How to Apologize to Your Child's Pre-School Teacher

“Could you stay after a second?”

I’m standing in the hallway outside Sarah’s preschool class when I hear these dreaded words.  Once again I get to partake in the awkward conversation about what Sarah did in class that day.  We’ve had talks about such things as: throwing sand in other kid’s eyes, kicking sand at other kids, biting, not sharing, not listening, not participating, wetting her pants five times in a two hour period, and basically just doing what she wants when she wants.

All of the children are directed out to their parents, one by one, their little backpacks and art projects in hand.  After the other parents have trotted off with their little tots one of the teachers stays in the classroom with Sarah and distracts her with something or other while the other teacher pulls me aside and says, “Today we had a little incident during recess.”

“Oh?” I say, hopeful that maybe it was someone else’s kid who’d done the damage this time.

“Yeah, while we were all playing outside Sarah came back in the classroom and locked all the doors.”

It takes everything I have not to laugh.  Sarah was starting to get more creative.  The most interesting thing about my conversations with Sarah’s teachers is that she has never been called out on for the same thing twice.  She gets in trouble for something, is told to never do it again, and then she never does (at preschool, at least).  Her ingenuity for new and improved ways to act out at school was truly impressive... in a very naughty way, of course.

We finish off our little discussion in the same way as all the others.  I can’t believe she did that, we’ll talk about it when we get home, blah, blah, blah.  It’s just going to end up with the same result.  We’ll be here again next week talking about her newest adventures and their consequences.

In all the months we’ve been in preschool I’ve never noticed the other parents getting pulled aside for the awkward conversation, unless they were the parents of the victims of Sarah’s sand throwing and biting phases.  I can’t help but wonder if I’m doing something wrong.  But, honestly, how do you pre-empt something like locking the teachers out of the classroom?  It doesn’t quite fall into the category of “make sure you listen to your teachers and do what they say” discussions.  After all, she did unlock the doors when they asked her to.

So, barring my coming up with every feasible way of acting out and having a talk with her about it I’m left with apologizing sincerely and often.  When they ask for treats for class parties I make home-made cinnamon rolls with sprinkles.  When they ask for cardboard oatmeal canisters I bring several.  When they ask for toilet paper rolls I bring them by the dozen.  This, in combination with Sarah’s curly-haired cuteness, I hope is enough to at least bring us to a neutral ground.

The goal is that by the time Sarah reaches kindergarten she will have mastered such skills of sitting still, listening, and playing nice with the other kids.  Two years should be long enough, right?