Going Bananas

Those of us with children in preschool and the early elementary grades know that every new school year these days comes with a new behavior system in place to help our child's teacher manage the classroom (and, conversely, to help our children control their behavior). Every room is a little bit different, but they all have a similar system of warnings that follow a predictible pattern. Sometimes this comes in the form of the ever popular "stoplight" model where students remain on "green light" (or green ticket or whatever) until they break a rule. This is actually the system that my husband uses with his first grade students, and he has found that it's the easiest for everyone to understand, parents included.

This year, Nate is in the 4 and 5-year-old preschool room at his daycare. They have a new jungle theme in his classroom (which is fitting because it seems like there are quite a few monkeys in there). There is a coconut tree outside the door and a tiger roars at you as you enter. Vines hang from the ceiling. And over on the far wall, near the circle time area, there are about 60 little, laminated paper bananas stuck to the wall. Each banana has a child's name on it. And each child has 5 bananas. Why 5 instead of 3 or 4, I'm not sure. But the idea is that when they get in trouble, the lose a banana.

For the first few weeks of school, Nate was losing a banana every day. I couldn't believe it! In the 3-year-old room, if they lost a seashell (or baseball or whatever it was for the season), they didn't get a prize from the prize box that day. And you'd think that the promise of getting a junky prize at the end of the day wouldn't keep a rowdy 3 year old in check all day, but most of the time it did. Maybe once every other week Nate would get in trouble enough to lose the prize box privilege, but not too often. And usually his infractions would happen at naptime, when he wasn't being quiet because (God's cruelest joke) Nate doesn't need a nap anymore. So, when he moved to the "big kid room", I was appalled that he was losing a banana every day.

Well, I finally got to talk to the head teacher and she reassured me that Nate was really doing fine. I guess in the new system for the 4's and 5's, they get to lose one banana and still pick out of the prize box. If they lose 2 or more, though, no prizey. And Nate had only lost 2 bananas in one day one time in the first two weeks of school. He was doing fine, she assured me. Nothing that wouldn't get ironed out as he got used to the new "sticter-getting-ready-for-kindergarten" rules. (Nate does have a tendency to talk too much when he's supposed to be quiet and interrupts the teacher because he has lots to share. )

I'm not sure how I feel about the new "lose one and still get a prize" system. Clearly, Nathanael figured this out right away and has been maximizing his ornery-time to be bad and still get a prize. But I'm not the teacher, so who am I to say...

Then, today my mom picked Nate up from school for us. And, as they were leaving, one of the helpers from his room, Miss Somebody, (NOT the head teacher), stopped my mom and Nate and explained how bad Nate had been today. He lost a banana (but I thought losing only one wasn't a big deal?), and he was too loud at naptime (is this why he lost the banana?), and he also LICKED someone. Okayyyyy. So, licking someone is weird and not alright. Not socially acceptable, obviously. But did he lose his banana for not being good at naptime or for licking someone? And if my son is continually having a problem at naptime, what are they doing to help him? Because I can tell them right now, the child doesn't need, doesn't want, isn't gonna take a nap. Not most days anyway, and the problem isn't gonna poof disappear. And you know what, we don't even want him to take a nap. When he does happen to fall asleep at naptime, the child is awake until 10:30 at night or later. He doesn't need a daytime nap. *sigh*

This is not all to say that Nate is blameless or that he is the victim of a faulty classroom behavioral system or rigid Naptime Nazi regime (although I do think that 2 hours is a bit long to make a 4 year old lay on his cot quietly!) No, I know that Nate is anything but angelic most of the time. He is active and stubborn and impulsive, and I'm sure that I don't want to be his preschool teacher!!

And when I talked to Shad about it this evening, and I reported the licking incident, what do you think Nate's Dad's first concern was? "Did he lick a girl?" If only I had the answer to that...