Tricky Discipline

Monday morning when I came down to my kitchen to the chaos that is my kids getting breakfast and lunches made before school, Trout left some papers for me. On top was the school newsletter about what was coming up that week, but below it was a letter from her, with a note from her teacher on the back, and Trout told me as I entered the kitchen, "Oh, yeah, Mom, there's something you need to sign." It wasn't just "something."  Names have been changed to protect the guilty:

Dear Mom,

I am sorry I did not meet and follow [Elementary School's] standards. I did not meet these standards because I was siber-bullying people by writing notes to Lisa that were mean and nasty, and I know I shouldn't have done that. I should have been not writing notes at all. And if I did, I should have only said kind things. Next time I will remember to not say mean things about people, appecialy siber-bullying by writing notes.

Sincerely,

Trout

On the back, her teacher noted that "Trout used very inappropriate language in her letter. Calling other students the F word, B word, and A-hole. I was very surprised by this. Thank you, Trout's teacher."

Oh no she dint.

 I looked her dead in the eye, and ever so quietly said "You are in big trouble, young lady. Your father and I will take a while to devise an appropriate punishment, but rest assured, it will be severe. Not just for what you did, but because you waited until Monday morning instead of telling us about it Friday afternoon."

"I know, Mom," is all she said.

After some discussion, we found out she had been passing notes to her friend Lisa, and in those notes she was venting about the behavior of a couple of boys who are in her class and who have been harassing her for some time, one by continually giving her the finger, and the other who has ADHD and has annoyed the stuff out of her for years now. The note was spotted by a substitute teacher, who confiscated it and turned it over to the regular teacher when she returned. I wrote a note of apology to her teacher, assured her we were shocked and disappointed, as well, and that we would be dealing with it.

Then we sat down with Trout to enumerate her infractions. One of us is the "this is wrong on principle" parents, and the other, well, the other is ... more of a realist, I guess. That parent isn't bothered by this at all, for the most part. See if you can figure out which infraction was detailed by which parent:

1. She passed notes in class.
2. She passed notes in class while a substitute was in charge, which reflected poorly on her regular teacher, who she quite likes.
3. She complained about other students in those notes in a manner that wasn't kind.
4. She used inappropriate language while doing so.
5. She is not just a Safety Patrol but a Patrol Captain, and better than average behavior is expected of her.
6. The note she wrote to me to tell me what she'd done had grammatical errors in it.
7. She got caught.

We made her write her own note of apology to her teacher. I made her rewrite the note home using correct grammar and spelling. And we grounded her for the entire month of March, not so much for what she did in the first place, but for not telling us about it for the entire weekend. We see that as a form of lying, and we've always been clear that not being honest with us will result in consequences that are orders of magnitude worse than whatever it was that they'd done in the first place. We also corrected her on the meaning of cyber-bullying, and how you can't really do that without a computer, and reminded her that the child with ADHD really can't help the way he is, and I expect her to have more compassion and understanding, which we've talked about many times.

We also told her how disappointed we were - that she is smart, and we expect her to use far more creativity in complaining about other students. Using profanity is totally unnecessary and beneath her.

And for Pete's sake, next time, don't get caught.

 

Comments

[David Blackstone]

Did you do another redesign? It's pretty. :-)

[hokgardner]

Your last line made me snort my coffee, and now my sinuses are burning.

We've told our kids that lying is the worst, too. My oldest is beginning to catch on, but the second is still clueless. Even when presented with evidence of her misbehavior, she'll stick to her lie, no matter what.