Don't Lose Your Cubes!

Friday evening, we went to the Anson Elementary Kick Off Bash. They had free sno cones, hot dogs, pony rides, dunk tank with the principal sitting up top, wet sponges to throw at your teacher's face, and so on. It was a good time until Rick spoke with Katie's teacher, Mrs. Jobe. Our sweet daughter go into trouble twice during the first five days of school. Really? Twice? In the first week? That means she was good only 60% of the time. Her first crime was talking in class. The second was messing around rather than going to her place in the line. For the younger grades, the discipline program is based on these little connecting cubes. They start out with 5 various colored cubes, strung together on the corner of their desks. When you are naughty, you have to remove a cube and put it on the teacher's desk. That is better than having your name on a board, which can be extremely humiliating for a youngster. I believe that they get back their cubes at the end of each day. Also, if I remember correctly, the teachers give a verbal warning first and if you do it a second time, off comes a cube. Let's hope that was a learning experience for her and she understands what the teacher's expectations are. I reminded Katie that she needs to conduct herself in school as she does in tae kwon do, such as "Yes ma'am.", "No ma'am."; eyes on the teacher, being at attention and being a strong leader.

Speaking of tae kwon do, Katie was strong in tae kwon do this week. However, Friday she was super duper strong. Twice the instructor stopped the class to show the class how strong Katie was, how she was paying attention and the fact that she stayed in her fighting stance while waiting her turn. Compliments are jet fuel for that child. You get pretty darn far with compliments as opposed to reprimands.

Katie enjoyed her first weekend during the school year. I didn't want her to stay up late just because she didn't have school the next day. I want to try to keep her on her schedule and it will be a lot easier come Monday morning. I figure her rewards for the weekend days is that she gets to sleep in, which means instead of 6 am she gets up at 7 am.

Rick is traveling this week so you have his daily picture to which to look forward. In the meantime I have included some photos from the Bash.

 Stylish ensemble for the Bash

Mmmmm, sno-cones

 Mr. London, Katie's principal. Katie's aim was off so she didn't give him a swim in the water.

 Throwing darts. She popped one balloon.

 The mascot for Anson, a tiger.

 Pony ride

Mrs. Jobe, Katie's teacher