"Too Cool for School..."

My son thinks he's too cool for school! Seriously! He didnt realize it was this crucial! lol Daycare was definitely a different type of environment for him but now that he's in a public school, it means business. And let me tell you, he didn't like it. He walked in the school thinking he knew and was excited about it but as the weeks passed by and he realized he had to continue doing work and homework... Reality kicked in!

He was beginning to stop paying attention in circle time, not participating in class activities and hitting other classmates! After a long conversation between Jason and I, we decided that Karate was just not fitting him and more disciplining had to take place. Why? Well after a week of continuous red faces and notes from the teacher indicating he likes to "karate chop" his classmates and was sent to time out for punching another boy in the face, karate is a no bueno for him and the outcome was... our poor four year old was grounded. Now although the whole punch in the face was excusable and I'll tell you why in a minute, it's still not right to punch anyone your first week of school. Eh. And when I found out why he did it, I was quite perturbed. Chuckled a bit but pretty unsettled. 

Come to find out a little boy in his class would steal his lunch food and pull his hair. Now if you know my son, no one steals his food and no one pulls his hair. He has this reflex and personality you don't want to mess with after that. BUT even then he told me he would try to tell the teacher and the "cafeteria lady" but no one disciplined the other boy who did it first. My thinking is, go tell the teacher first. BUT Jason (daddy) apparently told him that in defense if someone bullies you and a teacher doesn't do anything about it, defend himself and fight back. Um? Easier said then done. And I'm not sure he thought our son would actually follow through with it but... he did! And that is exactly what he told the teacher, principal and us... That "daddy told me to do it!" 

Ohhh emmm geeee! I was hot! Lol. Who tells their four year old to punch the bully back? What does that teach a child? Maybe I'm old school but I've always been taught to inform someone first before actually doing something about it yourself because that can get you in trouble too and we definitely don't want that! So what is the right thing to do? 

The teacher calls me today and my heart almost dropped because I'm thinking something else "worse" occurred for the teacher to call my personal cell. Needless to say, she just wanted to tell me how well his behavior has been this week. That he's beginning to participate in class activities with no hitting (but she does still reinforce the no karate chopping) and he has been her big helper for the day. One thing that stuck with me, was that she stated he was extremely intelligent as she sees it more now in his participation and classroom work, one of her brightest in the class (remember, he's a 4 year old doing kindergarten work). I was soooooo thankful as it was a breath of fresh air. ;-)

My son is growing up! And his teacher is finally seeing the awesome intelligent little boy that he is... I see his potential every day and he makes me extremely proud, all of us.