Family Values

Cole had his first detention yesterday. He didn’t complete his desk work during class time so he had to stay after school to finish. I went to his class at about 3:10 pm to pick him up. He was just finishing off his work when I arrived. I had a talk with his teacher about how things were going and helped him clean the garbage (pencil shavings, broken erasers, etc) out of his desk. This all seemed like a logical consequence to me.

I found out from his teacher today that some of his classmates have been asking if they can stay after school too. Apparently Cole really liked having the extra attention from his teacher and having me giving him attention after class. He was telling all his friends about it and making it sound so good that they all wanted to have a chance to get that ‘treat’ too.

Not quite the result that we were expecting. Today when he didn’t finish his desk work in the morning his teacher had him stay in at lunch. From 12:00-12:15 he did desk work, then from 12:15-12:30 he ate lunch. His teacher said that she had never seen him so focused, he finished his desk work faster than normal and ate all his lunch in record time so that he could get outside and play with his friends. We all agree that lunch time detention was less of a treat for him.