It's one of every parent's worst nightmares -- learning your child is being bullied. We've all witnessed it before, or worse, experienced it ourselves -- and just pray that it won't happen to our own sweet babies.
Justin's school is very serious about equipping students with skills to confound bullies to keep them from being victims. To that end, the administration brought in an expert therapist with years of experience working with both children have been bullied, and ones doing the bullying. This past week, assemblies were held all day on Tuesday with all students from kindergarten on up to teach them strategies for protecting themselves and preventing future bullying.
The best part about this was that there was also a workshop held for parents to cover the same material, and understanding what to do and not to do if you discover your child is being bullied by another. The speaker was phenomenal, and very relatable. He gave some really practical advice on how to follow through on the training at home, as well as cautioning parents on what NOT to do should bullying become an issue for their child. The information actually transcends more than school students -- bullying, unfortunately, occurs all throughout our lives. It happens in our neighborhoods, our social circles, even the workplace. The speaker said it even occurs in nursing homes, and he wasn't kidding. Learning how to control our reactions to intimidating children (or adults) who perform verbal, physical, or social bullying is empowering to those on the receiving end of such abuse.
My husband and I both got a lot out of the session we attended. It made us feel good to know that there are things that can be done to stop and prevent bullying. And it reflects highly on the staff at the school that they take this widespread problem to heart and are working to do something about it.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
In search of the Holy Grail
God bless kindergarten teachers. Well, all teachers really. But God bless especially those teachers that have my child in their class. He's a high-energy, stop-at-nothing class clown that loves attention. He makes life interesting, no doubt. And I know it must be a real challenge to do your job with him as a student.
Over the years, children have been given grades on their behavior in school. It goes by several names.......conduct, citizenship, deportment, social development.....but it all boils down to the same thing. How does your kid behave in the school setting? Do they make good choices?
We are 6 weeks into the school year now and it's been a roller coaster ride to be sure. Justin's school uses something called a clip chart to track students' behavior throughout the day. It has five colors on it: blue, purple, green, yellow, and red. Everyone starts on green at the beginning of the day. It looks something like this one, except his doesn't have the orange level:
Students have the opportunity to move up or down the chart based upon the choices they make during the day. In addition to that, each child's take home folder has a chart in it where they color in a block with the corresponding color they ended on that day. Justin's spent a fair amount of time on the bottom half of the chart, although his good days have so far outnumbered the others. Every time he ends up on red, a note comes home discussing what occurred to land him there.
Most of the time, it seems as if Justin's struggles are that he just spends too much time talking when he shouldn't be. He doesn't raise his hand, he talks while the teacher is talking, he talks in the hallway, or quite often, he spends time chatting it up with his friends rather than doing his school work.
It's been really frustrating for us as parents. For me, in particular, because I just don't understand this type of behavior. I was a really shy kid growing up and I didn't misbehave in school. I had typical first child characteristics: I craved the approval of parents and teachers, and strived to do everything right. His dad was much the same way. We want so badly for our kids to do well and not struggle in school. It's as if some of our self-image as parents is tied into the behavior charts and the notes home, so it provided some comfort to me that one of my friends who also has a kindergartener was on the receiving end of this:
My sister saw this in the newspaper, and saved it for me. It probably sums up how Justin feels about the whole thing.
This last week ended on a particularly bad note for Justin, though. In addition to talking too much, he was deliberately breaking crayons, taking his classmates' papers, and then bragging that he wasn't going to have to move his clip because he can "do whatever he wants".
After that performance, his dad and I decided that part of his penance should include writing a note of apology to his teacher.
We also thought it appropriate that Justin give up a few privileges over the weekend. It included giving up his Nintendo DS, playing on the Wii, and watching TV. I did tell Justin, however, that if he behaved himself well, he'd have the opportunity to earn some of those things back. Around 1:00 on Saturday afternoon, he looked out the window and said, "When will it get dark?" He's noticed the days getting shorter, so I naturally assumed he was concerned there wasn't much daylight left. I assured him that it wouldn't get dark for several hours yet. To my surprise, he groaned. I said, "What's the matter?" He said, "How much longer do I have to be good?!" I guess he was looking for permission to lose his sense of decorum for a little while. It must be so hard to be five years old and have your whole day stretched out in front of you, confronted with the daunting task of having to be GOOD!
I suppose I need to find a balance between my own feelings of embarrassment, my struggle to figure out the best way to parent this issue, and understanding how much of what is happening is just Justin learning to navigate school. I know he will eventually get it - or at least I hope so. But proper classroom behavior seems to be a problem as old as time. Googling "I will not talk in class" renders images of blackboards with that sentence on them multiple times. This one reminds me so much of Justin:
It's going to be quite the year. I might as well ask my doctor for the prescription for Valium now.
Over the years, children have been given grades on their behavior in school. It goes by several names.......conduct, citizenship, deportment, social development.....but it all boils down to the same thing. How does your kid behave in the school setting? Do they make good choices?
We are 6 weeks into the school year now and it's been a roller coaster ride to be sure. Justin's school uses something called a clip chart to track students' behavior throughout the day. It has five colors on it: blue, purple, green, yellow, and red. Everyone starts on green at the beginning of the day. It looks something like this one, except his doesn't have the orange level:
Students have the opportunity to move up or down the chart based upon the choices they make during the day. In addition to that, each child's take home folder has a chart in it where they color in a block with the corresponding color they ended on that day. Justin's spent a fair amount of time on the bottom half of the chart, although his good days have so far outnumbered the others. Every time he ends up on red, a note comes home discussing what occurred to land him there.
Most of the time, it seems as if Justin's struggles are that he just spends too much time talking when he shouldn't be. He doesn't raise his hand, he talks while the teacher is talking, he talks in the hallway, or quite often, he spends time chatting it up with his friends rather than doing his school work.
It's been really frustrating for us as parents. For me, in particular, because I just don't understand this type of behavior. I was a really shy kid growing up and I didn't misbehave in school. I had typical first child characteristics: I craved the approval of parents and teachers, and strived to do everything right. His dad was much the same way. We want so badly for our kids to do well and not struggle in school. It's as if some of our self-image as parents is tied into the behavior charts and the notes home, so it provided some comfort to me that one of my friends who also has a kindergartener was on the receiving end of this:
My sister saw this in the newspaper, and saved it for me. It probably sums up how Justin feels about the whole thing.
This last week ended on a particularly bad note for Justin, though. In addition to talking too much, he was deliberately breaking crayons, taking his classmates' papers, and then bragging that he wasn't going to have to move his clip because he can "do whatever he wants".
After that performance, his dad and I decided that part of his penance should include writing a note of apology to his teacher.
We also thought it appropriate that Justin give up a few privileges over the weekend. It included giving up his Nintendo DS, playing on the Wii, and watching TV. I did tell Justin, however, that if he behaved himself well, he'd have the opportunity to earn some of those things back. Around 1:00 on Saturday afternoon, he looked out the window and said, "When will it get dark?" He's noticed the days getting shorter, so I naturally assumed he was concerned there wasn't much daylight left. I assured him that it wouldn't get dark for several hours yet. To my surprise, he groaned. I said, "What's the matter?" He said, "How much longer do I have to be good?!" I guess he was looking for permission to lose his sense of decorum for a little while. It must be so hard to be five years old and have your whole day stretched out in front of you, confronted with the daunting task of having to be GOOD!
I suppose I need to find a balance between my own feelings of embarrassment, my struggle to figure out the best way to parent this issue, and understanding how much of what is happening is just Justin learning to navigate school. I know he will eventually get it - or at least I hope so. But proper classroom behavior seems to be a problem as old as time. Googling "I will not talk in class" renders images of blackboards with that sentence on them multiple times. This one reminds me so much of Justin:
It's going to be quite the year. I might as well ask my doctor for the prescription for Valium now.
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