February 3, 2004 - Tuesday
Twice today when I was at Harry's school I witnessed hitting incidents. The first actually involved Harry getting punched in the stomach by his "best friend," although it wasn't particularly hard and seemed more like one of those experimental things that young children do. And, aside from wanting to make sure Harry was OK with it, wasn't really all that concerned by it. The other didn't involve Harry, but I was the only adult to see it happen and, therefore, when the aggressor happen to come directly passed where I was sitting with Harry I held out my arm and stopped him, telling him that hitting was not all right and instructing him to go speak with his teacher about what had just happened.

What is somewhat alarming is that the group of children, mostly boys, that are in Harry Pre-K class are a very living bunch and that this sort of behavior is, because of the atmosphere I often seem to witness, not all that surprising. I know that the center is aware of the problem and are continuing to search for ways to keep things under control. Ultimately, it seems Harry's exposure to this sort of behavior is more luck of the draw - the specific group of kids he's ended up with at this center - than any poor reflection of the center. To be philosophical about it, I suppose I can look at from one of two ways:

First, Harry is going to be exposed to rough kids pretty soon any if he is going to go into the public school system and it might as well be now when there are a greater percentage of teachers to students than, say, kindergarten or first grade.

On the other hand, he's getting very mixed messages from home and at school at that isn't very good for any of us. At home there is no margin of error for that kind of behavior, while at school he sees that all the other kids are doing it. I guess the only good thing with that is that we'll start refining our message now for when he's a teenager.


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