For reasons like suspending a 4 year old for sexual harassment, er, hugging (btw, that story pushed our little E TN news webpage onto Reddit.com). The child’s hugging is appropriate for continued emotional development.
Emotional Development
Most children aged four to five will:
- Still rely on caregivers, while no longer needing or wanting as much physical contact with caregivers as they received in infancy and as toddlers
- Continue to express emotions physically and to seek hugs and kisses
- Socialize with peers, begin to develop relationships, and learn to recognize some peers as friends and others as people they don’t like
- Have more opportunities to interact with peers, either through school or recreational activities, and will play with other children
[Source]
Today I get the pleasure of having a meeting at Noah’s school. I requested a meeting with one teacher and I ended up with a meeting with all his teacher’s and the vice-principal. This kind of ridiculousness makes me regret not homeschooling Noah this year.
Update: The meeting ended up being 5 women and me. The teacher and vice-principal were only interested in rhetoric and bureaucracy taking exactly the defensive posture I tried to get everyone to put aside. Btw, the meeting was called because at the beginning of the year my son lost a $9 book that my wife offered to replace and it was never replaced so while the rest of the class had books they could write in, my son had to do all his work on a loose leaf paper using a borrowed workbook. I found out about this last week. Absurd statements rolled from the primary teacher’s mouth such as "from the meeting with your wife I gathered the only reason your son is in school is to be a safety." She is a hateful person and I have less respect for her after my meeting than I did before.
This meeting also reinforced my belief that we made a mistake not homeschooling Noah for the fifth grade. One approach some friends used with their children was to home school only in the fifth grade. This gave the child some one-on-one time with the parent at a non-critical year. For instance, to do the one year in the sixth grade would potentially harm the child’s social opportunities through middle school. I think Noah would have learned more this year and had a better time at home. A home schooled child can have plenty of time for social interaction through community activities/sports, home school social networks, and home schooled group classes (that’s right, homeschooling does not imply a child locked away in a closet).
We have several friends that homeschool and it really has been a life changing for their children. They are learning more at their pace, whether it’s faster or slower than the school system believe they should be learning. They are learning a variety of different subjects, not just what it takes to pass a “state test at the end of the year so the school can get more money”. But the parents are very disciplined in the school day also. They have times for school work and for social activities.
Not only do the children have to be dedicated to doing the work so do the parents.
We homeschooled Tommy in the 8th grade and it was a great experience. With Cathy’s degrees we could have taken him all the way through high school but in his circumstances, the public high school was a better choice.
The home schooling community in Knoxville is very strong. I used to think that home schooling was just for religious nuts but really I am seeing home schooling as an increasingly smarter alternative to public education.
We are homeschooling again after two horrible years in the public schools. It is very rewarding and my kids are learning far more than they did in the public schools. I wish you the best of luck with what ever you decide to do. I know we are thankful to be homeschooling again. Do your research and find out what will work best if you do choose to do it. We found a homeschooling academy that works well for us.