The Write Stuff

In the world of single parenting homework in my house can be lie pulling teeth from a rabid crocodile. In fact, while trying to negotiate with Red Chief about his writing in kindergarden, I've come up really short. As one who teaches the occasional English composition classes, for me the problem is especially perplexing. You see, as a Kindergardener, by the time they complete end of grade assessment, kids are expected to be at certain bench marks. For Red, writing a page in under 20 minutes represents achievement. For some reason, I can coach my students, but I cannot coach my child. On the day he was supposed to have his writing test, I'm told to go see the teacher because Red only wrote two lines in 30 minutes. For me, this sends up an alarm because two weeks earlier when we dealt with this episode, I had to sit with him at the school; and with me looking over his shoulder, he wrote. On the day of the actual test, when I learned about this, my reaction was typical: this boy is being stubborn. At the same time, I'm thinking the boy needs proper motivation. So I drive him to Best Buy and I'm not too happy with myself for what I'm about to do. I buckle under pressure.
Pleading with him, I tell him look, if you do good on the writing test tomorrow, I will start making arrangements to get you the video game you want for your birthday early. Note this damn video game system cost $300.00. Yep, I was that desperate. True to form, he excels on the writing test. I flatly elated because I knew my son could do it, but really, I'm giving him $300.00 for two pages of writing. Something about this just doesn't seem right, but a deal is a deal and so I was committed to buying a $300.00 video game. Enter the deal breaker. After a trip to the zoo, Red's class is given an impromptu writing assignment where they have to write about the zoo the next day. Red turns in a paper with two lines and cavalierly saunters to the teacher to deposit his masterpiece. The teacher tells Redmond this is only two lines. Big Red tells her unapologetically, the zoo is over. Not too thrilled with his retort, she tells him she's going to tell his father. He's like ok tell him. Needless to say when I heard about this, I was calling his actions, completely unacceptable. Note, I was using my doctor professorial language in front of the teachers. When I was telling his grandmother about it, I called the boy a 21st century version of Gary Coleman. I was not happy with him and needless to say, the video game was put on hold (thankfully). So tonight, in going through homework blues, again I had to deal with mild defiance. I refuse to spank my child over academic non compliance, but it does not mean I can't withhold privileges. So his favorite toy was taken away. As he came back in tears, I felt bad. I can teach adults (well, 18 year olds) but I can't teach my child; this is unreal. So enter empathy and strategy.
Red and I had a talk. I showed him some of the positives of writing. I showed him my dissertation (which he drew on), some newspaper writings, a national pop article, and most recently, a response I got from the President (though I believe it was his team of interns). I told him that writing represents power and can take you many places. When I shared with him the salutation, I said even the President of the United States calls me doctor. No I don't know what that means to him, but I hope that he will one day understand that writing is the gateway to bigger and better things.