4th Grade, Daycare, & He Did It

Miles is LOVING 4th grade. He seems to have a really good connection with his math & science teacher, Ms. Chelsea. He has 27 kids in his class this year which is a lot more than he's ever had. It's kind of nice b/c it gives him more friends. Sometimes when there was only 7-8 other boys in the class, he may not have much in common with any of them. I don't know how a teacher can keep up with 27 kids, but his teacher seems to do a great job at it.

She comes up with fun and creative ways to learn too. The other day she chose 4 students to go help 2nd graders sign onto a test in the computer lab. He was chosen and it made his week. I'm so thankful that she 'sees' him.

The best thing about her is that she has so many rewards to encourage positive behavior rather than focusing on punishments for negative behavior. I should probably take a page from her playbook on that. Most of her rewards are non food related such as writing with a pen for a day, wearing a hat, being the teacher's helper for a day, bringing a stuffed animal to class, etc. It doesn't take much with kids. The homework club is a positive reward for turning in your homework every day of the month. That reward is a Coke and candy bar. 

The first week of school Miles brought home 4-5 papers that talked negatively about Carson. At first it was kind of funny, but then it was a little alarming. He talked about how we went to the beach for baseball and we "had to take my brother. He was really bad in the car."

This one says, "My brother is mean. My dad is tall. My mom is short." That one is a keeper.

"I have a mean 3 year old brother." These are just three examples, but there are more. I finally had a talk with Miles b/c I wanted to make sure he wasn't really bitter towards Carson or truly struggling with how difficult Carson can be. He seems surprised and almost upset that I thought that he didn't 'like' Carson. His first words were, "I love him." The genuineness in his voice was sweet and convincing. I told him that we have to speak nicely of our family b/c we would never want anyone to think that we don't love each other. I heard him instantly making a change and saying nice things to Carson. I'm sure we all need that reminder from time to time.

Carson is enjoying school, but has had some rough patches. I think his ears have really been bothering him which translated to bad behavior. For a while, I was getting bad notes everyday. He even had to go to the office for calling his friends "booty heads". I think some of the notes are silly, but it's still been a rough couple of weeks. The school bus came for a visit today. He really liked that. He said, "I have good day mom."

He had a superhero day a couple weeks ago. He doesn't have any superhero shirts, but I managed to find this one stored away in Miles' room. 

Miles wore this shirt for Halloween when he was Carson's age. It yielded the cutest Halloween pictures to date.

As a follow up to last night's post....I thought I'd report that Carson came to our room in the middle of the night, got on the cot without waking us up, and went to sleep until morning!

This might be one of the worst habits we've ever fostered, but I simply cannot fight him like we fought Miles for years and years. He goes to bed easily every night which is huge. If he could continue this and we could get solid sleep, we are going to call that successful. Darrin and I went to bed before 10pm, which is much earlier than usual, and slept until after 5am. I felt so good all day and still do! That is one reason I'm awake and blogging instead of passed out on the couch.

We'll see what he does tonight. If he continues this, I might be able to blog more!