11/04/2011

The Player.



During zj's second week of school I got a note from the teacher.

It read:

"Zj is having trouble keeping his hands to himself.  I have spoken to him about this several times, and I hope you will, too."

I gave zj a cursory "Remember not to touch the other kids, ok?  Your teacher sent a note home about it.  You'll do better, right?"

"Right, Mama."

Ok, whew.   First school discipline problem averted.

A couple weeks later, I got another note.

"Zj is still struggling with keeping his hands off the other students."

So this time, I actually decided to do a bit of parenting -I didn't have anything else going on that day -  and find out what was going on.  

ME: "Zj, your teacher sent home another note about touching the other students.  What's going on?"

ZJ: "Well, I try not to, but sometimes I can't help it."

ME: "I understand it's hard to be still sometimes, but you might be making the other boys and girls uncomfortable if you keep touching them."

ZJ: "But Mama, she said I could."

Hmmm... It turns out he was only touching ONE student.  Her name was Ginny, and she had "long yellow hair."  He liked to touch her hair because it was so soft.

The yellow-hairs will get you in trouble every time.  Trollops.

A few weeks later, zj came home from school announcing "a couple kids tried to rip him into two pieces at recess time."  My mind immediately went to bullying and mistreatment and such so I began grilling him about the details.  I had to put my considerable interrogation techniques to work, but I finally figured out that he was being fought over by two little girls in his class, each of whom wanted him to play with her exclusively.

Awesome.

Last week, after zj got home from school and I was cleaning out his bag, I found a picture - made with markers, which are pretty much OUTLAWED in the kindergarten classroom - that was covered with hearts and J's and 6's.   When I asked him about it, he said it was a note from a girl in his class.  "Which girl?" I asked.  "I can't remember her name, Mama.  There are A LOT of girls in my class, you know." he replied.  Oh.  Of course there are.

Then yesterday when I picked him up from the bus, before I could even get out a "HiHowWasYourDay?" he greeted me with this:  "I have to take a silly band to school for Josie because hers broke and she made me pinkie swear that I would bring her one.  Hers was a pink flower. Pink is Josie's favorite color.  And she likes flowers."

Ummm, ok.

So I went through the entire "You're not supposed to take toys to school you might have to face consequences for this I'm not sure this is a good idea" litany.  Zj's response?  "Mama.  It was a PINKY SWEAR."   Well, there's that then.  Pinky swear trumps everything.

I put him on the bus this morning, pink flower silly band firmly on his wrist, with strict instructions about not getting into trouble with it, etc., etc., yada, yada, yada.  

I asked him about it first thing this afternoon.  "Did Josie like her silly band?"

"Oh.  Another girl on the bus saw it and told me she liked it.  So I gave it to her instead.  But it's ok.  Josie isn't mad.  I sat by her at lunch, so she forgave me."

If this is what five is like, I'm not going to survive six.  Or sixteen.  Heaven help us all.



 

1 comment:

Pin It button on image hover