Tantrums

One of my smalls has been in day care with a bunch of much smaller children for quite some time.

She often handles things in a less than mature manner, but she's learning.

:)

Donna* is a cute little thing, chubby cheeks, beautiful strawberry blonde hair, and just full of stories and giggles and creative spirit. On Open House night, she came to my table with her parents and introduced herself to me.

"Hi, I'm Donna. I'll be in your after school care program."

She stuck out her hand, which I solemnly shook.

"Nice to meet you, Donna, my name is Susan. I'm sure we'll have a lot of fun together."

That was one of the only glimpses of maturity I've seen from her this year. ;)

Not really, she does pretty well. BUT.... she doesn't like transitions, particularly when it's time to go home and she's involved in a fun activity. And she will cry, stomp her feet, wail and be otherwise obnoxious if I let her.

I don't.

This afternoon, we came in from playing outside about 5. Since we close at 6, during that hour, most of the kids are picked up. Not a good time to make a big mess.

But several of the smaller ones wanted to play the restaurant game, and  after extracting a promise from them that 'the next parent who comes to pick up means that ALL of you must pitch in and put the restaurant away' I let them get stuff out. I turned off the lights in that corner of the room, although the room isn't dark even when the lights are off, and they got out the little LED candles, had their little tables set up and a pretty good game going.

Then, Alden and Ariana's dad came to get them.

I briskly said, "Okay guys, time to put the restaurant away."

And Donna just LOST it. Stomped a foot, folded her arms across her front, stuck out her lower lip, manufactured some tears and began to wail.

"I DON'T WANNA!!!!!!!"

"Donna, the deal was that it would all be put away when the next parent came to pick up. Alden and Ariana are going home, and it won't be long until you are going to leave, too. Time to clean up."

"I WON'T!!" She was winding up to really let it out, I could tell.

And I said firmly, "That's fine. Then the next time everyone plays restaurant, you will not be allowed to play."

And she INSTANTLY shut it off.

"I'm sorry," she said contritely.

Alden, Ariana, and Donna cleaned up the mess in short order, and about three minutes later, Donna's dad came in. She was all bubbly and cheerful and happy to see him (unusual, she usually pitches a fit when he comes to get her) and went right out with him, after saying, "I can just go home, I already cleaned up my stuff!"