How to Cripple a Child

So this week I've been the recipient of The Blame Game.  Perhaps earlier in my career I would have been willing to accept some of the blame that has been heaped upon me this week, but at this stage I know I'm right and that I've done nothing for which to be blamed.....Would you like to know what's my fault?

Well, it seems Georgie's mother has decided I'm a baaaaaaaaad teacher.  And here's the reasons:

1. Georgie made a puddle on the floor earlier this week.  And that was my fault because I wasn't tracking how often he was using the classroom bathroom and asking him if he needed to go pee pee in the potty at regular intervals.  Now, a few years ago I would have offered to create some sort of reward system or something to encourage him to "go" and would have shouldered that responsibility.  Now, no way.  I told her that since he was the youngest kindergartener in my class (didn't turn 5 until the middle of September) that developmentally he probably wasn't identifying the beginning of "the urge" and didn't realize he needed to go until it was a near emergency and that I couldn't make another student evacuate the bathroom to let him use it.  HE needs to be responsible for using his SIX (or more) bathroom breaks that I offer during our 6 hour school day.  Lordy, I'm 7 months pregnant and the idea of 6 breaks a day sounds heavenly to me.... I get one.  If I can make it on 1 a day, he can make it on 6.

2.  I refuse to search through Georgie's backpack to find things that she sends to school with him. This has been an ongoing issue for him.  For example, last week she sent treat bags to give the class on Monday for Halloween.  Well, when Georgie came in to class, he told me he had "toys in his backpack."  For those unaccustomed to elementary age kids, they OFTEN bring toys from home in their backpack, and are either naiive enough to tell their teacher that, or they think we're too stupid to notice that suddenly Justin Bieber has joined our class and is singing a tinny recorded song emanating from his abdomen. So when he announced he had toys, I said what I always say: "Toys stay in our backpack, and please don't bring them back to school."  So that was the first nasty note of the week. Fun!  I just flat out told Mom this time that he told me he had toys, and I told him toys weren't allowed.  He needs to learn to communicate what he really means.

3.  Then today, I'm in trouble with her because he hasn't brought a take-home reading book home all week.  Well, tough shit.  I spend the first MONTH of school chasing after the kids to make sure they are choosing a book and packing it away to take home.  I spend a second month chasing the third of them who still don't get it.  Now in the third month of school I do not chase, and will only remind.  If he still doesn't know what his job is, then it's HER problem, not mine.  SHE needs to help her child because MY job is to foist some independence on him.

    All of this took me back to a couple of years ago when I was miserably plodding through a year of 5th grade hell.... I had a mother tell me I couldn't hold her child responsible for a book report because I hadn't written it down for him in his assignment notebook and hadn't called her to tell her that it was assigned.  I told her that it was HIS assignment, not hers, and that I don't notify parents individually of assigned schoolwork. But come the hell on.  Really?

   These are the parents who are crippling our education system.  And lordy I wish they weren't mine to deal with.