The man said to me “and here’s your tropical paradise” as he handed me my mango pineapple smoothie.  It needed a little umbrella perhaps, but on a crazy windy day in Nebraska, this was probably as close as I was going to get to an actual tropical paradise.  He handed it to me with a great big smile and wished me a good day, much like the gentlemen who took my card, took a minute, smiled, looked at me and commented, it’s a great day, isn’t it?  It was a very simple but wonderful way to start my day in my little yellow bug with my little yellow smoothie, and all it took was a smile and a pleasant greeting from some very nice McDonald’s employees.

Now, McDonald’s is certainly not the food mecca of the world, but they do train their employees to be kind and courteous for the most part, much like any food service organization.  But these guys took the time to make eye contact and seemed genuine in their greetings and it made me feel good.  As I drove away I thought, what a great way to start my morning!  How hard is it for us to do the same and why is it so hard to teach this to children?

I arrived at school, still feeling pretty good and used that extra energy to get some things finished before the kids arrived for choir.  We always start with a pleasant greeting to each other and we get to work, and again, I’m feeling pretty good until the rudeness starts.  And the disrespect.  And the unkind words to each other.  And within minutes the sunshine that had been brought into my life by two very kind people had been overshadowed by the negativity that was my choir.  My kids blamed it on being a Monday, on being tired, or because someone was in their spot or any other number of things, but even my usually cheerful kids were brought down by the bad attitudes.

My attitude changed as well.  I looked at the kids and thought, okay, if this is any indication of how the day is going to go, we’re in trouble.  Whether it was the full moon coming or the storms on the horizon, something had these kids going more than usual.  I often wonder if some of this is brought on because I’m expecting it to be crazy.  Am I also putting out some negativity that just allows it to continue?

I think this is one of the reasons teaching is just so stressful.  The students come in with expectations they may have about what they want to do or how they may behave and some of them are surprised by the different expectations at school.  When I have a child curled up on the floor crying because they want just “one more chance” because they don’t want an earned consequence for their actions, this shows me that somewhere along the line, someone has said something like, “okay, you get one more chance” and then the child gets several more chances.  When you have the expectation that a child will look at you while you teach and their entire life is spent looking down at a screen, there’s a difference in expectations.  When you have a child that hits first and thinks later, and then they expect you to understand that the other person made them do it, there’s a difference of expectations.  When you have a child who is allowed to stand up on seats and yell in a restaurant and you expect them to sit and eat their lunch at school, there is a difference of expectations.

The difference in classroom behaviors today as compared to, let’s say even 20 years ago, was that behavioral expectations for children were more universal.  What was expected at school was an extension of what was expected in most homes.  A lot of those expectations in homes have changed drastically with children running some households because parents are either too busy or too overwhelmed to do something about it.  Sometimes parents lack the parenting skills to help set boundaries for their children and don’t know how to guide them to treat people and things with respect, to use kind words and deeds.  Maybe they didn’t have an example to follow or maybe it’s just the culture as a whole, where everything is about “me” and my wants and not about anyone else.

Unfortunately this type of behavior, attitude, lack of boundaries and differences in expectations make things especially difficult in the classroom.  The child who gets whatever they want at home and who doesn’t at school honestly doesn’t understand why.  The child who is not given the responsibility of picking up after themselves at home is not going to understand why they have to at school.  The child who is allowed to say whatever he or she wants at home is not going to understand the insistence upon respectful words at school.  So, maybe it’s not a matter of training the children, but offering to work with parents so that as adults, we can all be on the same page and stop confusing the kids.

And in the meantime I’ll probably make my morning stop for a little bit of tropical paradise and maybe be more of a sunshine yellow for my class tomorrow.