We were mistaken. I find that being a teacher and sending your child to school is difficult. Well, maybe that is making an assumption that is not true. Maybe any parent, teacher or not has a difficult time sending their child to school. The reason it is difficult for me is that I have expectations. Not overally rigid expectations, but expectations.
The little guy started mid January, and it was just not a good fit. He had just turned 3 and is what I consider a young 3. His teacher, who I am sure has good qualities, just did not bond with him. Every day we were met with a negative, and the negatives were kind of comical after awhile. The lastest was during my parent teacher conference. She said I really needed to work on my son touching other children. I asked what kind of touch she was referring to and she said he was coming up to the kids and putting his hand on their chest. I said "Well do you think that since this is a speech communications classroom that he might be trying to communicate and that maybe you could teach him a sign or words to use when he wants to communicate with the other children." She then told me they had a no touching policy in the classroom. Not that the teacher could not touch the children, but that the children could not touch each other. I could not help it, I laughed. I am all for hands are for hugging, and helping not hurting, but no touch among preschool children at all is just so sad.
My son's first interactions with other children outside of the orphanage were difficult. He was frightened of them. We then got to where he was intereseted in them, and recently he has been starting to engage with them, always gentle. To accomplish all this and then be in an environment where it is discouraged and "problomatic" breaks my heart. Needless to say..... he won't be returning to that classroom. I want our son to know he is wonderful. I am always open to hearing areas for improvement, but if a teacher can not find the beauty in a child, then it is not really the child's fault. Even children who have given my eye twitches (true story) steal my heart at times.
It sounds as if you came to the right decision for you. Hands are for hugging...not for a no touching policy! Especially at that age. Oh my it sounds like things have been trying. I remember the good old "unsafe" days where seat belts were for keeping kids from jumping over the seats at inopportune times.
ReplyDeleteOh that just makes me sigh...sounds like you made a good move taking him from the class.
ReplyDeleteHe looks very sweet in his ski outfit.
You worked so hard at getting him to be comfortable with other children and were successful. Then to have him in a classroom where his overtures are being criticized and discouraged. How incredibly disappointing. I too would have been expecting something different from a good speech and language preschool classroom. Your son, by the way, is absolutely adorable.
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