according to the Association of Foster Grandparent Program Directors.
Locally, though, participation in the program has grown nearly 20 percent in the past six years, and directors are looking for more volunteers and schools willing to open their doors, local administrator Sharon King said.
The pay is modest, but rewards high. Through a series of federal and state grants, volunteers receive a tax-free stipend that ranges from $225 to $400 a month, depending on hours worked, plus travel reimbursement.
What keeps Tobiaski coming back, though, is the joy of helping struggling children learn to read.
"This is about the best job I've ever had," Tobiaski said.
The program is "a wonderful support system for grandparents looking for ways to help kids," and the only resources school districts must chip in is a free meal on the hot-lunch line, said King, who works in the council's Rock Falls office.
At the national level, the program is geared toward senior citizens with limited income, but King encourages anyone 60 or older to apply because living and medical expenses often bring potential volunteers into an income bracket acceptable to federal grant readers.
At Central Elementary, the resource room is where kids go to receive extra help on their class work or blow off some steam that might have built up from struggling to sit still for 45 minutes.
The room is colorful and comfortable, furnished with teaching toys, bean-bag chairs and bright storage bins to cache school supplies.
Children wander the resource room with relative freedom. Some scrunch into a bean bag and practice reading to animal-therapist volunteer Harvey Bos and his calm black Labrador, Annie. Others sit around a squat, crescent-shaped table and pepper Lois Gillespie, the resource room teacher, with questions about class work. Yet another hunts and pecks her way through the basics of letter correspondence on one of the room's computer stations.
Gillespie has taught special education in Amboy for 35 years, and although Tuesdays are unusually busy, she says there's hardly a dull moment any day.
The focus is a targeted education and one-on-one assistance for specific areas of development, which is where the patience of a sympathetic grandparent comes in.
Tobiaski, for example, spent 35 minutes talking a third-grader through two workbook pages about telling time, as she helped him turn the minute and hour hands of a toy clock to the appropriate positions.
"They could call me Miss Tobiaski or Grandma, but Tobiaski is kind of hard. Grandma is just easier," Tobiaski said.
The resource-room format is a shift from the now-abandoned special education policy of dumping all under-performing or disruptive students into the same room for most of the day and telling special-education teachers to make them learn, Gillespie said.
The personal focus that children receive from their favorite grandparent can make a world of difference for those who might not receive adequate attention at home, said foster grandparent supervisor Pam Vasquez said.
"Some of these kids, this is the most attention they get from anybody," Vasquez said. "I never knew how great this was until I started working for it."
Reach Sam Smith at (815) 625-3600 or (800) 798-4085, ext. 525.
