Tomorrow's the day

.
Thanks for all the outrage on Bean's behalf. I feel terrible dropping her off there, but Dave won't be back until today, so I'll meet him at the school in the morning. Hopefully the talk will go well and this will be Bean's last week with the devil woman.

I got an incident report yesterday that she deliberately shut another girl's arm in a door. And then I had to listen to Miss B start in on me about how Bean's becoming more aggressive. Now Bean's always been much more, ahhh, *tactile* than her friends. I think it's part of her sensory-seeking tendencies - we've talked about this before, haven't we? - and a friend pointed out recently that I really need to be more mindful of her sensory needs, as this shapes behavior.

So anyways, Miss B's comment and subtle criticism made something gel in my brain that I'd been working on, distractedly, all day - I wanted to know what the effects of shaming were on behavior.

What I found was consensus that a percentage of shamed kids become more hostile, that they act out their hurts in an aggressive way, in large part because they're being shamed about more appropriate ways of expressing their emotions. If Bean's feeling shortchanged and can't cry, that's a lot of emotion and energy to hold in, so it comes out somewhere else. She's definitely my daughter in that she really doesn't hold things in, so if she's getting beaten down for crying, that emotion is going to come out somewhere else.

I need to touch base with Dave again, as he has concerns that we don't have a Plan B in place if we give an ultimatum, but we could figure something out. The bottom line is that I am unwilling to have Bean in that class beyond this week. They can move her back or forward, but she is not staying there.

I am also going to be very clear that this teacher has been in consistent violation of their "no shaming" policy for a minimum of 6 months, and that I believe she's damaging to children and has no place in education. I'm loosely, loosely considering notes in the other two kids' folders to make the parents aware of the treatment their kids are experiencing ...

Yeah, it's "only" three kids out of maybe 18-20 that are experiencing this treatment, but there are another 15-17 who are being taught that belittling and humiliating people is fine and dandy.

I sent a note to Dave saying that if he didn't want to be involved in the "no Miss A" portion, I could tangent that to a separate discussion, one I'd do alone. I'm not sure if he feels as strongly about it as I do; frankly, I don't really care. He's on board for the Bean portion, and I appreciate that. But I feel like I really need to advocate for all the kids, and not just my own on this one.

I'll close with something a bit more lighthearted - a Beanism in potty humor:

Mommy! Look! It's a loooong poopie.
(One minute later)
Look! A whole family of poopie!!
.