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Photo by Matteo Mazzoni Creative Commons License

On a particularly stinky day in your life – how do you cope? Is it under the covers with a pint of the newest Ben & Jerry’s? Hot bath with music? A cocktail (or 12)?

Our children emulate our behavior, we all know that. Have you considered that your children will also imitate how you deal with stress?

A child’s stress may seem meaningless when compared to yours; losing the kickball tournament versus not being able to pay the mortgage. But stress is relative to the person feeling it. You might be able to cope quite well with a cash shortfall this month where your 3rd grader might literally lose sleep about the kickball tournament.

Be Aware of How You Display Your Coping Skills to Your Children

Imagine for a moment that your child is now a grown adult with his or her own family and children. Now superimpose *your* coping skills on that image. If you’re picturing your little one coming home and: slamming cabinet doors and shouting (anger), pouring several drinks (soothing with alcohol), or sulking in the corner (emotional withdrawal) then you might need an attitude adjustment – at least for the benefit of your children.

For good or bad, our children will try to emulate us. At least in the beginning (0-8 years old) we serve as the primary example for our little ones. They want to be like us; sometimes dressing up in mom’s heels or carrying around a briefcase like dad.

Do you really want your sweet baby to carry around your marginally effective and generally socially unacceptable coping skills?

Attitude Adjustment

If your modus operandi is sulking and it’s hard to overcome, then at least let your kids know what’s going on. In the absence of guiding information, they could blame themselves for your behavior or even worse consider themselves in control of your happiness.

Try these:

• Sweetie, I’ve had a bit of a tough day and I’m trying to figure out how to solve a problem with work – so if I’m a bit quiet it just means that I’m thinking really hard.
• I’m feeling grumpy so I’m going to take a walk to see if I can shake it off. Would you like to come with me?
• Something that happened at work today really disappointed me and I feel a little sad. I’m going to have to work a little extra hard tonight to make it better. I just wanted you to understand why we need to wait until tomorrow to watch your favorite movie.

It’s Their Childhood

As a parent you’re going to freak out about any myriad of things. Emotions aren’t bad – on the contrary; explaining how you’re feeling (in an age appropriate way : low on the details) gives your children permission to explain to you when they’re feeling angry or disappointed. In addition, you’re helping your child develop empathy for your feelings and the feelings of others.

If you can’t control yourself inwardly – then at a minimum fake it until they go to bed. Your emotions and behavior color the sense a child has about their own childhood. I never want my children to say: My mom was always angry.

Now It’s Your Turn

Have you caught yourself using a “less than admirable” coping mechanism in front of your child? Has your toddler imitated you in a way that was equally horrifying, disappointing, and hysterical? Share, share – I want to hear it!!

Other Related Posts

• Parenting May Cost You Friendships OR Circle the Wagons – This is Really Hard!
• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle

Photographer: James Thompson - Creative Commons License

During the settlement of the old west in the United States,when the pioneers were under attack they “circled the wagons”.

This incredibly visual term refers to the act of taking up a defensive posture along with like minded individuals against an external force of some kind. The wagons were pulled into a circle : the strength of the combined group becomes greater than the sum of its parts.

Listen To Parents of Older Children

I was having a conversation with a friend of mine – one of those moms that I have a lot of respect for. I would categorize her children as “nice kids”. Not in an Eddie Haskel way (blech) – in a sincerely, genuinely “nice kid” way. They do well in school, behave well, and are respectful to adults. Win-win-win.

So I was a bit surprised when she shared a story about her daughter’s experience at “band camp”. For all those “American Pie” fans – go ahead and get it out of your system. If you haven’t seen American Pie, don’t – you might never let your daughter near a flute again….

This woman has a lovely 8th grade daughter who attended a band camp with middle schoolers and high schoolers (who came up with that brilliant mix?). Apparently, the kids sat in a circle one night and compared notes on their vast collective sexual, alcohol, and drug experience. (By the way a significant amount of alcohol is being supplied by parents.)

To the child’s credit – she came home more than a bit horrified to share the experience with her mom – who in turn, tried desperately to NOT vomit on her shoes. I tried not to vomit on my own shoes as I heard the retelling of the story.

Your Friends Don’t Parent the Same Way that You Do – Now What?

As your children go through the elementary school years and are on the cusp on tween-age and teenage years you may find that the families who were part of your social circle may need to change.Generally, we accept the social circles we find ourselves in by default: the soccer families, the gymnastic families, the neighborhood families, or the country club families. Since those are the people you’re around – those are the families you end up spending time with. The adults hang together, and so do the kids.

This may be a BIG mistake, at least as the kids get older. The parenting-style chasm begins when the kids ask for and are granted more and more independence.

Nightmarish examples for kids 11-14 yrs old:

• You’re sitting at a post soccer game dinner – the kids want to sit together but the only place large enough for all of them is in the restaurant bar. OK, maybe not so much of a big deal. But when you get up to check on the kids, you find that two of the televisions in the bar are set to completely inappropriate programming (insert whatever you feel is inappropriate here). None of the other parents seem to notice or care. Do you pull your child out of the bar and make him sit with you?
• At an overnight tournament, all of the parents are sitting around on the hotel deck…younger children are playing tag close enough to the parents to be seen. Older children want to take an unsupervised stroll down the street to the neighborhood Circle K. All of the parents shrug their shoulders and say “yeah, whatever – just take your phone – here’s some money”. Do you pull your child out of the group and make him stay at the hotel with you?
• The “cool kids” – a group your daughter desperately wants to be a part of – are hosting a post-9th grade dance party at one of their homes beginning at midnight. “All the other kids are going” – and it’s true, they are ALL going. Once again you’re in the minority. What do you do?

Liquid Stress

The older my children get, the more I realize that as a community of parents, it’s time to “circle the wagons”.  Make a mental note of the parents who parent their children in a similar way. Make a concerted effort to get to know these individuals and rearrange your adult relationships in a way that helps (rather than hinders) your own parenting style.

The results will be interesting. The parents you’ve become friends with over the years may need to be dropped, and parents who were never on your radar before may become your greatest allies.

Ladies Night

You don’t have to drop all of your friends – you can still go out for cocktails whenever you want. But it doesn’t mean your children need to be BFFs.

Now Its Your Turn

Have you had an experience where you’ve needed to make some tough decisions on your own relationships or those of your children?

Other Related Posts

• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle

The Price of Privilege by Madeline Levine

If there could be only one book imbedded in your child’s placenta at birth, this should be it. Especially for parents fortunate enough to live in higher than average income areas, where higher than average angst lives, breathes, and flourishes. I found myself on pages 28 through 30 and embarrassed to point out just how many other pages completely and utterly described me as a parent. All well intentioned neurosis to be sure. And yet…

An Unexpected Epidemic

Dr. Levine goes through the frightening statistics behind the mental health epidemic that affects children of affluent families at a much higher rate: 22 percent of adolescent girls from financially comfortable families suffer from clinic depression which is 3 times higher than the national rate. Why are our children, who are afforded every privilege and opportunity at a far higher risk for depression?

You may not like the answers, and yet….OUR particular children are showing an unexpectedly high level of anxiety, depression, and substance abuse as early as the 6^th grade. What on earth is going on? This is NOT typical adolescent angst, NOT a phase that the child will get past, and NOT a natural developmental process.

Affluent Parents Make Not Seek Help

To complicate matters further, Dr. Levine tells us that affluent parents hesitate to seek professional help more than other groups of parents. They (we) tend to have strong feelings about protecting a child’s academic records.

More Bad News for the “Good Job” Generation

And perhaps most importantly: “Why Praise is Often ‘Bad’ Warmth”. WHAT?? Our children are products of the “good job” generation. We hand out trophies willy-nilly for no apparent reason!  Everyone is a winner for goodness sake. Some of us even purposely avoid competitive scenarios for fear that it may harm little Johnny’s little ego.

Before you climb onto the ledge (make some room for me please) just know that Dr. Levine does a detailed review of what it means to raise a child with a healthy sense of self and specific parenting strategies for raising children from ages 2 to 17.

Bottom line:  Read the book. When you’re done, read it again. And if you think it doesn’t apply to you, you’re wrong. Read it again. (For those of you, who know me personally, READ IT AGAIN).

When you’re done, leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Other Related Posts

• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle

Photo by: Ward Kadel (Concord, CA)

Conventional old-school wisdom says that the way in which you parent is the key to how your kids turn out.

You don’t have to go very far (the nearest radio, television, blog, news outlet) to hear parents being blamed (mother’s primarily) for the ills of our youth.

Johnny is a sociopath because his mother works full time, or she doesn’t work and behaves like a helicopter parent; he is allowed to play too many violent videogames, or runs the neighborhood without any guidance.

What About Peer Pressure?

In The Nurture Assumption, Judith Rich Harris argues that once parents have donated their genetic sauce – they have very little influence over their children EXCEPT in choosing their child’s peer group.

So if you can’t escape your son’s hard coded hatred of going to bed at night or your daughters disdain for table manners, then should you (could you) manipulate their relationships?

Let’s take the assumption that based on Harris’ research, some massaging of your child’s friendships is worthwhile in the long term. The next obvious question becomes: “What cocktail of personality and social characteristics are you looking for in your child’s friends?”

Examine Your Own Motivations

Are you trying to create a healthy, safe social environment for your child? Or are you trying to advance some sort of personal social agenda? This can become a slippery slope very quickly…

Don’t force your son to play lacrosse just because YOU think it’s cool. Don’t blame your daughter for not wanting to hang out with the girl next door – you know, the one who never goes outside and lives with her nose in a book.

Next Step

Surround your family and your children with other families and children who you admire (for whatever reason). Put yourself and your children in a position where your social circle pulls you UP to be better: better humans, better neighbors, better friends.

Sometimes your relationship with other adults might suffer for the sake of your children. If your best girlfriend’s children resemble wild homicidal pygmies – you might have to curtail your contact to just an occasional ‘girls night out’. More about this issue in the next post

Be Open to Surprises

You never know where your child will find a great buddy. Don’t assume – observe. Then be honest with your children – brutally so.

Remember the “every family has different rules”? Try to find a community within your community with rules that resemble your own.

Now It’s Your Turn – Comment With Your Response!

• Have you ever had an experience where you had to limit your child’s exposure to another child?
• Do you actively “guide” your children’s friendships?
• Have your adult relationships been affected by the interaction of your children?

Other Related Posts

• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Teaching by Example: Do You ‘Accidentally’ Undermine Your Child’s Authority Figures?
• A Principal’s Nightmare: A Letter from the “Parent From Hell”
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?

How Much Does Your Teacher Get Paid? Photo by: Notoriety

Have you ever wondered how much your kid’s teacher makes? Or how about the governor or other state employees?

Ohio Treasurer, Josh Mandel – just created a website aimed at public transparency (love love love) including 2011 salaries (and earlier) for all state workers and wages for other public workers.

That’s right – you can plug in the name and school district of ANY teacher, administrator, state workers, or elected official in the state of Ohio and see their salary. Wowie – talk about transparency!

Carrot: one detail I find interesting is the number of days worked.

Tell us what you think – Were you surprised by a particular salary? Were the numbers what you expected overall?

Access the online database by clicking here.

Other Related Posts

• Teaching by Example: Do You ‘Accidentally’ Undermine Your Child’s Authority Figures?
• What is the job of a school board member (or : what the hell are these people supposed to DO?)
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?

Do you have a movie or a book you read over and over again? If I happen across Shawshank Redemption on late night television I have to finish it. It doesn’t matter that I’ve seen it well over 20 times, or that I’ve read the short story (by Stephen King) twice that many times. There is something inherently human about that story – something that grips you until the very last moment.

“America The Story of Us” is a 12 hour series created by the History Channel. I’ll admit that I’m addicted. If I make the mistake of checking the History Channel just before bed, the next day will require a double dose of whatever type of coffee I’m drinking. The program is essentially American history set to cool 21st century graphics and sped up outcomes. But it still manages to grip the essence of the American story through focused vignettes and a fantastically written narrative.

My favorite episode is #3: Westward which follows the westward expansion in the mid 1800′s with all the hardships and horrors you can imagine. This is the point at which I become horrified to realize how soft and fat and weak we’ve become as a people.This country was founded literally on the backs of a few thousand courageous people who were willing to say: “I have no idea what’s over those mountains, and there’s a good chance we may die – but we have to take the chance.” Then they packed up their belongings, their animals, and their children (their CHILDREN) and put everything in harm’s way for freedom and a better life.

We’re raising a generation of “soft” children

Could any one of us do that now? We can’t even make it 30 miles away without 3 hours worth of Blu-Ray and a bag full of snacks and water bottles. (Most of us can survive for at least 72 hours on the spare snacks in our trunks and backseats.) And sure, I know what you’re thinking – that wouldn’t happen today, it’s not a fair comparison – people at that time were used to hardship - these people didn’t even have front loading washers for crying out loud!

This nation was built on: hardship, the value of work, and striving just as surely as steel built the railroads. But when I think about our kids freaking out because the lemonade is not pink, or that the pizza is cut wrong, or any other meaningless minutiae – it makes me crazy. And it isn’t our kid’s fault, it’s our fault.

What are we teaching our children about “striving”? Is it necessary for a child to suffer? Perhaps not “suffer” in its literal and most negative sense. But surely there is a value in working towards something or, striving for something. There is a value in getting up, doing your best and failing – knowing that the next day you have to get up and quite possibly fail again. There is a value in boredom, of being without.

Teach your children to strive

Who cares if our children have it easier than we did? Shouldn’t our children benefit from our hard work? Absolutely not! Your children should benefit from your hard work only if it offers them “opportunity”, not when it produces them with the fruits of YOUR labor.(think: brand new IPad, new phone, or flat screen tv).

If you’re a successful (or struggling) entrepreneur – teach your child how to start a lawn mowing business – and allow them to benefit from the opportunity of learning from you. If you’re a financial planner – teach your child what it means to invest, save, and donate. If you’re a doctor or a lawyer – teach your child what it means to dedicate yourself to study.

Whether or not the child achieves any particular goal is not the point (shocking, right?). In fact it might be preferable that they fail miserably. The lesson is in the effort – not the outcome. The lesson comes in picking apart the failure, acknowledging the fact that it IS a failure (don’t sugarcoat), then learning from it.

Are we seriously, purposely/accidentally raising a generation of weenies? Are we raising a nation of adults who won’t be able to make it an hour without a snack, a scheduled/manipulated social interaction and a “good job” to boot?

Utterly terrifying.

Other Related Posts

• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Teaching by Example: Do You ‘Accidentally’ Undermine Your Child’s Authority Figures?
• A Principal’s Nightmare: A Letter from the “Parent From Hell”
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?

Giving Your Kid's Teacher a Nervous Breakdown??

There’s always a lot said about what an easy life teachers have. Summers off, union negotiated contracts, tenure, etc. All of those perks are pretty great, but when did you last spend any time inside a K-6 classroom?

Teachers have to deal at least 25 little humans with widely varying academic and behavioral strengths- and that’s 25 at a minimum. Fourth through sixth grade teachers are generally subject specific teachers and may have a hundred students or more.

It takes an incredible amount of mental fortitude to teach and inspire 100 students and their 200 parents – plus or minus another 50 or so step-parents, meddlesome grandparents, and other random blended family members.

So what are the things YOU might be doing that make your kid’s teacher crazy?

• Sending your child to school unprepared
  Mrs. Smith asks everyone to arrive on Tuesday with one gallon size ziploc bag. Your child doesn’t have the ziploc – not because you forgot (life happens) but because you figure that the teacher will have a couple extra bags. Forgetting that one innocuous ziploc is a big deal. Every time one cog in the wheel doesn’t move at the same pace, motion stops for the entire class. I can guarantee you that the teacher is feeling at least one moment of “internal eye roll” directed towards your child. If enough of those internal eye rolls build up, the poor woman is going to look like a slot machine searching for a jackpot.

• Not sending your child to bed early enough
  If you want to be the “cool dad” and let your 9 yr old son stay up until midnight to watch a movie that’s fine – congrats you win the cool dad prize! Adults can recover with a cup of coffee. If your kid is grumpy and unresponsive in class because he’s tired it disrupts the flow of the entire class. Plus, you might very well be throwing away an entire day of “learning” – you know that whole pesky learning thing that is supposed to be your child’s JOB every day?

• Not sharing pertinent and important information with the teacher
  If your child’s guinea pig died and she’s crushed, send her to school with a note for the teacher. Acting out and misbehavior which can be traced back to an identified issue will obviously be dealt with differently. Your darling angel might just be given a “get out of jail free card” for kicking that annoying girl with the perfect pigtails and the designer shoes. Plus, the teacher might want to change her read-aloud book selection from “George the Happy Guinea Pig” to “Henry the Hog Goes to the City”.

• Not respecting the “rhythm” of the classroom
  If you visit your child’s classroom, be respectful of the rhythm and flow of the classroom. Ask ahead of time what time would be appropriate for a birthday treat and if you’re allowed to stay to share it. If you’re coming in to volunteer arrive silently. Pretend your child’s classroom is a live opera production in a fancy theater and you’re arriving late: Turn off your phone, slip in quietly, wave silently to your child (who should continue doing whatever he was doing before you got there), and leave the same way.

• MOST IMPORTANT : Not asking a question before flying off the handle
  Your 3rd grade son comes home in a huff because “football has been banned at recess”. Unfortunately your son lives for football. He and his friends play every single day, and without football at recess you’re afraid he won’t even get out of bed in the morning for school….Option 1:You can shoot off a salty and aggressive email to the principal of the school including phrases like “ridiculous decision”, “American past time”, and “unfair policies”.
  Option 2: You send the TEACHER an email with the following: “Hi Mr Smith, Tommy told me that there was some issue with football at recess (he said it was banned) – do you know what that’s about? Please let us know if we can do anything to help. Tommy LOVES his football!!”
  Result: in either case you would receive the following:
  “Hello Mrs. Johnson – there must have been some miscommunication. Football was absolutely NOT banned at recess. Some of he boys had been using the football to pick off the “fancy girls” one by one. Our guidance counselor is speaking to the boys about the appropriate way to use a football. In fact by the time you get this email, Tommy will be out in the playground playing football again.”

Option 1 makes you “that parent”. Option 2 gets your question answered without coming off like a jerk. Believe me when I say that every teacher in your school knows who the “option 1″ parents are…Don’t be an OPTION ONE parent!!

The biggest challenge to a teacher is not “Bobby has 2 mommies”, it’s “Bobby’s mommy has 2 heads”.

Other Related Posts

• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• Teaching by Example: Do You ‘Accidentally’ Undermine Your Child’s Authority Figures?
• A Principal’s Nightmare: A Letter from the “Parent From Hell”
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?

Photo by: Chris Willis

In a recent post I list one of two basic goals of parenting as: preparing your children for the day they leave.

That’s both the biggest relief and the biggest heartbreak about parenting; they don’t leave all at once – it happens in increments, if you allow it.

There’s the point really: we have to allow our children to separate from us slowly by learning to speak and advocate for themselves starting at the youngest ages.

When you take your 3 year old to the pediatrician let your child explain how she feels. She’ll leave stuff out of the explanation and that’s OK – you can fill in the gaps.

Children advocating for themselves at school

Nowhere is this skill more important than at school. Encourage your preschoolers to stand up for themselves with classmates and negotiate their own solutions. When a child comes to you crying with a playground issue it’s OK to say “What do YOU think should happen?” “How would YOU solve this problem?” or my favorite “I know you can work it out yourself”.

Encourage younger children to advocate for themselves within the classroom as well. Even a first or second grader can ask to be bumped up a reading level. When your children bring home classroom concerns or issues – consider letting them handle it on their own. Obviously there will be occasions, especially at the younger ages, where you will need to intervene. But even complex “adult” issues like bullying should engage the child as much as possible.

It might be time to back off by 7th or 8th grade

By the time your children hit middle school – your children should be the only ones interfacing with their teachers and guidance counselors. Is there a question about scheduling? Resist the temptation to pick up the phone or draft an email. Your 7th or 8th grader should be sending the email; at this age, they need to begin to hone the skills of

• determining WHO the right person is to solve a problem
• figuring out HOW to plead their case
• following up to make sure the issue is RESOLVED

Bottom line: We do our children a grave disservice if we make ourselves available at every turn to pave the way with the outside world. Next time someone asks your child a question bite your tongue and let him answer.

Come to think of it, biting your tongue in general is a pretty awesome life skill. Maybe I’ll start practicing – but not today.

Other Related Posts

• The Top 5 Ways You Make Your Kid’s Teacher CRAZY
• Teaching by Example: Do You ‘Accidentally’ Undermine Your Child’s Authority Figures?
• A Principal’s Nightmare: A Letter from the “Parent From Hell”
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?

Eye rolling and grimacing does NOT help your cause. Believe me I've tried.

We love our babies. We’ve wiped their chins and their bottoms and do it all lovingly (at least in front of the grandparents). Then they get older and we put this angel child on a huge yellow tin death trap with no seat belts and a bus driver who might be a meth head (for all we know) – and so you worry.

The first parent teacher conference comes and maybe you lose a little bit of sleep before, and maybe a bit more after. And you find yourself asking your spouse questions like : “What do you think she meant by “right on target? Does that mean we should start doing flash cards to get him past the target? And what does target mean anyway? Is that average? Who wants average?” So you worry some more.

Why can’t he swing the bat as well as Bobby?

Sports and activities heighten the overall sense of worry. And if you make the colossal error of comparing your kid to the neighborhood phenom in ____ (insert blank sport or activity), I promise you’ll become a basket case. Besides I happen to know for a fact that your neighborhood phenom picks his nose incessantly. So he can be a beast at soccer – but he’s never gonna get married if he doesn’t get that finger out of his nose. (Feel better? You’re welcome!)

So we worry, and that’s OK, we’re supposed to worry. But there’s an ugly edge to “internal” worry. There may come a point where you have a legitimate gripe with a teacher or coach. Don’t let your concern for your child’s best interests somehow sink to open criticism of that authority figure in front of your child.

I’ve seen parents dress down coaches in front of their children and heard a mother tell her child that she was “intellectually superior” to her teachers. When you engage in this sort of behavior you head down a slippery slope which I can promise will bite you on your backside (and hard).

When you speak disparagingly of an authority figure in your child’s life – you might very well:

• hurt the child’s feelings – children become attached to their coaches and teachers
• put your child in the position of having to choose between how he/she might feel and what you feel
• unintentionally hurt your child’s chances of advancing in that sport or in special programming – if no one wants to deal with YOU, your child could be passed over (I’ve seen it happen)
• cultivate a climate of disrespect within your house – which will at some point be directed at you
• unintentionally teach that we have to “like” or “agree with” our bosses, in-laws, parents, teachers, etc – sometimes we have to do what we have to do regardless of how we “feel about it”.

So what should you do if you think your kid’s teacher is an idiot?

• always take the teacher’s or coach’s side when speaking to your child
  “Honey, I understand that taking 5 points off for using a semicolon versus a colon is excessive, but you’re the one who made the mistake. If you know this teacher is extra picky, then you have to be extra vigilant.”
• document quantifiable/specific instances of what you consider to be an issue
  “Out of the last 8 soccer games, my son has only played 2 quarters”
• set up a separate meeting with the teacher – DO NOT let your child find out about this meeting
  Be sure that the teacher/coach knows that your child is unaware that you are having the meeting.
• BEFORE you launch into your list of quantifiable misdeeds ASK A QUESTION: “Coach Smith it seems like Johnny has not gotten much play time lately. Is there something we can do to help him improve? Or is there something going on that I’m unaware of? (ideally your child should be asking this question, but we’ll deal with that in my next post)
• If the teacher or coach meets you with resistance or defensiveness, then make your case with your quantifiable data and make sure you leave the meeting with a plan for going forward: specific action steps to make sure that the same issue is not repeated.

Respect authority, even when the ‘authority’ is a moron

There is an objective value to respecting authority. That does NOT mean taking abuse or not advocating for your rights or best interests. It DOES mean advocating in a respectful way. You’ll know that you’ve achieved this when everyone leaves a meeting with their dignity intact.

And sometimes, authority figures are unfair and take out their petty little lives on the innocent kids in their classrooms. Regardless of how “we feel” we still have to suck it up and deal with it. What better way to prepare our kids for the crappy bosses, landlords, and in-laws in their future?

As to the ONE teacher my son had who was just nasty, rude, and gleefully unfair? My son’s friend said “Mrs. W, I think she just needs to get married…” Um, yeah  – that too.

Other Related Posts

• The Top 5 Ways You Make Your Kid’s Teacher CRAZY
• Let Your Children Speak and Advocate for Themselves
• A Principal’s Nightmare: A Letter from the “Parent From Hell”
• Kids Can’t Learn Coping Skills If They Never Have to Cope With Anything
• Stop Telling Your Kid She’s Special All the Time– You May Screw Her Up Permanently
• Seven Commandments for School Volunteers – Thou Shalt NOT Be a Pain in the Noodle
• What do you think about tenure? How satisfied are you with your child’s education?