Ask Hal – Getting in Trouble at School
Dear Hal,
My daughter, 7, has been getting in trouble in school. Either being too aggressive with the other children, or taking things, or hiding things from other children. When she is confronted by the teacher or assistant principal, she denies it. Even though it is quite obvious that she had done the offense. I cannot use the strategy that this is her business and she will receive the natural consequences, because the school calls me to handle it. I talk to my daughter but it is in one ear and out the next. Otherwise, academically she is doing great. I try to tell her that getting 100s is not everything; you must behave. She is bigger than most of the girls in her class and I want to prevent her from turning into a bully.
You probably wouldn’t be surprised by the large number of questions I receive about school behavior. Whether it’s complicated by coinciding academic struggles, or it’s all the more confusing, as in your case, because there are no academic troubles, kids’ misbehavior at schools can take all forms and confuse all stereotypes. There simply is no simple formula to explain or confront it.
But there is one process that always complicates it. It’s called The Triangle. The Triangle is how most human relationships function. Since one-to-one relationships are inherently full of anxiety (whereby people have to actually confront one another), most find a third party to help find security and balance. A husband and wife don’t confront one another about their dying marriage, for example, they simply focus more and more on their struggling kid.
In your case, the triangle is between you, your daughter, and her school. The school is upset about your daughter’s behavior, so they contact you. You are upset about her behavior as well, and you’re frustrated with the way the school handles it. Both of you have tried confronting your daughter about it, but she exercises some simple defense mechanisms (ignoring you, denial to the school), and you’re both left looking at each other again.
This is a classic triangle that occurs all the time, with the student/child at the center of it all. The only way out of the triangle is to correct just that. The child is not the issue. Your daughter is not the issue. The issue is your anxiety about her behavior. The issue is the school’s anxiety about not knowing how to make your daughter conform, and your apparent inability as well. What’s fascinating is that all of you are dreading your daughter becoming a bully, and yet you’re all creating her to be one by letting her bully you around!
Confronting our own anxiety is always, always the way out of the triangle. So since you cannot fix the school’s anxiety (that’s their problem), and you cannot fix your daughter’s behavior (that’s her problem), you must turn to focus on yourself. What makes you afraid of truly confronting your daughter. Not just “talking to her,” but confronting her in a way that lets her know her place. Like, “I don’t care if you get 100s; what I care about is how you treat others. And you will not bully other kids–ever. I don’t know what the school’s going to do, and I don’t know what you’re going to do about it, but here’s what I’m going to do–I’m going to (pick a consequence here, any consequence). I don’t care if you don’t care about (losing privileges, spending the day in her room, whatever consequence you choose), I’m still going to do it.”
Your fear about her becoming a bully has led you to treat her as if she already were one. Confront your fear first, reminding yourself that she’s simply a little kid trying to figure out her way in the world, and you’re an adult called to lead her out into the world. Then confront her about how you’re going to respond to her from now on. And then confront the school about what you believe is, and is not, their responsibility.
But it all begins with confronting yourself. I promise the way out of the triangle will become clearer every time you do.
(5 votes, average: 3.2 out of 5)
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