It says, *I will not hit my sister in the face.*
After some thoughtful, chuckling deliberation I decided to make my son, the 6.32 year old Prince write that out on two sides of legal paper.
Admittedly, I did crack myself up - justifying the masochism by the fact that he not only really shouldn't be whopping his (deserving!) sister in the face, but also by the reality that he really needs the handwriting practice.
I vividly remember my father making me *write* for punishment. My depraved aunt did as well.
And I had a teacher in 4th grade - a crazy, lazy Armenian "Mr. Ellion"(sp?) - who sentenced misbehaving students to write, well, about every 10 minutes or so. Usually it was *2 pages, both sides* but occasionally he'd erupt to 3 or 4 pages, both sides. He made you write *I will not...* whatever it was you were doing at the time.
Once, now we're talking 1983-1984, he waddled into the classroom and a racial minority was doing the centipede on the radiator. Caught, Mike Burrell had to write *I will not do the centipede on the radiator in Mr. Ellion's classroom ever again.* on a cruel 4 pages of paper, both sides.
That was called *breakdancing*, you Moronic children (and forgetful-'old coots')!
Anyways, my son keeps walloping his sister in the face. Just the other day, he bloodied her lip up good in the middle of a pizza joint.
He doesn't have to tell me as I well know how FREAKIN' ANNOYING she can be.
But he's got to learn to pound her on her arm - charlie-horse style. That's what I used to do. I used to pound my sisters on their upper arm with a full punch. Anything near the face and my biological father would kill me.
I'm so exasperated with my son's incorrigible face-hitting that I'm contemplating teaching him my method from way back when.
We're not there yet though; next time he'll have to do four pages, both sides, and we'll see if that is effective.
Here's a better video:
Rereading this post I found an error - I was actually the racial minority in that school!
5 comments:
I was the younger sister who used to get beat up. Don't let your son do it. Annoying is no excuse for physically hitting. Ever.
I know time-out probably seems like a sissy maneuver to you but it works. Make him spend an hour sitting on his bed doing NOTHING. It'll work.
Hah!
Time-outs work as well as *marriage counseling*.
Are you serious, Anne?
I make the kids sit in the bathroom - or outside on the steps when it's cold.
If memory serves, I wrote a post on the ineffectiveness and inanity of time-outs way back when. But I might be hard pressed to find it.
I figured you would think that way but having been a parent far longer with you and having twice as many kids as you do I have to say I have the upper hand in this argument.
First of all, I will say that different forms of punishment work differently according to the kid. For instance, Christian parenting often emphasizes corporal punishment and I have no problem with spanking though I think it should be used more rarely than some believe. My middle son, however, did not respond to spankings. He would just get his back up even more. One day out of exasperation more than anything else I sent him to sit on his bed. Within thirty seconds he was crying and saying he was sorry. He was truly repentant. I decided that because he is such a socially oriented kid that for him to be sent away from the rest of the family was a much worse punishment. So that is what I began to use with him.
When my two older boys would fight, sometimes I would just say you sit here and you sit here and you don't get to play. They would immediately apologize and make nice with each other because they wanted to play with each other...and it taught them to negotiate with each other before mom stepped in.
By the way, oh illustrious one, you are contradicting yourself and you have actually confirmed my argument. What do you call it when you make your kids sit in the bathroom or sit outside? That IS time-out.
Anne,
It's only *time out* if they are *playing a game* or goofing around.
I run a tight ship here - all work and no play!
By your logic, any break in the action,....for example, getting sent to the hole in a prison would be a categorical *time out*.
I like to think my punishments are more like the hole than like basketball time outs.
My son is good and smart enough to realize that there's no easier path in his life than listening to me. He seldom gets punished.
His sister is another animal altogether.
She doesn't really wise up for any threats or penalties - but she does really, really hate to *lose dessert*. So that's my biggest weapon. Not only did she lose it tonight for numerous infractions....I gave her brother his chocolate chip cookies right in front of her to rub it in this time. She was fighting back tears at the reminder.
I have no doubt that I will one day (soon?) figure out how best to get good behavior out of her. Although she does come from a long unbroken line of crazy women (From Eve,.....grandmothers, first wife, Christine)!
I think we are just talking semantics.
Believe me, my kids will tell you their mom is tough, but wonderful! Remember my post about that Seinfeld episode I watched with my kids? He tells his audience, "When I grew up I wondered why I had been so afraid of my parents?" - and my two older children started laughing uproariously. I asked them why and they said, "Because we KNOW why we were afraid of you."
Last night my daughter was over visiting and having dinner with us. Her 17-year old brother, as he sometimes does, was annoying me. I said something to him to the effect that I would "always be your mother." - i.e. this is your warning. I think I even said something about not liking him and he was all (pretend) hurt and said, "you mean you don't like me?" - to which his sister responded, "She will always LOVE you but she doesn't always like you!" Just another fun family moment at the Galivan house.
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