Tuesday, September 16, 2014

The Perfectionist and the Fun Kid.

In every group of friends there is the one that follows the rules and tries to keep the others out of trouble. He is the one that tows the line, is his own worst critic, and is a pleaser. He doesn't want to disappoint anyone.

And then there's the kid who is always shouting, "Hey, y'all! Watch this!"

We have one of each in our family.


At the boys' school they have a system for discipline that produces a positive reinforcement for good behavior. Each class is different in how they carry this out. Last year, the talk was all about "bugs" for James. Each child had a bug jar and if you misbehaved a bug was removed from your bug jar and you lost a stamp on your hand at the end of the day. I proudly bragged that James only lost TWO all year long. And one of those two produced such crying that you would have thought someone had died.

Will's class has implemented the same system this year, but I think they use monsters. The first few weeks his teachers have taught them how to sit quietly at circle time, how to behave around friends, and how to walk quietly in the hallway. It isn't a perfect system, but it does give them some guidelines for behaving at school.

So here's where the Perfectionist and the Fun Kid come in. Do you think you can guess who is who?

There's James, who only lost two bugs the WHOLE YEAR last year. And then there's Will who by September 16th (a mere MONTH into school) has already lost EIGHT monsters/stamps/whatever. EIGHT.

Last week as I laid him down for his nap after he'd lost all three in one morning (he did that again today), he looked at me and BATTED HIS EYELASHES as he said, "Mama, you yike me?" Batted his eyelashes. He KNOWS.

If you need me, I'll be covering up my gray hair and looking for new wrinkle cream. I fear that this is only the beginning for the "Fun Kid" and his schemes. Maybe I should bake cookies and brownies for the office staff in school at the beginning of each year, huh?

2 comments:

Anna Catherine said...

I got mad at Lance last night and he said, "Nanya, you yike me?" Even the big boys use this tactic!

Unknown said...

Consider yourself lucky, you got one of each, I got three "Hey ya'll watch this!" I'm surprised I'm not covered in grays yet! ;)