Wallace is so sweet and sensitive with lots of intense emotions. I am pretty blunt and matter of fact and have been struggling with keeping a confident but calm tone of voice with him this past year. I am conscious of it and working on it continually. I don’t want him to learn to not show his emotions but a full blown 20 minutes of screaming and crying because I knocked over a glass of water is a bit much..
Here’s a great article by Teacher Tom called The Technology of How to Treat Humans. He linked me a few more to read today after I commented on his post of Obedience Is Not the Goal. I’ve also been working on Stop Being So Stern by Janet Lansbury, and by working on it I mean it’s been open on my phone for a few weeks.
Today I tried to keep track of when I was using directives and then trying to rephrase it. We had a smooth lunchtime and nap prep but he didn’t actually fall asleep. As usual, I was worn out by the end of the night and used more directives than I wanted to at bedtime. Wallace was overtired so it was destined to be rough. I just heard a falling asleep sigh, so my quiet minute before schoolwork is almost over.
Yesterday’s nap when he woke up from a bad dream but fell right back to sleep in my arms.
