Back in the mid90's at my wits end with my kids teacher, I decided to try a small experiment in behavior modification. I was pretty desperate for a solution. When you are 25, busy, working, going to school and taking care of two kids and a house there isn't all the much time to be called into the grade 1 class and forced to sit in a mini chair listening to a high strung teacher grumble. But for three months I was forced to do that daily.
No amount of communication could get Madame to see she was part of the problem. No suggestions from me ever made it past her sardonic smile. I had a bored child on my hands. My Darling girl whos mind outthought most adults and who had set out to make school fun. A teacher who had a love affair with conformity. Who found my little beans brilliance serial killer level disturbing. Somehow, out of that situation I found myself getting served with Grade 1 Detention ad infinitum.
Unable to convince Madame to try anything new I turned to the one person I could influence. I explained to my baby that her hijinks were rather unwelcome. "But its soooooo borrrrrrring Mummy". I know Baby. You only have about 20 more years of oft boring teachers to deal with. No worries, we are going to try something.
I knew I was going against the permissive grain of the parents around me. ( Deep breath! Be brave.). Baby, take this little elastic and wear it as a bracelet. Okay. Now every time you want to get out of your seat, feel you need to tell your friends to ask unanswerable questions, shoot spit balls from your drinking box straw or tell your teacher a wild, wild story and prove her gullibility please give your wrist a little snap. Worked charmingly. No more detentions for Mom. Just 8 hours of one bored kid 5 days a week and Madame had no problem with that.
Enter the nosy Mom! Having seen how my 90's version of the fidget spinner restored classroom peace for me Mom 1, the self appointed Mayor of Grade 1 parents, decided it was just the ticket for her bored child, too. A day later I hear her shrill complaint.
The school called and gave her a movie of the week level warning about self mutilation. Turns out that instead of a tiny snap to remind oneself to be good her Darling decided to try to use the trick to change her friends behavior. No matter how much she twisted that elastic....or how blue her fingers turned her friends remained annoying. Odd.
I hadnt forseen that extrapolation of my experiment. For a six year old it was a brilliant thesis. Missed one minor given, that's all. Nothing in this world you do can force another human to change. You can complain whine cry manipulate and even dominate but real change is all the other persons deal. Sorry Bunny. That's just the way it is.
We would like it to be easier to change people. As Mom and Dads, bosses and employees, lovers, friends. Unfortunately, behavior rises from so many competing factors. Personality is a strange mix of biology, experience and current and past social mores. Behavior takes all that and then adds quality of sleep, nutrition, the environment and available tools and pops out something new at the end. It can be fantastic. It can be dismal.
Still, all we can do as humans is change ourselves. If we change enough then sometimes people around us must change to adjust. We control how much or how little other's behavior can affect us. Our own level of tolerance determines how easy or hard that will be. We can choose to be like Jello. Just let the cream poor over us and jiggle- largely unchanged. We can choose to stir and become a yukky mess of gelatin and dairy. Changed largely by our own reactions and behavior.
This is our human truth. Even now in the " new millennium" where we teach our children its their right to be offended by anything. Like that is a healthy notion. Sorry, kids, your rights, your feelings, your discomfort still ends at the tip of the next guys nose. Agree or disagree, be offended or dont- theres only one person we each truly control. The self.
No amount of communication could get Madame to see she was part of the problem. No suggestions from me ever made it past her sardonic smile. I had a bored child on my hands. My Darling girl whos mind outthought most adults and who had set out to make school fun. A teacher who had a love affair with conformity. Who found my little beans brilliance serial killer level disturbing. Somehow, out of that situation I found myself getting served with Grade 1 Detention ad infinitum.
Unable to convince Madame to try anything new I turned to the one person I could influence. I explained to my baby that her hijinks were rather unwelcome. "But its soooooo borrrrrrring Mummy". I know Baby. You only have about 20 more years of oft boring teachers to deal with. No worries, we are going to try something.
I knew I was going against the permissive grain of the parents around me. ( Deep breath! Be brave.). Baby, take this little elastic and wear it as a bracelet. Okay. Now every time you want to get out of your seat, feel you need to tell your friends to ask unanswerable questions, shoot spit balls from your drinking box straw or tell your teacher a wild, wild story and prove her gullibility please give your wrist a little snap. Worked charmingly. No more detentions for Mom. Just 8 hours of one bored kid 5 days a week and Madame had no problem with that.
Enter the nosy Mom! Having seen how my 90's version of the fidget spinner restored classroom peace for me Mom 1, the self appointed Mayor of Grade 1 parents, decided it was just the ticket for her bored child, too. A day later I hear her shrill complaint.
The school called and gave her a movie of the week level warning about self mutilation. Turns out that instead of a tiny snap to remind oneself to be good her Darling decided to try to use the trick to change her friends behavior. No matter how much she twisted that elastic....or how blue her fingers turned her friends remained annoying. Odd.
I hadnt forseen that extrapolation of my experiment. For a six year old it was a brilliant thesis. Missed one minor given, that's all. Nothing in this world you do can force another human to change. You can complain whine cry manipulate and even dominate but real change is all the other persons deal. Sorry Bunny. That's just the way it is.
We would like it to be easier to change people. As Mom and Dads, bosses and employees, lovers, friends. Unfortunately, behavior rises from so many competing factors. Personality is a strange mix of biology, experience and current and past social mores. Behavior takes all that and then adds quality of sleep, nutrition, the environment and available tools and pops out something new at the end. It can be fantastic. It can be dismal.
Still, all we can do as humans is change ourselves. If we change enough then sometimes people around us must change to adjust. We control how much or how little other's behavior can affect us. Our own level of tolerance determines how easy or hard that will be. We can choose to be like Jello. Just let the cream poor over us and jiggle- largely unchanged. We can choose to stir and become a yukky mess of gelatin and dairy. Changed largely by our own reactions and behavior.
This is our human truth. Even now in the " new millennium" where we teach our children its their right to be offended by anything. Like that is a healthy notion. Sorry, kids, your rights, your feelings, your discomfort still ends at the tip of the next guys nose. Agree or disagree, be offended or dont- theres only one person we each truly control. The self.
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