If you followed us around, you would have thought my daugher was Veruca Salt. Here's some of what you would have heard:
- Fine. [Insert foot stamp and eye rolling.] Go and buy yourself some giant grownup diapers!
- If you just buy this for me [a giant lollipop and whirling electronic toy combination made by blind Chinese orphans] I'll be able to keep control of myself for ever.
- [Screamed: ] I can't wait until I'm older than you and then I'm going to whack you on the butt!
- [Sobbed through tears and spraying gobbets of saliva:] I'm going to move to England! I'm really serious!
34 comments:
I know you won't post this but I'm going to write to you anyway, This is just plain bratty behavior and is NOT cute in a kindergarten age kid. I taught kindy for years and you'd better believe they shaped up by the end of the first week of class.
And lest you think I was a mean and authoritarian teacher, I assure you that this is not the case. I was as awesome K teacher (public and private schools). I still have copies of excellent evaluations and glowing letters from parents.
Hope your kid adjusts well to not being the spoiled queen bee of her kindy class. But if not, please please please, whatever you do, DO NOT blame the teacher when this kind of bratty behavior causes her to have trouble in class. You allow it at home, probably encourage it, and think it's cute. Her teacher will not think it's cute.
Your little one has prodigious verbal and persuasive skills. I smell a litigator in future.
I love the England comment
The Little Anachronism uses shockingly similar negotiating strategies: is there a handbook?
Grow up, anonymous: it's entirely clear that AP doesn't encourage this, but that doesn't mean that it isn't a funny moment, in the quiet afterward. Also, it's a pretty well-established pattern that kids behave better with non-parents and peers ("familiarity breeds contempt" someone said), so take your "awesome" and stuff it back in your retirement folder.
Anonymous K teacher, I think you're over-reacting. I think that AP was pointing out it was unusual behaviour, due to the fact that AK was tired & stressed. The whole story has to be told, in order for the punchline to pay off.
England!!
Gotta love kids who get read to a lot.
I'm puzzled as to why anonymous thinks you think this behavior is cute.
And I'm wondering why both our children have similar locutions, even though I don't live in a square state. Maybe there is something to innateness after all (I don't think).
I think Anon. was hoping I wouldn't post his/her comment, not knowing I wouldn't post it.
Frankly, I don't believe Anon. has ever set foot in a kindergarten. Clearly s/he isn't a parent.
She had a great first day, but she's disappointed that she didn't get any homework.
The Angry Kid was probably stressed and not a wee bit scared. In little ones, that tends to come out all sideways as temper tantrums.
Better she vent at you, rather than PruneFace McStarchybritches. Pruney might have a bank vault full of glowing letters from parents and admin wonks, but I bet she was a Holy Terror who scared the piss (sometimes literally) out of the kids in her class.
Kindergarteners are FIVE, McStarchy. Some are a very young five, at that. If all of your vaunted experience never taught you that kids react badly to stress, then I doubt you were as spectacular as you seem to think.
In short, lighten up and blow it out your ass.
I'm so glad you posted anon's comments so that we could see that some Kindergarten teachers are just as judgemental as we feared.
My kid #3 is a little high strung and we had a similar situation as she started Kindergarten. The stress of not knowing what school she was going to until the last minute, combined with the regular start of school jitters, made her a very difficult child in the days just before the start of school. We had a few scenes like you just described. Once school started she was fine. In fact, she has gone on to be the poor kid that the teacher always uses as an example of how students should behave. She starts 8th (!) grade next week and hasn't run away to England yet.
Your daughter will be just fine in kindergarten as long as she doesn't have a teacher like anonymous. This person gets to make comments on something called a permanent record.
All children have meltdowns sometimes. All of them. (Even the sanctimonius anonymous did.) And who gets to see most of them? Mom.
I do have to howl about her getting to be older than you and moving to England.
Oh c'mon. We love being those parents who encourage screams from our kid in the middle of Target. It's so cute!
And, yes, K-teacher, we'll come after you with weapons because these outbreaks couldn't possibly our fault.
-angry baker
All of that behavior just says to me (mom of two, ages 6 and 8, and former high school teacher) that she's a very strong person who was overstimulated and tired and more than a little nervous about starting school. Heck, I've seen high school seniors throw tantrums worse than that, and they can carry through on the spanking/hitting threat.
My son was very nervous about kindergarten last year (after a bad preschool experience that I had to pull him out of), but it went really well last year. He is a touch scared and nervous about this year, but after meeting his teacher last night, he's calmed down a lot. It's the not knowing that's scary.
As for anonymous, she sounds just like the "award-winning" preschool teacher who messed my son up but good. Many parents loved her, but my son started developing his ulcer in that class. Not all teaching styles work for all kids.
C'mon...who amongst us hasn't had a fit in public at least once?
And I do mean as adults. ;-)
I wanna know how you kept from laughing at the England comment.
I almost fell on the floor laughing.
The girl knows she can have all the tantrums she wants, but she will never, ever get what she wants by tantrumming. Result? She doesn't have them often, but when she does, she *means* it. Ow, my eardrums.
I congratulate the Angry Child on her erudition under stress, the girl could take lessons from her. Glad her day was not so bad after all.
On my first day of preschool, I was really keyed up. I thought my best friend would be there, but when I got to school I found out that she wasn't there because she had moved onto kindergarden. I got upset, had a meltdown, kicked my teacher in the shin, and was in time-out before my Mom even left. Its so out of character, its hilarious (well, the kicking is out of character, the being upset at unexpected changes isn't).
Its probably not the most stellar moment in my educational career, and I'm sure Mom was mortified, but thank goodness I had a great teacher who understood that sometimes kids just get overwhelmed and didn't hold it against me.
I hope that your anonymous commenter accidentally finds herself being fucked by a goat.
There is nothing worse than being out in public with your misbehaving child, being almost at your wits end, and then being looked upon with disdain by someone who thinks you are failing as a parent. For some reason, it is even more pathetic when done by an anonymous blog commenter.
I am so glad to hear that Angry Kid enjoyed school. The littlest Isis recently started preschool and is finally starting to settle into a routine.
Plus, people who give you the stinkeye for being out when a child has a meltdown are the same jerkholes who will either chime in that you OUGHT to spank the kid, or threaten to call the cops if you even raise your voice at the child.
Sounds like the Angry Kid is perfectly ready for a copy of "Alexander and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day." Best book ever, really.
I'll bet that anonymous doesn't even know who "Veruca Salt" is...
Which is further evidence that anonymous is neither teacher nor parent.
Angry Kid completely stole my heart away! I don't think she's bratty. I think she's clever and strong willed and funny. I'm 44 and I will admit that sometimes I throw a temper tantrum when The Lovely Myfanwe won't let me have something at the store. (Though I'm wise enough never, ever to refer to "giant grownup diapers"!)
As for Anon, well, I would just remind her that the Lubbavicher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Scheerson, said that in a conversation between an adult and a child, if the child doesn't understand, it is always the adult's fault.
I love that she was disappointed there was no homework. I recall feeling the same way. But that will change. In 5th grade Norbert decided whether he liked or disliked a teacher based on the amount of homework they assigned.
My verification word is badturrd.
OK, I totally wasn't going to say this, and I even walked away from the computer, but the image kept coming back to me.
I know who Anonymous is! Former teacher, despises children, firm disciplinarian.
Anonymous is Miss Trunchbowl!
After raising 3 children, they are now 21 (a girl) and 19 (twin boys) all I can say is your daughter needs a spanking. Your daughter's behavior is unacceptable in polite society.
My neighbor has a 21 year old daughter and he tolerated the same temper tantrum behavior that you tolerate. His daughter turned out out to be a narcissistic spoiled brat. She is a very intelligent young lady who cannot keep a job because the "boss" makes her do things she does not want to do.
This girl is very intelligent, I would say 80'th to 90'th percentile sort of intelligence. Her gifts and capabilities will never be realized. It is a terrible tragedy.
Deal with the behavior now or your daughter will make your life absolutely miserable in way you cannot imagine. Teenagers are endlessly inventive when it comes to finding ways to make you miserable.
You will also have rendered your daughter unable to function as an adult and ultimately she will hate your for it.
I am sorry if I sound really dark and harsh, but I am old enough now to have watched this scene replay in a dozen families over the years. You still have a chance to recover and teach your daughter, but time is very short. If you bite the bullet and stop the behavior, the effort you expend now will pay off in a wonderful relationship with your daughter when she is 20 or 21 years of age and in college.
Trust an old fart who has been around for a while. The advice may stink now, but there will be a beautiful fragrance later.
I spent many years as a legislative advocate in the area of domestic violence prevention. I believed then, and still believe to this day, that hitting people is a bad thing. It doesn't matter if it is a spouse, a child or a total stranger. Hitting people is morally wrong.
Like Faded, I too have the perspective that age and experience provides. I have managed to raise an 11 year old boy who is able to act appropriately in public (at least 95% of the time, which is more than I can say for myself), shows incredible sensitivity to others, and has excellent table manners. I have never, not once, never hit him. (That is not to say I haven't WANTED to, it means only that I was able to control my base urges.)
I have a dear friend -- a 50-year-old woman -- whose mother found it easier to hit a child rather than employ actual parenting or intellectual instruction. To this day she is scarred by it. The whole "they'll thank you for beating the crap out of them when they are older" is a lie. An absolute lie.
I look forward to the day when hitting children becomes universally unaccessible and joins other once-widely-practiced-and-now- unacceptable things like wife beating, feet-binding, slavery, and smoking.
@ faded - I'm curious. Do you believe that spanking is the only way to correct a child? And do you believe that adults who fail to live up to their potential do so because no one spanked them when they were little?
AP spanking is not the only way to correct a child. There is actually a 4 step progression.
1. You teach your child the behavior you want the child to learn. You make sure the child knows what is expected. The expectation must be age appropriate. You do not expect a 2 year old to take out the trash.
2. You repeat the teaching when the child does not do what is expected, I call this training. Knowing your child is very important in this step because you have to judge how quickly your could learns and how resistive they may be so that you can determine the number of times to repeat the teaching. This requires you as a parent to have degree of confidence in your ability to make decisions with partial or sketch information. The process breaks down for some parents at this point because they are not sure of themselves and become frustrated. If they get really frustrated very bad things can happen. Much like what aiden referred to in his previous post.
3. This is sanctions. If your child is resisting you use a non-physical punishment, say denial of a privilege or a suspension of an activity they like. How you did this is will be tailored to your child because you know your child. If step 3 does not work then step 4.
4. Step 4 is a spanking. The objective it to create a little discomfort. Spanking is the thing you want your child to avoid. It has to be uncomfortable enough that the child says to him/herself, I don't want to go there again. It does not take much to get the average child to that place. If you have a healthy attitude toward spanking you will think of as a last resort, not the first or only tool in your set of training/discipline tools. I have learned over the years that you must never be angry when you spank a child. A good physical measure to see if spanking has gone to far is a bruise. There were times we would tell our kids to go to their rooms. Mom or Dad will spank you later after Mom or Dad calms down. We would go back to the child's room 30 min later and have a talk with the child and by that time the child would indicate an understanding the problem they had caused and a spanking would not be necessary.
Parents who loose their tempers, get angry and beat their kids do need to be dealt with quite strongly. That sort of treatment screws kids up horribly. I have seen plenty of that as well. This is an issue that is near and dear to my hart because my wife of 30 years was physically and sexually abused by her father for the first 12 years of her life. She is now 60 and we still deal with the effects of the abuse.
If you are doing things correctly spankings are rather infrequent. Also by the age 8 or 10 spankings are no longer age appropriate and should never be used. By that age your child is beginning to develop some of the early marks of adult behavior. If you spank at this time you will screw up their development into adults and fix them emotionally at the age where spanking became inappropriate. The parent who spanks when the child is older will usually produce and angry and rebellious young adult.
AP you are faced with a situation where you will need to work hard and consistently to get your daughter's behavior under control. It will be very hard. Weather you spank or not you probably only have 2 to 3 years to get her behavior under control.
Having said all of that I will make this observation. There are time you can do everything you believe is right and do it to the best of your ability and your child blows up ad winds up in prison, on drugs or God forbid dead. Please understand that all of the stuff in this discussion will improve your chances of having a good outcome raising your child, but practicing all of this does not guarantee a good outcome.
I think all kids are stressed at this time of year-not that we should excuse the behaviour, but we also need to understand where they are coming from... I've found that extra doses of cuddles along with Mom/Child talks go a long way towards helping them understand their feelings about school (and life in general)!Besides, there are certainly days when I want to move to England too!!!
LOL! I think I shall also move to England.
I think saying that the way you raised your kids will work for any random person (especially when you're not there to see the actual incident and have never met the people involved personally) is beyond the pale stupid.
My brother-in-law is still scarred from what his parents did to him after they had a short chat about him (when he was two) with "Dr." James Dobson. Their relationship is strained, to say the least. "Dr." Dobson made a couple of comments, without meeting the child or knowing the situation at all, and in slavishly following them, my in-laws did massive damage with their son.
I will admit to having spanked my kids. You know what? Hasn't worked at all. Those four steps? Done them all, and they only sometimes work. Every child is different, not just in personality but also in needs and communication and thinking styles. Some respond to spanking, and some rebel even further. Some respond to time-outs better than others, and it's the good parent who can pull whatever tool will work at that moment out and use it calmly.
Telling someone that she needs to spank her kid after reading a short synopsis of the behavior, simply because you're a mom of fairly successful adults, is the height of foolishness. Whenever I judge another mom, even in my heart, I always wait for the lightning to strike.
I vote for Carina to win the thread.
Good Lord Almighty, parenting posts do raise a ruckus!
I am glad she enjoyed her first day. I remember both my first day and my son's. That big, scary, unknown place becomes 'my school' and all is better.
The post is a funny anecdote -- but the couple of self-righteous parenting comments (and the amused sanity of the general commentariat) really lift it into the pantheon.
My Norbert came home from the first day of school to comment that he has several new teachers -- all of them "really awesome teachers". I was prepared for doom and gloom, because 6th graders aren't known for their enthusiasm on the way to school, but he seems really pleased.
I hope AK continues to enjoy school. Maybe she'll be an AP herself someday!
As the parent of a difficult 6 year old I can TOTALLY sympathize with you. I'm shocked and saddened at people who have no idea what kind of parent you are or what kind of kid you have would dare to behave in such a superior manner as to tell you what your child (whom they have never met) and you (whom they have also never met) need to do.
C'mon people!
I know exactly how this feels and how difficult kids can sometimes be.
And for those of you that advocate spanking (which makes me physically ill to think about)- I'm just going to say this once- this has a name- it is called Assault and Battery when perpetrated on an adult- somehow you have made yourself feel better about it when you assault and batter a child by calling it discipline. It is assault & battery nonetheless.
Thanks, everyone. I would never hit my daughter intentionally. And the idea that she, a usually compliant, sweet and generous child, should be beaten because of a bad day is appalling. To those folks who think you can give appropriate parenting advice to a person whom you don't know, for a child you have never met, over an incident you did not witness and consequences you were not present to evaluate... Grow up and get a little perspective.
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