As I start off this blog, I'm not really sure what it'll become. I have a LiveJournal, but it's full of emo and rants and things very personal that I'm not particularly wanting the world at large to see. But I wanted to try NaBloPoMo for a month now that I've got a job and things to actually talk about every day besides trivial online drama or my own little mind. So I decided to start anew, with a blog rather than an LJ.
So anyway, I'm now working in an elementary school as a paraprofessional - Colony 1 computer tech. It's fun! I feel like it's my first real adult job - hell, I even get insurance! And the kids call me Ms. Livermore. I'm officially an Adult. Colony 1 is Kindergarten and 1st grade so I've gone from working with middle schoolers and high schoolers at the summer camp to the tiniest of the tiny. It's different - crazy - but not in a bad way. Just different. I've adjusted well enough, I think, instead of saying "Holy Crap" I've forced myself to say "Holy Cow" etc.
One thing I've found is similar whatever the age group, though - Parents. As horrible as a kid can behave, the parents take an entirely different skill set to deal with. Some are great! They volunteer and help with all the kids and have senses of humor and low and behold - their kids are usually great too. But there are the parents who either think their kid is God's Gift to the world and can do no wrong, so their kids end up being spoiled brats who don't think they need to follow the rules everyone else does. OR they're clingy, nosy, and hover around when they should really be letting us do our job and end up with oversensitive, babied children who are used to special treatment. It's ridiculous. We have a boy in our colony whose mother volunteers, which is great and all... but I never see her with a child that's not her own. She just follows him around all day! He comes outside late to recess, and if the kids do, they're not supposed to be able to go up to the big playground, they're supposed to stay back on the small one with the kids who chose to because they've missed the bell to go up. Teaches them to be on time and not dawdle getting their stuff together or in the lunch room. He comes out late, so we say he has to stay down, and his mom's all "Oh, I'll just take him up..." Lady, our inconvenience isn't the point here. We're trying to teach the kids the importance of being on time.
Then today, he comes in to play computer games, which the kids are allowed to do in the afternoons IF they have all their work done and have a computer pass. Well, they said that the substitute didn't know where the computer pass was, so that's all well and good, I set him up on a computer - and his mom follows him in and sits down next to him to play together. Bleh. I want to eyeroll a little bit but go on with my work when later it's time for his gym class, so i tell him it's time to stop and go to gym - he proceeds to have a fit if his mom won't come with him, which she won't because it's gym. But the fact that because his mummy wouldn't go with him he decided that meant he just didn't need to go - he said he was going to go home early with her and that gym and music weren't important. I winced. What an arrogant little turd. He's the type who argues with us over everything, and I know it's because of this. I hope he ended up going without his mum and if not that he doesn't get a bloody grade. It's ridiculous! You'd think parents would be easier to deal with, but the fact that you have no ability over them, can't hold them accountable - as bad as a kid can be, you have the power to do something about it. Parents know they can get away with it all... and I've come to really detest the ones who do.
So anyway, I'm now working in an elementary school as a paraprofessional - Colony 1 computer tech. It's fun! I feel like it's my first real adult job - hell, I even get insurance! And the kids call me Ms. Livermore. I'm officially an Adult. Colony 1 is Kindergarten and 1st grade so I've gone from working with middle schoolers and high schoolers at the summer camp to the tiniest of the tiny. It's different - crazy - but not in a bad way. Just different. I've adjusted well enough, I think, instead of saying "Holy Crap" I've forced myself to say "Holy Cow" etc.
One thing I've found is similar whatever the age group, though - Parents. As horrible as a kid can behave, the parents take an entirely different skill set to deal with. Some are great! They volunteer and help with all the kids and have senses of humor and low and behold - their kids are usually great too. But there are the parents who either think their kid is God's Gift to the world and can do no wrong, so their kids end up being spoiled brats who don't think they need to follow the rules everyone else does. OR they're clingy, nosy, and hover around when they should really be letting us do our job and end up with oversensitive, babied children who are used to special treatment. It's ridiculous. We have a boy in our colony whose mother volunteers, which is great and all... but I never see her with a child that's not her own. She just follows him around all day! He comes outside late to recess, and if the kids do, they're not supposed to be able to go up to the big playground, they're supposed to stay back on the small one with the kids who chose to because they've missed the bell to go up. Teaches them to be on time and not dawdle getting their stuff together or in the lunch room. He comes out late, so we say he has to stay down, and his mom's all "Oh, I'll just take him up..." Lady, our inconvenience isn't the point here. We're trying to teach the kids the importance of being on time.
Then today, he comes in to play computer games, which the kids are allowed to do in the afternoons IF they have all their work done and have a computer pass. Well, they said that the substitute didn't know where the computer pass was, so that's all well and good, I set him up on a computer - and his mom follows him in and sits down next to him to play together. Bleh. I want to eyeroll a little bit but go on with my work when later it's time for his gym class, so i tell him it's time to stop and go to gym - he proceeds to have a fit if his mom won't come with him, which she won't because it's gym. But the fact that because his mummy wouldn't go with him he decided that meant he just didn't need to go - he said he was going to go home early with her and that gym and music weren't important. I winced. What an arrogant little turd. He's the type who argues with us over everything, and I know it's because of this. I hope he ended up going without his mum and if not that he doesn't get a bloody grade. It's ridiculous! You'd think parents would be easier to deal with, but the fact that you have no ability over them, can't hold them accountable - as bad as a kid can be, you have the power to do something about it. Parents know they can get away with it all... and I've come to really detest the ones who do.
