The Last Word

Miles has been having a little trouble at school lately....well, and at home for that matter.  He has this little problem of talking back.  He must have the last word.  As I've mentioned on here before, getting in trouble at school is nothing new.  He seems to have streaks of it.  He's good for a while and then he's consistently bad.  Truth be told, I think a lot of the "good" days only happened b/c his teachers didn't write his time outs on his sheet.

At first it really bothered me when he would misbehave at school.  I certainly don't like it now, but I've come to accept that he's a 3 year old boy that just has to learn.  We try not to practice double jeopardy.  I feel like his teachers are very capable of disciplining him at school and at his age I think that's what needs to happen.  We usually talk to him about it but I try not to come down on him too hard when he's already paid for his crime.  However, when it comes to disrespect, I just can't handle that.  Talking back is definitely in the disrespect category.  Yesterday, he went to time out for refusing to stop yelling at a teacher to the point that he had to be taken out of the room.  Oh my.

We had a very stern talk on the way home and then he had to make a card for the teacher he yelled at.  I know this doesn't qualify as punishment, but I thought it would be good for him.  We practiced his apology.  We also practiced appropriate responses that don't involve talking back.  He worked so hard on his card...

 

I would love to report that he didn't go to time out today, but he did...twice.  Once for hitting a friend b/c the friend called him "Co Co".  Serious stuff, I know.  The other was for throwing a toy.  I can actually live with that and consider it a success that there was no talking back :)