Archive for the ‘School’ Category
I was going to do a random phone photo post – - except I’ve just spent the last 30 minutes looking for my iPhone and I can’t seem to locate it. On top of that, Find My iPhone isn’t working for me right now so I have no clue where it might be (except maybe in the car and I’m not going out there to look tonight – too cold).
Crap. This means I’ll probably have to do an Ava purse search in the morning. That’s where I found my debit card last week after it had been missing for ages. And my keys. And my work ID badge.
So that’s all I had for you tonight. Sorry.
Oh, wait. Ava had another fabulous day at school. I dare not hope we’ve turned the corner completely but it’s given me hope in a week when I sorely needed it. Work is, ummmm, stressful (not in a bad way) right now and knowing that I can come home to an easy(ish) night and just relax (well, not much due to school) is priceless.
Now that’s really it for tonight.
After our mega long parent-teacher conference the other day (did I mention I booked the last appointment of the day because I already knew it would take me way longer than 15 minutes?) it appears that we are seeing a little bit of improvement. Ava had a rocky day Monday but the last 2 days have been great for her and I can tell that her teachers are making a concerted effort to praise her more for her successes AND to make sure to tell us, in front of her, how well her day went. Even going so far as to provide us with a few examples of her good behaviors during the day so we can continue to reinforce the positive.
I realize we’re only a couple of days in but this shows me that her teacher did listen to our concerns and is trying to help. I feel much better about that.
And I’ve given myself a stern talking to as well. I need to adjust my attitude as to how I react and respond to these issues and learn when and what to let go. I’m not saying I’m backing down – just reminding myself that I need to choose my battles and not sweat the small stuff. I will also admit to recently going on a oh-please-somebody-teach-me-how-to-parent book buying binge at Amazon so some of my attitude adjustment is coming from there. In particular I’m finding this book, The Pocket Parent, to be very helpful. Highly recommend for toddler/preschooler parents. I wish I’d read this one a little sooner.
So that’s the good news.
The bad news is that apparently when her horrible, sucky, bad choices kind of day packed up and moved out it just hopped right on over to my office and settled in. It’s been a long time since I had a day this bad. It started when I left the house and only let up for the few hours I spent with her this evening (and honestly, even then I was a little distracted by it). But you know what? I’ll keep it if it means she doesn’t have to deal with it.
<Sigh>
I’m going to bed now just to get this day over with. Stick a fork in me ’cause I’m done.
I’ve mentioned before that Ava is struggling a bit in school.
More details:
Earlier in the year there was a problem kid in her class. Kid had some serious developmental issues and this setting was not a good fit for her. Kid was also not very verbal and would lash out aggressively and often – and she was a very big kid who was capable of inflicting some damage. She was fairly violent at times and seemed to target specific children (thankfully it was rarely Ava). The problems were increasing and a number of parents were expressing their concern about the other childrens’ safety. The teachers in her class were so busy with dealing with this child that the learning environment was not optimal for the other children and most attention was focused on this kid. The kid left the school soon after – her sibling still goes there so I assume she was asked to leave after several months of trying to deal with the behaviors.
So, what does this have to do with Ava? Well, for one thing this kid taught all of the others (by example) that hey, you can hit people. My kid learned this pretty well – along with several others. So all of a sudden, my non-hitting child has deciding that hitting is a perfectly acceptable way to solve problems. We’re not hitters in our family so this is either something she picked up there or is just something she likes to do. 90% of the time she’s hitting the same kid (who is also a hitter) but she’s hit another little girl a time or two as well. We are NOT happy about this, of course.
But it’s not only that. She’s in trouble almost every single day for not listening or for not putting her things away or for not sharing or for throwing a toy on the ground or…well, you get the idea. I really dread walking into her daycare for pickup because I know somebody is going to make a beeline for me to tell me all the things she did wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I asked for feedback when she gets in trouble but I didn’t know it would be like this every.single.freaking.day. Sometimes I just want to ask – and I have – if she ever does anything right.
And I’m not proud of how we’ve handled it sometimes. We’ve tried it all – taking toys away, yelling, various punishments, talking the issue to death, reading books, putting her to bed early – and we’re not really seeing any results other than we’ve completely succeeded in making us all miserable. I hate how it affects our whole evening every single day and I feel helpless and I don’t know what to do and then that makes me mad at myself and it turns into one big vicious cycle of grouching and misery.
But I do know some things. This can’t continue. I feel like we’re losing so much quality time together because we’re letting what happens at school bleed over into our family time in the evenings. I don’t want to be so affected by this but it just wears on me – and I’m worried that if we don’t address it that we’ll end up with a little psychopath on our hands. I am worried, so worried, that she will start feeling like she can’t do anything right if she keeps on hearing all the things that she does wrong. She is such a (usually) kind, sweet, and loving kid that it kills me to think of her being labeled as something other than that.
I’ve been revisiting all of my child development books and honestly, most of this seems developmentally appropriate for her age. But I feel like if I say that too much then people think I’m just defending her because she’s my kid. I get it that she’s doing some things wrong, but geez. She’s four. If they were capable of behaving like perfectly self-controlled little adults all the time then they wouldn’t really need us, would they?
This is where I need advice because I am wondering if I need to look at other schools. I worry that Ava is already being labeled and that the expectation of misbehavior is something that will stick with her for the rest of her time there. I worry that she will develop a negativity about education. I worry that her teachers are eagle eye-ing her for even the slightest misstep because she’s gotten a ‘reputation’ as a kid who doesn’t listen well.
But then I also worry about the impact it would have on her to take her out of the only place she’s ever gone (she started going there at 13 months old) and away from the familiarity of the facilities and teachers. While the place isn’t perfect, our experiences there have been mostly positive and she’s been happy. Heck, she’s still happy. She likes going in the mornings and looks forward to getting back to see her friends after she’s been away for a weekend. If we moved her now we would end up moving her again when she goes to Kindergarten next year and my kid, well, she does not do transitions especially well.
So, what to do, Internets?
Ava has homework every week.
Translation: Mama has extra homework on top of the plenty she already has on her own AND has to remember to take the stupid blue folder back to school every Friday lest I get another passive-aggressive note in her folder.
Sometimes the homework is easy. Count thirty things and bring them to school to share. Write down her full name and address. Draw a picture of something round in your home. Stuff like that.
Sometimes it’s not. Letter writing practice almost always involves tears (mine and hers). A discussion of the five senses nearly drove both J and I batty. We alternated walking out of the room while she whined until she finally decided to participate. Teachers? We are most definitely not. Homeschooling is not likely to happen in this house as it would surely drive us to drink (heavily and often).
But tonight’s assignment was kind of fun.
We talked about the things we are thankful for and wrote them down to be posted in her classroom.
Ava’s list included: crayons, books, her daddy, Lambie (her most favorite stuffed toy ever), our house, and her new baby cousin, Victor.
J’s list: family, fire trucks, pumpkin pie, and friends.
My list: Ava (of course), our pets, my iPhone (yeah, I went there), and panda bears.
I think maybe we should do this more often…
Man, I dread these things. No wonder my parents opted out as soon as they could. Talk about stressful.
We had Ava’s first conference of the school year today. As I’ve mentioned in a few earlier posts, we’ve had some recent behavioral challenges with her at school and for the first time in a long time I really, really wish I could just stay home with her for a while. Not that I’m justifying or rationalizing her behaviors, but dang. She’s 4. Why are the expectations so high nowadays??
For example, she got in trouble today for taking a piece of candy from the treat jar. The treat jar that was left, unsupervised and at kid level, by another teacher who failed to put it back up out of the kids’ reach. I get it that Ava knew she wasn’t supposed to be in it and she admitted that, but geez. Again, she’s 4. The temptation to grab a sweet is pretty hard for me to resist so I can imagine how hard it would be for her. For that she got a semi-public (mainly because there isn’t a lot of room for privacy in their classroom) mini-lecture about stealing. I did address the issue of labeling a (my) child publicly but I think I need to reiterate that again with her teacher in the morning.
Her main teacher really is mostly okay. She’s pretty straightforward, yet understanding so I don’t really have any complaints with her. The few concerns that I have had we’ve discussed, resolved to our mutual satisfaction and I’m good with that. She is very good with the kids, has a ton of patience, and seems to understand the value of positive reinforcement – which is something that we’ve discussed at length both in the past and again today.
Ava is also very stubborn and strong-willed. I know this. Really, I know this. Fortunately for me, I have a stronger will and I win because I am the mom. Her teachers however, cave in just often enough to reinforce Ava’s behavior which only makes it harder for them (and for me) next time.
Also, speech. I think Ava is doing fine from my perspective. I’m surely biased but I see frequent changes for the positive in her pronunciation of words all the time. Is she 100% clear to all people all the time? I doubt it because sometimes there’s a word here and there that I don’t get either but she can mostly communicate with neighbors and strangers fine so I don’t think it’s a huge issue that she can’t really pronounce /sp/ all that well at this point. S is fine if it’s alone but it’s the combo that she can’t quite get yet. Am I wrong here, y’all?
And they pointed out that she doesn’t yet know her phone number or address yet. Again, she’s FOUR. What she does know is how to turn on my iPhone, enter the unlock code (that she’s memorized – which reminds me that I need to change it again to keep her out of it), get to the favorites screen, and know which words to hit that will call Dad’s cell phone (which she did a couple of weeks ago while J was several time zones away from us – waking him VERY early in the AM hours).
And word cognition. Apparently she’s not so great at determining which words begin with a particular sound. Some she can get, some she can’t. I just can’t help but think that my mom probably wasn’t worried about this particular skill at all when I was 4. And hey, look. I grew up and can read and write. I even have my own blog where I can massacre the english language and all related grammar rules at will. The thing is – she knows this stuff and will answer your questions IF she feels like it or is forced into it by someone like, say, me. For example, I asked her to give me a word that starts with A. She did. Ava. I’m good with that. I asked for a B. After much hemming and hawing and whining and dragging of feet (and a few minutes of a stand off in the car where I told her we would sit until she gave me a B word) she did. Burp. And then illustrated with one.
She is her father’s daughter, after all.
It wasn’t all negative. She’s meeting or positively progressing in all of the developmental and educational milestones they track. At least there’s that.
It just felt to me like an awful lot of it was about what she’s not doing and I am scared to death that’s what’s coming across to her at school.
I sure hope not.
Edited to Add: I quizzed Ava all the way to school today about her address and she does know it quite well. Turns out Ava’s answer to the question, “Where do you live?” when asked by her teacher was “Home.” Well, duh. She answered the question accurately then, IMO. I plan to point out to her teacher that the question might be better phrased next time.