Category: Ah, me boys

So here’s a question for you: what do you do when you disagree with the unofficial policies of your child’s school?

Today’s question is inspired in part by a note that came home yesterday insisting all students must wear splash or wind pants in the school yard or be kept inside at recess. This is the first I’ve heard of this requirement, and I have neither the resources nor, frankly, the inclination to try to find splash pants for all three of them. Midweek, no less. And spending $20 plus, multiplied by three, for something they’ll wear for a week or two does not appeal to me either. I sent a note back to the school to that effect, and each boy packed a pair of dry pants as a concilliatory gesture and “just in case” measure – but I trust them enough to believe that when they promise to stay out of the mud and puddles, they will do so.

To me, this gets into the grey area between school rules and parenting. I sympathize with the school’s desire to keep the muck and mud outside, but if they’re going to make splash pants mandatory, I’d like more than a day’s notice. An example that slips even further outside the zone of school responsibility, IMHO, was the time last fall when one boy had a piece of candy taken away the day after Halloween. A note came home saying the teachers did not feel that amount of sugar was appropriate for a morning snack. (In my defense, I had ALSO packed a piece of fruit. And I didn’t realize that Beloved had also slipped a piece of candy into each child’s lunch box, in addition to the treat I’d permitted. Regardless, I truly believe that unless I am packing varsol-filled thermoses and asbestos sandwiches, the school has no right to judge or interfere with what I put in their lunch boxes.)

I’m leery to even talk about these examples on the blog because I adore the boys’ school and the staff. I think they’re hard-working and kind and we’re lucky to be part of such a great community. But I’m curious as to how you handle these types of conflict because I am torn. For the most part, I’m happy to follow the rules even when I disagree with them and think it’s important that the kids see me respecting authority. Rules are in place for a good reason – most of the time. However, another part of me wonders if there isn’t value in teaching them to question authority when authority clearly oversteps its bounds (as I believe it has, in these two examples at least.) And finally, a part of me worries that causing trouble will somehow make the kids’ relationship with their teachers and school authorities more difficult than it should be or has to be. I don’t want them to be labled as troublemakers, even if by proxy.

(FWIW, I think the splash pants rule is maybe more acceptable for the littlest kids. I will continue to send Lucas in his ski pants, partly because he goes in the morning when it’s still cool and partly because I don’t think a four-year-old has the same ability to resist a puddle that a nine- or eleven-year-old might have.)

So what do you think? Would you let these things go or speak up? For the candy incident, I let it go. It was a well-intentioned action, even if it left me feeling judged and more than a little annoyed. For the splash pants, I simply can’t comply but I tried to offer up a reasonable compromise. Do you think there is value in talking back when you disagree with unofficial policies and rules like this, or is it better for community harmony to shrug it off and comply?

(Edited to add: in no way is this post intended to reflect poorly on the boys’ school or its administration. They have a difficult role balancing many competing priorities and I have nothing but respect and even affection for them. Even if I disagree with an occasional policy or two, I can’t say enough nice things about how lucky we are to be a part of such a great community and this post was in no way meant to be critical of them. I used these examples simply to illustrate a larger issue that I think many parents face, regardless of which school their children attend.)

Tap, tap, tap… testing? Is this thing on? You guys still out there? Oy, life. Sometimes I think mine is a little too full for my own good. As Martha says, though, it’s a good thing.

We had parent-teacher interviews last week. The boys’ progress reports were stellar and I wasn’t particularly worried about anything, but I always like to touch base face-to-face. This time last year, I was visiting one boy’s classroom to discuss with his teacher the ‘not satisfactory’ and ‘satisfactory’ he was getting in some of the behaviour areas — apparently he was of the opinion that if he didn’t feel like doing what was asked of him, he could disengage from the activity completely. He would also put in just barely the amount of work required to complete a task, instead of doing it to the best of his ability. He’d been having a rough time since changing schools the year before, but knowing how easily the academic part of school was coming to him (his grades have always been strong), I was rather alarmed (to say the least) to see these behavioural issues crop up and escalate through the year.

This time last year, his teacher and I worked together to explain to Boy in Question that his job is school, and he pretty much has to suck it up and do his job. (I love a teacher who takes no crap, I really do. She is awesome!) Through the year we noted steady improvement, but I was still elated to see on this year’s progress report nothing but ‘excellent’ in all categories. There’s a boy who has found his groove!

Anyway, happy as I was with ‘excellent’ across the board (and his brother not far off that mark), I still thought it prudent to touch base with the teachers. The boys’ teachers seem to genuinely like them and offered positive and constructive feedback that generally amounted to “great kids, no worries.” Phew!

My favourite comment was this. Obviously struggling for something more meaningful and perhaps more critical, the teacher paused for a moment before shrugging and saying, “Sometimes he eats his snack a little too early.”

I blog this not to brag, but to file away for future reference. The road is not always this smooth, and I am grateful with my whole heart for days like these, for boys like these, for this life of ours. Sometimes it’s good to celebrate when we get it right.

And we’ll work on his early snacking issues, too. Because a person needs goals, right?

For a while, it felt like our dirty little secret. Somehow, we’d managed to avoid getting my middlest son up on two wheels even though he’s now in the third grade, and I took it as an entirely personal parenting failure.

It wasn’t for lack of trying. We’d been encouraging him to get up on two wheels for years, but he was anxious and resistant and I never felt it was worthwhile to push him. I didn’t want to turn it into a power struggle or a thing for him, so we just kind of let it drift. Last summer we scoured the city for an appropriately-sized bike with training wheels on it (try finding a bike with training wheels for a 60 lbs kid some time!) and then removed the training wheels within a month. The boy was stressed every time we tried to get him rolling, though, and had a tumble or two and lost interest.

Every couple of weeks, we’d go back to it and try again with different approaches. For a while, I told him to just scooch around with his feet on the ground to get the feel of balancing on the bike, but he kept banging his shins on the pedals. It was turning in to a big deal, and I chose not to stress him out over something so simple, especially considering he was completely happy to putter around on a scooter instead. It doesn’t help that for living on an island, there sure are a lot of hills around our place. (I suppose the fact that the nearest intersection is called Hilltop should have given it away?) Between the death-defying slope of the driveway and the fact that the road slopes rather alarmingly after a couple dozen meters in either direction (let alone the blind curve just up the street), we never had a lot of room for him to practice without supervision.

But it bothered me. I’d see other kids riding their bikes and feel a pang of guilty regret. A boy in the second grade should be able to ride a bike, no? So when spring broke this summer, I was filled with new resolve and a reservoir of patience. This year, we’d get him up on two wheels. And that’s when his new bike broke. Something in the gears jammed up and the pedals wouldn’t turn. And in the way it sometimes happens with busy families, getting it fixed slid right off the priority list.

Still, the idea that he was not yet able to ride a two-wheeler bothered me. My eldest boy and I started taking bike rides together this summer, and while I was able to justify it as a priviledge for an older child, I still felt guilty. My middle boy did not seem particularly disturbed, probably because he’s a lot less inclined to adventure and activity than his older brother anyway. But with a littlest brother graduating from a tricycle to a two-wheeler with training wheels, I saw trouble brewing on the horizon.

All that to say, I was worried in a kind of distracted way about the fact that my boy had reached the ripe old age of eight without being able to ride his bike without training wheels. I’d worried about the other boys in other late-blooming ways, but was able to reassure myself that the youngest would not, in fact, still be gently sucking his soother as he spent his first night in a university dorm. I was not so sure that my middlest would not still be scooching along on a ten-speed with training wheels on his way to and from high school. Could it be possible that some children never learn to ride a bike? I was afraid we might be about to find out.

And then, miraculously, it happened out of the blue. Wee elves must have broken into the garage over the last few weeks, because the bike gears became magically unjammed when we poked at the bike yesterday. (Seriously, that’s what must have happened. I certainly don’t have the ability to do more than replace a fallen-off chain!) And so we decided on the spot to give it another go.

I honestly don’t know who was more surprised, me or the boy, when he wobbled off down the road, picking up speed and grace by the meter, leaving me cheering behind him. We practiced for a while longer, pinging back and forth between the blind curve and the steep slope, ever grateful that we live on a quiet street where people are always on the lookout for kids. And he rode merrily back and forth without my help, clearly as surprised and pleased with his newfound balance as I was.

I’m so proud. And relieved! And I think we’ve got a few good weeks of decent weather left, to start enjoying those family bike rides at last.