There are some things teachers do not look forward to and November is one of them. Report cards, which take many volunteer hours to do, parent/teacher conferences which also take hours to appropriately prepare for are the first two. More than that, it is the welcome mat for the upcoming holidays. There are some things parents can do to make their child’s school life more productive than it normally is at the end of each year. Some teachers pretty much feel that come mid-November, the idea of teaching anything new, difficult or the least bit complex should be put on hold. The kids are falling to hype just the way many of us are. November brings Thanksgiving, which brings relatives in many instances. Children are excited to hear of all the plans for the day. They go along shopping for the turkey or turducken or tofurkey and see it become the 400 pound gorilla in the room until the holiday is over. Children know that right after Thanksgiving goes out the back door, _______ (fill in special day here) comes in the front. Even if your family doesn’t celebrate a holiday during this time, school is out. This is reason enough for kids to be excited. Something different is great, as long as it doesn’t last too long.
At the risk of seeming like jerks, teachers say very little about things these two months. We write our plans in pencil. It would help if parents could keep in mind that after the kids are wound up, they come spinning into classrooms the following day. Please:
-Don’t start baking cookies until December. Nothing says school’s out like staying up until 9pm putting frosting on sugar cookies.
-If Grandma and Grandpa are coming, hold the news inside until the morning of the day they arrive.
-Under no circumstances should you take children shopping for gifts with you. They become temporarily disassociated with reality, much like democrats on the evening of November 4. It takes a while for them to come down off the possibility high.
-Withhold all holiday plans from your children. Every day can be a new adventure. Pretend it’s spontaneous.
-Don’t let kids sign holiday cards. It adds a commitment to their celebrations…a binding contract.
-Keep bedtime what it always is. No late nights no matter how much fun they are having watching the adults play Trivial Pursuit like a blood sport. In fact, move bedtime to an hour earlier.
Families please, have mercy on your child’s teachers. Go along with us in our sometimes futile attempts to keep school a place of learning. If a bunch of art projects that take the shapes of turkeys, snow people, horns of plenty, and the ubiquitous evergreen trees start coming home, you’ll know we’ve given up.
Happy (Insert holiday here.)
