she listens, she really listens

Everyday at day care Ada's teachers fill out a daily sheet about how Ada's day went. When she was in the infant room it was an extremely detailed sheet that basically gave us a breakdown of every movement she made. The Toddler room sheet was a little less detailed but still let us know every time Ada pooped or how long her nap was. Now that Ada is in the 2 year old room the daily sheet is pretty brief - a total of six possible check boxes and a section for notes on her day. We don't really pay attention to what these check boxes are unless one of them isn't checked. Recently there have been a LOT of unchecked boxes especially around sharing with friends, helping out, and listening. Now I always got mostly A's and B's in school and there is a part of me deep down that sees Ada's unchecked boxes as the first indication of her spiral down into the world of C's and D's. Ok it is a very very small part of me, but I'd still like her to get all of her check marks.

So on Tuesday morning, after noticing a missing check mark next to listening on Monday, I talked to Ada about being a good listener and how it was important for her to listen to her teachers. We have a process in our house where if Ada is not listening to us we tell her she can do whatever we are asking the easy way or the hard way and we count down from 10 to allow her to make up her mind. She is yet to defy the 10 seconds. It works, but I think it has set Ada up for missing check marks at school since her teachers don't have the time to do that with every kid. So I explained to Ada that she had to listen without the 10 second countdown at school. I figured I was just filling the air with words, but when I picked her up from school that evening right there next to 'Listening' was a big fat check mark, and a comment from her teacher about what a good listener she was all day. However, it wasn't all good news, the box next to 'Good Helper' was amazingly blank.

Given my seemingly good success with the whole listening thing I decided to give the helping out item a try. So on the way to day care yesterday Ada and I had a big talk about helping out her teachers. She nodded, and again I wondered if I was just filling the air with my words. But when we picked her up yesterday she had ALL of her check marks, and a comment about how she was a 'Really big helper!'.

I feel so proud that she actually listened to me. Of course there is always the possibility that Ada rolled into day care, plopped down a twenty and said, "Yo teach, I need that check mark next to helping out, and there is a extra 5 in it for you if you throw in a comment with an exclamation mark."