defiance girl

[flea]

We're having trouble with Casper at school. Last week she got in trouble in her classroom when Mrs. B was at a meeting and there was a sub. She wouldn't listen and ended up having to sit in a chair, their version of "time out." mr. flea had a talk with Mrs. B the next day (Friday) and learned that Casper had also been physical with some classmates. mr. flea was pretty concerned about this and had a serious talk with Casper in the hallway about not headbutting people.

I went to Open School night Monday in part to touch base with Mrs. B about this issue, although since Casper was there I felt I couldn't speak too openly about it. But Mrs. B said that Casper had had good days Friday and Monday.

Today Mrs. S the music teacher called mr. flea to say that Casper wouldn't tidy up the materials with the rest of her classmates at the end of class. Instead she way lying on the floor and rolling around. Mrs. S said she spoke privately to Casper about this both yesterday and today. (Obviously it didn't take yesterday!)

Casper also basically ate no lunch Monday or Tuesday, unless she bought lunch from the cafeteria which she is not supposed to do. Unfortunately there is no way to prevent her buying lunch; the system is set up so that anyone can choose to go through the lunch line, and if they have no money on the account the parents are billed. I think it's not appropriate to let 4 year olds choose to buy lunch, which is usually things considered 'treats' in our family, like pizza, chicken nuggets, etc. But I did not design the system and have no control over it. The whole reason we send her lunch is because I think the cafeteria lunches are not healthy. Monday night I had Casper help me make her lunch, hoping that by allowing her to choose what was in it and make it herself she would then eat it. Didn't work.

Mrs. S. implied to mr. flea that we are too lax in our parenting; she seems like kind of a law and order type. When Casper doesn't want to do something at home, we try to negotiate a compromise. If we are unable to - if it's something where there is no compromise position - Casper has a tendency to throw a fit. We put her in her room to calm down (stop screaming) when this happens. I don't think we're being ridiculously lax, although god knows we aren't disciplinarians.

Anyone have thoughts on how to handle the issue of disobedience at school? Casper is 4 and a quarter; she's among the youngest in her class, but Mrs. S at least doesn't think it's an immaturity issue - more a testing of boundaries. I plan to have a chat with Mrs. B by phone tonight if possible, so see if she has any suggestions on how we can reinforce listening and cooperating at school.

Are we raising this kind wrong? Is she too wild? Is it our fault, or is this who she is?

Comments

[mearagrrl.livejournal.com]

That does seem odd on the lunch business--one thing to allow it if the kid forgets/doesn't get lunch, but you'd think they'd have to like, get an OK from someone.

Otherwise, I got nothing but "good luck", not having any parenting experience of my own.