This morning at playgroup I asked one of the moms who is a teacher about bullying. This has been a topic on our moms group list-serve and I was surprised that no one had suggested talking with the parents to handle the situation. I wasn't sure if you weren't supposed to do that or if I had missed an email where the mom explained that either she already had talked to the other mom or had chosen not to for a specific reason. Turns out it was the latter. However, my friend did say that a lot of times parents don't want to hear that their child is being a bully.
You probably know where this one is going. Immediately I swore to myself that I was never going be one of "those" parents who didn't want to hear that her child was less than perfect. I mentally scoffed at those parents. Then I went to pick up my older son (OS) from preschool.
After unclipping his backpack and strapping him into his booster seat, I opened up his backpack and noticed a note from his teacher. It contained a printed list of things to do to improve fine motor skills. At the top was a sentence from the teacher suggesting that OS do some of them. I felt myself getting defensive. OS didn't have a problem with his fine motor skills! His skills are just fine. He's four not fourteen! There's no reason that being a little behind in fine motor skills should cause someone to almost fail art class and thus be in danger of repeating second grade. Oh wait a minute, that was me! Who exactly was I talking about? I silently said my little mantra "I am not my child, my child is not me".
I still felt a little indignant. Then I remembered that only seconds earlier I had found myself questioning whether OS may have a little difficulty with fine motor skills. After all, he cannot strap himself into his booster seat with his seatbelt, and he cannot easily clip the straps of his backpack across his chest, much less unclip them. While his teacher had mentioned to me that she still has to help some of the kids in the class, most of them can do these things themselves. OS is one of the youngest in the class...though. Hmm...apparently I just can't get past this art class. It probably is a good idea to do some Crafts for the Clueless-worthy activities follow some of the suggestions from the worksheet. Of course I left a message for the teacher to to discuss it.
A. Elliot's Lesson Learned:You are not your child-repeat after me.
I can identify with this. I get all defensive when given suggestions of what to do to help my kids. I don't know why I take it that way. I suppose I'm thinking it's a reflection of me.
Good mantra...I think I need to start repeating that to myself.
Hey Alex... You aren't your child, but the small motor thing can have genetic components. It's not a big deal for OS, but if he doesn't balk at trying the exercises, why not? OTOH, sometimes preschool teachers forget differences between boys and girls - and there's no doubt the girls trump the boys (generally speaking) in small motor skills in that age group.
It's hard not to be initially defensive. I mean it is your baby after all. I think many of us have the inclination to get defensive when we receive criticisms about our children. We want to believe that our children are truly perfect. (or that we are the only ones who can point out their shortcomings)
So I have this great book at Jen of a2eatwrite suggested to me that has activities for kids 0-5. Email me and I'll send you some descriptions of motor skills building games for OS's age range.:)
Professional Mom of two cats, a dog, an ant farm, and oh yeah...two boys: a 4.5 year old and a 2 year old. Also found in my house is my husband who is known on this blog as The Big Giraffe.
For those of us who didn't get an instruction manual with our babies and for whom parenting hasn't always gone as planned. On a more serious note this blog is about supporting a woman's ability to make her own choices about parenting including the choice, for whatever reason, to bottle feed her babies formula.
The magazines that both boys get monthly, probably have activities that would be of benefit.