Bud Floorwalker and other tales
House on Red Corner · 2010-01-11 · Eckenrode
Our toddling boy, we transverse far distances by himself. He will turn around and come back or turn around again and continue happily stomping off. He falls, boom. He gets back up and off he goes again.
I had started this post a week ago, but then something happened. Our house turned upside down and our eldest, who had been a well behaved and communicative young lady turned into this horrible monster. She started chewing on our skulls trying to get to our brains, she clawed our eyes out and nibble on the nerves that were holding them in place. Basically, we experienced a violent regression which stemmed from her not wanting to go back to school. There was wetting of clothes several times a day and refusal to answer any questions.
We spoke to the School’s Social Worker because this was a trend we saw coming before the holiday break, but the end of the week I had an appointment with the Teacher.
That did not go well.
TheBubster hid in the closet when the Teacher spoke to her. Everything the Teacher told me had teh affect of, “Well, she’ll adjust…” or “She’ll change…” When we had been teaching our child to make decisions in her life; big decisions sometimes; several times a day, and suddenly she is in this place where its only what the Teacher says and only when the Teacher says, there was bound to be some revolt.
What did it for me was this story the Teacher told me about an exercise which was about teaching the kids to follow directions. The kids were going to learn how to draw a bear, TheBubster did not pay any attention to what was happening for half of the exercise, and when she was corrected, she looked at what the other kids were doing, and drew a bear. The Teacher said, “And you can’t tell from looking at her picture that she didn’t do the exercise.”
TheBubster is four. She wants to sit and read books. She wants to sit and read books. She won’t take a nap at naptime because that is the only time they will let her sit and read. She wants to play. She wants to paint and draw and basically be a kid while she is learning. We have fostered that in her by sending her to Montessori and Emilio Reggio style Schools. When the Teacher complained that TheBubster “wants what she wants when she wants it,” she was complaining about something we encourage in our child.
TheBubster will not return to that school. If we have to teach her ourselves, we will, however being that this is New York City, someplace with a population greater than the entire state of Connecticut, we will be able to find ourselves a nice little school that has the same sort of philosophy and that we all fit into, especially TheBubster.
Bud is still walking and has not stopped since he decided it was time to start.