Landing

At four o’clock in the morning, things are pretty numb, especially after having gone ten rounds with a preschool. You see, maybe it’s because I’ve been in education for so long, or maybe it’s the two Masters Degrees in the field. Or it could be the fact that I’m a mother who actually cares what kind of day her kids have, I don’t know, you pick, but I think that I might know a thing or two about a classroom.

Yesterday I was all done. There is a point at which a three-year-old can be blamed for something and a point at which it’s going to have to fall on the teacher’s head. When kids are treated aggressively they act aggressively, when they are ignored, they act out for attention. Period. Basic child psychology, or for those who didn’t crack the book in their Early Childhood Development class, the Hallmark card version, “Children who are loved, love in return…etc. etc.” Pretty simple.

The preschool in question is the school of Boshenda Birtha. You may recall Boshenda Birtha, and if you do, you may also recall that she went down hard long ago. Oh, the showdown was epic.

Well, the teacher who pushed it over the line with the inability to do her job yesterday was my son's, Too Young to Teach Trixie. Now, understand that Trixie has the observation skills of a doughnut. She has a habit of being late for work, and time after time I've refused to leave my three and four-year old in a classroom of 12 students of varying ages with the covering teacher, we’ll just call her Gossiping Hag. We call her this because not only do I hate her personality, but because all I have EVER seen her do is gossip to the other teachers in the hallway while a gaggle of kids run amuck behind her. So, this being the situation, I've been late several times for work while waiting on Trixie to drag her 22-year-old ass into school and take half of the kids. Fortunately, I run my own program and have a little more autonomy than most, thus being late hasn’t been a monumental deal, but still, it's been annoying to say the least.

So, anyway, we have a twenty-something naive teacher who hasn’t yet finished school, and a thirty-something inattentive excuse for a teacher with whom I've had issue. Are you following me? Now ask me if I've said something to the director about Gossiping Hag and Trixie being oblivious to the pre-K frenzy that would inevitably result in my son being upset, or in some kind of trouble because when Gossiping Hag and/or Trixie finally started to pay attention to a brewing situation, it was already way past brewed and someone was screaming.

Ask me how many times I've told the two disgraces themselves that they needed to have a routine in the classroom for clean up time and for snack time – I mean sing a song for crap’s sake, something other than yell seven times for all toddlers within ear shot to line up, pick up or shut up! Yes, to answer your questions, I've done all of these things, but to no avail. So yesterday when my son got into trouble, and as is their history, they were unable to tell me what provoked him, I was all done. I still haven’t figured out how the cleanest, newest and most expensive commercial preschool in town has employees who don’t really seem very interested in taking care of kids.

They called me and told me that my three-year-old boy was hiding under a table saying that he wanted his mommy. That he refused to come out and that he swiped at the teachers when they’d reach for him. What? How did this happen? What happened?

We. Don’t. Know.

Don’t you now? What do the camera’s say? What am I paying a small fortune here for exactly? For you not to know? Or how about this, you’ve been grossly negligent and cruel, as I’ve observed myself several times, and you just don’t want to fess up? Yeah, I think that makes more sense. So ladies, we’re all done. And sit down because here’s your earful.



And the remainder of yesterday was spent doing all of the paperwork for transferring schools. The new school is part of the same commercial chain, but it’s a much smaller campus, and hopefully a less chaotic environment. This morning I went in and made sure that the kids were adjusting well. They were happy, and that made me happy.

Before I left I went down the principal’s nightmare parent list, as I made it painfully clear what I expected of this school to the director, and after hearing what I witnessed at the other center, she was very agreeable and supportive.

You remember those dogs that we talked about? Damn, it's not complicated - don’t mess with my kids and everything will be just fine.

Now you see why Steelhead doesn’t scare me anymore.