Last night I was the guest teacher of fourteen 8-11 year old girls from church. We had the meeting at my house since it’s easier to SHOW organization than explain it (to me anyway).
As they entered my home I asked them to kindly remove their shoes (if you’re an adult I don’t ask you to) then have a seat in the living room. A few ran right downstairs another few over to my kitchen counter and a handful listened and sat on the couch. We rounded them up and I explained what was expected of them while at my house: we have original artwork so be careful and do not touch or lick (you never know).
We started in the kitchen where I showed them our candy buckets (there are 2.5 large containers of pretty-much every candy known to man) and said,
“If y’all behave, then you get to have a treat out of the bucket and the best behaved gets first pick.”
Throughout the lesson, as we toured my house and I explained ways to organize, there were some down-right unruly girls that thought they had to entertain everyone. They talked over each other and me, opened drawers to see what was in them, touched stuff, ran around and jumped into a bed – under the covers (there were 3 of them that did that).
By the time we got to the basement, I about had enough of little girls.
To be fair, not ALL of them were horrendous, but the ones were so much so that it was difficult to notice the girls who were behaving. Time was not up yet but I was. As they gathered onto the couch and quieted down a titch I went into my spiel about how shocked and amazed at how disrespectful, rude and obnoxious most of them had been. Silence. A few squealed that they were being good (of course they weren’t the ones REALLY being good because the ones REALLY being good wouldn’t say that). A couple gave excuses why they were naughty (she started it, I’m never like this at home or at school, we always act like this). The good girls sat doe-eyed staring right at me. Then I told them that there will NOT be any treats from me tonight because they didn’t deserve it. Squawk. Squeal.
“But you TOLD us we’d get to have treats.”
Yes, I did but I also said you have to behave in order to get some.
“You already went through the trouble to make them so we should get to at least take one home.”
Um, no. You’re not getting rewarded for acting so rude.
“What if we behave right now, then can we have some.”
No. You are NOT getting any treats tonight. So stop asking.
“Well, you should at least give treats to the girls who didn’t misbehave.”
Nobody is getting treats; you ruined it for everyone.
I tried to finish what I had to say, asking them questions about their rooms and what to do with all their stuff and THEN they tried to behave acting all sweet. At the very end I told them that even though I was flabbergasted at their behavior I still loved them and because I was upset with how the evening turned out I still think they’re great people but that they have some behavior issues to work on. I told them that hopefully they’ll remember that it was a bummer they didn’t get treats and next time they’ll be better behaved.
So tonight I went to the 7 girls’ houses that WERE well-behaved and told their parents in front of them that I was thankful they were so nice to have over and it wasn’t fair the naughty girls spoiled it and I gave them a treat as a thank you for their good behavior. One of the parents that came to pick up her 2 girls got a report of how her girls behaved and she was thankful to know that. I don’t think every mother would’ve agreed with my solution.
What would you have done?
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