Discipline Rules

Yesterday should have been a total suckfest, but it wasn't half-bad, as it turned out.  I had back-to-back meetings at the elementary school, and I have to say, hooray for teachers.  And, dare I say it?  Hooray for administrators.  These people just could not do enough for my kids.  They were bending over backwards to help like they were Nadia Freaking Comaneci.  Maybe somebody put Prozac in the coffee, I don't know.

Homebound schooling set up for the Peanut Butter Kid: check.  Gifted program included: check.  Entire team totally impressed because the PBK was doing second-grade-level math during our meeting: check.  

Then I mentioned my next meeting with the fourth grade teachers to deal with the Pork Lo Maniac's fine motor skill delay.  I was encouraged to set up a 504 Plan, and enthusiastic suggestions were made as to various accommodations that would help my daughter with homework, test taking, and classwork.  Yay, yay, oh yay.  Then I saw the teachers and they were all how can we help right now?

So I was all kinds of happy and excited, even though sitting in those munchkin-sized chairs for a formal meeting is the weirdest thing ever.  But then as I was leaving I saw my friend's daughter fourth-grade daughter crying.  And another boy being hauled into the front office for kidney-punching the girl in the back. 

The girl is my older daughters' best friend in Texas.  And her mom is my only Texas friend, Peggy Sue.  Peggy Sue's daughter is one of those girls that everyone wants to be friends with not because she wears the coolest clothes, but because she is kind and smart and fun.  

(Note: No one in our school wears the coolest clothes, because everyone wears a uniform.  Which I love.  Except the part about tucking in the shirts.  The shirt-tucking is enforced like nothing I have seen outside of the U.S. Armed Forces.  In the morning before we leave school, I tell the kids, "make sure you have the keys to learning," and they all check their shirts.)

(Another Note: I just image-googled "shirt tucked in" to look for graphics to illustrate this post.  You know what I found?  A boatload of images of guns that you can hide even with your shirt tucked in.  So I just totally figured out why schools want the shirts tucked in.  But now I'm even more baffled by the fact that our school district has a uniform policy for elementary school, but not for the upper grades.  But then again, it's Texas.  Maybe you're just expected to be carrying by the time you're in high school.)

(I will stop with the notes now.)

Anyway, that whole bullying scene kind of broke my heart and turned my day back into the original suckfest I had been expecting when I woke up too early with a tension headache.  Because you know what?  Sometimes I feel like this whole world is going to hell in a handbasket.  My friend and her husband are going in for a meeting tomorrow to find out what the school's action plan is.  I hope it has the words "Shock and Awe" somewhere in it.  And also the word Suspension.  And maybe the words School for Bad Kids, which is what my kids call Juvie.

At dinner we got into a whole discussion about school rules.  The Peanut Butter Kid summed up appropriate school behavior with "You have to behave nicely.  And you can have fun, but not too much fun."

I asked the kids what they would do about the bully if they were in charge of the school.  It turns out my kids are even more strict than me.  Here are their answers:

Peanut Butter Kid: "I would send him back to pre-school so he can learn how to behave at school."

Little Dude: "NO!  I don't want him in my class!  He needs a TIME OUT."

Cookie: "I would suspend him for five days.  That would be nice because then everyone in my class would get a break from him for five days."


Pork Lo Maniac: "I would suspend him for five days and then put him back in third grade."

Cookie: "That might actually be helpful.  He isn't doing very well in school and it's only the fourth day."

Pork Lo Maniac: "That's not a very good start to the school year.  If he does anything else they need to send him to the School for Bad Kids."

Cookie: "Can you imagine what he's going to be like when he's a teenager?"

Pork Lo Maniac: "Yeah.  How come teenagers don't walk on the sidewalk?  Why do they think it is cool to walk in the street?"

Peanut Butter Kid: "He's going to be a criminal.  And have to go to jail."

Little Dude: "I don't want him in my class.  Send him to time out in jail."

They're like the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland.  Off with his head!  They also clearly subscribe to the the Not In My Backyard Class school of thought.  I can't say I blame them.  I'm sure this kid has all kinds of problems, and I hope that the school can give him counseling.  But I don't love that he's in my daughter's class, causing problems and kidney-punching girls.