Times gone by

[brioche]

IYM what a nice thread !

Some of the current things generally passed off as modern civilization achievements are really psychotic bollox nourished by parents' and educators'
sense of guilt towards a way of life which prefer to spoil children instead to stop and listen to them .

That means to me I am doing a not so bad work with him and ...... if he doesn't behave at school I am one of those mothers who drags him out by an ear and if he doesn't give me a satisfactory explanation (well I always listen to both versions of facts ... call it a professional deformation !!) about what I heard from teachers he gots a good punishment . However I never blame teachers in front of him cause it would mean to undermine their authority .

Am I a dysfunctional parent ?

Still wondering !!!

i don't know what you mean about the bollox part. Please elucidate and i will be happy, from an educator's standpoint (and one who really does care about the kids) how i feel about that. i don't think educators spoil kids though. i really don't. It is true that they have to learn that people aren't there to clean up after them, for example, but i do teach them that. "Our caretaker is here to take care of the school, not clean up your mess. That's your job. Go get the broom."
"No one is leaving for lunch until the carpet is clean. It didn't look like that this morning."
"Stack your chairs before you go, i'm not going to do it for you again."
"If you leave things on your desk it won't get washed by the caretaker, and i don't want any complaints about stickiness."
child:
"Am i going to get a Gotcha! (incentive coupon) for holding open the doors at recess?"
me:
"Not now that you asked."

i'm strict, but my children learn how to interact as people and respect others . i am immensely proud that every class i have had, including JKs, who must have learned it from me, have bent over backwards to welcome the new kids as "our new friend," and "fought" over who gets to sit beside him/her and show them the ropes. They also thank people: the music teacher, the drama teacher, the gym teacher, the caretaker when he fixes something for us. i also truly listen to what they have to say and their problems. Even if i can't fix them, i listen.

When i combined the extra kids from two classes, the groups of four each had two kids from each class to facilitate them getting to know each other.

i truly do think it's sad that a lot of parents leave the job of teaching their children manners to the schools, and it's exhausting to have to teach it to 22 people in a schedule that's already chock full, but i do it. i do it because i can say that i have done my best to prepare my kids for the real world, where no one cleans up after them and no one coddles them. Of course, some children learn that lesson early, like the 7 year old in my class who is in a group home and his mother flakes out on the supervised visits so often i didn't know he was supposed to go every week for over a month.

i hate calling parents in to complain about their children, and only do it as a last resort or if instructed to do so at the office. This is especially because the truly incorrigible kids are learning it at home. The parents walk in and 10 minutes later you realize how little support you're going to get on the home front.

Just MHO

Oh, and regarding the egg and chicken thing: i have had the "24 hour flu," which is actually mild food poisoning, once in the past decade. i used to get it much more often when cutting boards were wooden and were reused after a quick wipe.