Kiss My Knits!

So it’s not all doom and gloom, my daughter’s report card came home today, and she did improve in most every area. Her teacher says “she did extremely well on math quarterly testing” which was a concern for us, and her words-per-minute fluency jumped from 44 to 76 wpm.

So that’s good.

I finished Emily’s doll, and it looks good. I put it in the car next to her seat so she’d see it when I picked her up from school. I was looking forward to seeing her reaction.

Unfortunately, when I got to school, Emily’s teacher was waiting in the car line with her. Emily got in and was entranced with her doll – or so I think, because all I really got was a vague happy and excited vibe and something about how her shirt was finished now, because I had to pay attention to what the teacher was saying. Which wasn’t good.

Apparently Emily didn’t wash her hands after using the bathroom on the way to lunch. The bathroom monitor reported this, so Emily was sent back in to wash them, which she did angrily, jerking her hands and doing a perfunctory job. Afterwards, she had a huge screaming crying fit that had her on the floor multiple times in the hallway on the way to lunch. The teacher had to call the vice principal to take the class down to the lunchroom while the teacher took Emily to her resource classroom.

She didn’t calm down there, but stayed upset for a good half hour of continuous full-on hysteria. During that time, the principal and the school psychologist were also called in, to no avail.

Obviously, we didn’t go to Starbucks, which is reserved for good behavior days.

Her teacher says that’s the first time something that major has happened this year. Which, considering years past, I suppose is progress, but it’s not as much as I’d like. I’ve put in an e-mail to find out what finally calmed her down, since I didn’t think to ask at the time. Usually it’s time and solitude that help, so if they were calling in more and more people, I can see how the situation could escalate. It’s understandable – I think anybody would naturally want to call in more people to help. I’m curious to see if they know what finally got her to break out of her cycle and relax.

I’ll post about the doll later. I’m a little discouraged at the moment.