- They're not scared of me: They always quiet down immediately when Mr. Myles, who's 62 and extremely tall, walks into the room/gym. Unfortunately, I feel like he thinks this proves something because he can so easily control them, and he thinks that they'll act better when in actuality, they just act more correctly for the short amounts of time that he's with them during the day.
- My meanness is too sarcastic, so the sophomores think I'm kidding with them and am not serious. Also, I do play with them and act really nice the majority of the time, so it might be confusing; if I were more like Cris and always seemed somewhat cranky, perhaps they wouldn't mistake me for such a nice person. For instance, Denaryus kept touching my leg over and over again on Tuesday even after I had to hit the wall out of frustration and had literally thrown his hands off of me. Honestly Denaryus in general will not stop messing with me, and I have resorted to telling him to leave me alone about 5 times a day because he just doesn't know when to quit.
- Some of the little boys have crushes on me, and this doesn't lend itself to them feeling that I have authority over them. This especially applies to Jaylin who has some trouble with his temper and tends to get angry and call other children losers/also reacts very badly when I will not sit next to him (usually because I'm tired of having to deal with his issues or just feel like talking about something else other than what food he has for lunch). Unfortunately, Jaylin is a really confusing case because I feel like he ignores me a lot throughout the day, but then during lunch or something he'll announce that he loves me, which is just awkward to deal with from a 7 year old. Now that he isn't sitting with me at lunch, he only really ever has problems with trying to be all up on me during snack/when I'm reading to Maya/Issy. Plus he missed me terribly when I took time off last week, so his greeting was a little more enthusiastic than I expected it to be. This theory also applies to Denaryus who will not do what I tell him to ever; I can't say how many times I've had to chase him around the gym/room/playground because he's doing something completely ridiculous and won't stop when I say so.
- Despite the fact that I do some of the same things to punish them as Cris does (like put them on the wall/black line when they're acting up in the bleachers), he makes everything sound worse because his voice is super scary when he sounds mad, so they listen better to him. Plus in general, the boys do not respond as well to women; even the male junior counselors can sometimes be more effective than me and junior counselors like Jordan. Furthermore, I'm not as readily angry as Cris is about them being "too loud," so sometimes I let them get more out of hand before I try to get them under control, and then it's too late, especially because they seriously do not listen to my pleas with them to be quiet and do as I tell them. Miss G and Mrs. Michelle have both commented that the children are just mean and disrespectful to me a lot of the time, and Miss Sharon has had to yell at the children on my behalf a few times because they literally ignore my requests and follow hers immediately. I also have this problem with Victoria who is 6 and just never listens. I spend most of my time with her carrying her around because she won't do anything when I give her instructions, like today when she wouldn't get off the top row of the bleachers or the volleyball pole no matter how many times I told her.
- I don't look enough like someone's mother, so they don't take me as seriously. This theory is based on the fact that Michelle and Sharon who are older and have children of their own (Miss Sharon is Cris's(24 years old) mom, and Michelle's oldest child is Jordan who's 14)/they are also well versed in the motherly yelling which seems highly more effective than my brand of discipline which usually consists of trying to appeal to their sense of reason (which clearly they must not have).
- Generally, my inability to raise my voice in a threatening manner, especially due to my neverending cold (which makes my throat hurt) can cause many problems; I realize that I need to raise my voice to get through to them, and I really try, but I find it discouraging because I feel like I try to get them to listen, and nothing ever changes, so I almost don't want to try anymore because there seems to be no point to it, and all it does is make me more frustrated and upset with myself; however, if Mr. Myles scares them enough like when they all sat on the gym floor and had to earn their way into the bleachers, they become very manageable without requiring the use of a very forceful voice.
- They are spoiled and don't want to listen to anyone who tells them to do anything at a certain time; they only want to do things they consider fun which may include ignoring my requests that they not play on the bleachers so that they do not smack their heads on the floor like Jaylin did the other day. Also for Brandon who is constantly pouting about something or saying he thinks something's stupid/having a complex about other people laughing at him, he obviously thinks his ideas about everything are superior and doesn't want to listen at all or follow directions. Brandon tends to say things to me like I wasn't going to hurt myself when I try to tell him not to play on something we've deemed dangerous on the playground or tells me that he was just playing when he was fighting with another boy, but since they're supposed to keep their hands to themselves, the ridiculous amount of touching that he and others do is just highly unnecessary. If they could just stop being so up on one another every second of every day, I think that there would be a few less problems; assigned seating in lunch/snack seems to help this problem slightly, but it's hard to keep them in their same seat for a very extended period of time, even during lunch. Issy also has major problems with listening and just refuses to do things the majority of the time and likes to cry all the time "like a little punk" as her aunt says.
jul 4 2009 ∞
feb 22 2010 +