Some Thoughts on Behavior

Does anyone remember this face that I posted awhile back?

For quite awhile it seemed like all I was getting from Ezra was anger, sadness, tantrums, crying, and fighting with his brothers and me. Talk about exhausting! I also posted some of my strategies - for sibling rivalry and anger. Well, I'm not sure what happened, if these strategies "worked" or what, but man I am seeing a huge difference in Ezra's behavior. This past week I have received countless spontaneous hugs and kisses and I've gone from "Bad Mommy" to "The Best Mommy in the Whole World." That sure feels good!

Sometimes with my kids I feel like things go in waves. They start to push and push to find that boundary line, testing to see how far they can go. Really I think they're trying to see how secure they are in these loving limits. It gets to the point where I start to think, "I can't take it anymore! I can't stand this kid, his behavior is out of control, something must be done!" And then, just when I feel that nothing I'm doing is working, it lets up. It's like he knows he's ok. He's safe in our love. The boundaries are there, he's found them to hold firm, they won't move and he can relax and breathe and be content and secure and happy once more. Phew!

I'm glad my snuggle bear is back. I know he never left, but I was starting to wonder!

It Worked!

I've been trying to apply some of the principles of "Siblings Without Rivalry." The fighting is driving me up the wall - something must be done! Here are five steps outlined in the book (there are other steps when the situation is potentially dangerous or really difficult to resolve):

1. Start by acknowledging the children's anger towards each other. That alone should help calm them.
2. Listen to each child's side with respect.
3. Show appreciation for the difficulty of the problem.
4. Express faith in their ability to work out a mutually agreeable solution.
5. Leave the room.

So here's one scenario from today:

Ezzy: Screaming. It's that close-to-a-tantrum kind of scream.

I walk into the room and Kai has the little foam couch and is hiding in it. Ezra grabs it. Kai lunges for Ezra, grabs the couch back and returns to hiding in it. Ezra continues screaming. Uh oh - volatile situation!

Me: Ezzy, you want to use the couch?
Ezzy stops screaming long enough to nod.
Me: Kai, you do too, right?
Kai grunts in agreement from inside his hiding place.
Me: Hmmm... two kids who both want to use the couch. That's really tough. I bet if you work together you can come up with a solution that's fair to each of you.

Then I left the room.

This is what I heard as I was changing Koa's diaper.

Kai: Ok, come on Ezzy, I have an idea. We can go in the living room and build a fort. It's going to be really cool.
Ezra: no.
Kai went on describing the fort and trying to convince Ezra. Ezra was so worked up he wasn't going to come around easily. They continued arguing for a little bit and then next thing I knew both boys were happily walking to the living room to build a fort together.

Success!

Here the happy brothers are playing in their fort together.

I cannot believe it actually worked!!! Now if I can just be consistent and continue to do this. It's hard. I really like this idea from the book. The authors say:

Basically we try not to interfere, but when we must step in, it's always with the thought that at the earliest possible moment we want to turn the children back to dealing with each other. We want them to experience themselves as solvers of problems. That's the best preparation we can give them for the rest of their lives (p. 174).

What a day

Well, today was my first day back to homeschooling since having Koa and our first official day with Sonlight - our new curriculum. I think overall the day was positive but it was not without some tense moments.
This moment was a triumph. Kai was really giving me a hard time about doing any chores because he "just didn't want to." He finally made a good "choice" (I told him he could either do his chore quickly and we can move on to the next activity, or if not we could keep working on chores for the rest of the day). That kind of kicked him into gear and he actually went above and beyond what I asked him to do and was very proud of himself.

I have to include this picture because this is what I'm seeing a lot of these days with Ezzy. Actually taking this picture kind of snapped him out of this fit he was throwing, he was so surprised and then wanted to see his photo. Right now we're working on "Angry Choices." This is something that really worked with Kai at his age. Just knowing that it's ok to be angry - and there are things you can do when you're angry instead of hurting other people. I feel like I am saying the same thing over and over and over to him. I know he's going to get this - I have faith! Poor guy - it's tough to have such strong emotions and not know what to do with them.

Another struggle I have with Kai is writing - he does not like writing at all, especially any type of work with handwriting. I'm not sure what to do because he needs to be writing and he puts up a fight when it comes down to it. So we did this activity today - writing in shaving cream - bubbles and sticks. I think it really helped because a little later Kai sat down and did a whole page of handwriting. So hopefully this will get easier. I hope, I hope.

I love what I'm doing right now, but in those tense moments (for instance when every child is screaming or crying at the same time - last night at bath time this did actually happen) I sometimes seriously think I'm just going to lose it. I get frustrated, I get angry, I get irritated, I yell - and I know that is completely not productive or helpful in any way. Sigh. Luckily my kids have grace with me and we seem to pull through together and keep moving forward. In the end there's always lots of hugs and lots of love. No matter what has happened in the day, I can always count on laying down with Jude at bedtime and without fail he gives me a hug and kiss and says, "I love you so much mommy" over and over again. You can't beat that.

Tomorrow is a new day and a new adventure!

First day on my own

Our family left yesterday and that means it is back to reality for the Freeman family! I realize that if I am going to manage these four on my own I can't do it all. I need these boys to start pitching in and taking some responsibility. I was encouraged by The Successful Homeschool Family Handbook (that I referenced earlier). They place an emphasis on work being as important as academics. The Moore's say that it is good for children's self worth to know that they are an important, valuable and needed family member. One suggestion they make is to never do anything for your kids that they can do themselves. This is harder than it sounds! When dealing with a 6, 4, 2 and newborn a lot of times it is faster, easier and more efficient to just do it myself. And that's really what I've been doing the last 7 years. It's definitely time to change my ways.

I called a "family meeting" (first ever) yesterday evening. I explained to the boys that now that Grandma's gone I'm going to need them to be helpers and take responsibility. That means cleaning up their toys, putting their clothes away and working together to keep our home a nice place. We ended with high fives and enthusiasm. Well, within a half hour I heard Scott from the kids room, "What???!!!" I walked in to see Jude and Ezzy with a pile of side walk chalk. Chalk was mashed in and all over the entire floor and bed. Somehow I don't think they got my message!

This morning - my first day on my own - Kai was very enthusiastic about helping out. He is a kid who thrives on praise and verbal reinforcement. He really loves to make me happy. He did the breakfast dishes, made his bed and straightened his room without even being asked. Wow - off to a great start! It was harder to motivate Ezzy and Jude to put away the cars that they dumped all over the living room. They finally were motivated because they wanted to have music but I wouldn't let them get their instruments out until they cleaned up.

For music we put on Veggie Tales Worship. The boys danced and played instruments through 1/2 the CD. This is a little embarrassing and probably hormonal but as I sat there holding Koa I was tearing up a little bit! I just enjoyed watching them and taking a few minutes to close my eyes and give thanks and praise to God for being with me, loving me and being my friend. I've been having some "baby blues" the last few weeks and it was just a moment of realizing God is with me and it was comforting. Funny how God can reach us in just about any moment.


The rest of the day progressed pretty smoothly. The boys did chalk drawings (on a chalkboard this time) and played while I folded laundry. They put their stacks of clothes away. When they got hungry I didn't let them eat until they put everything away. Then I got out this book that I just got - it's pretty cool. We read a pretty large amount of it about simple machines, different kinds of matter and energy. The other boys drifted off to play but it held Kai's attention very well. Scott surprised me by coming home at 2! So my first day on my own was a short one, thankfully.

So, I was really nervous about this day, but it ended up being good. Overall I feel happy that these boys are home with me. I like having them here and I like spending time with them (even though Jude was tantruming from about 3:00 on - fun times - that's a whole other blog post). I'm feeling pretty optimistic right now. We'll see how we do tomorrow!


p.s. if anyone has suggestions or ideas about getting young children to clean up after themselves, I would love to hear from you!

First blog post...!

Where to start?

With starting homeschool we also just moved into a new condo. This was a great way to get off to a fresh start with organizing supplies and a learning space. I've put all the boys in one room and used the third bedroom as a classroom (doubling as a guestroom). We now have a fun, relaxing learning atmosphere that I love - and the kids love it too.

I have a friend that just recently left Costa Rica to live in the states. She handed down to me tons of homeschooling supplies including some unit study boxes that she put together. These gifts as well as her advice and support have already been invaluable to me. We just finished a unit on insects that I think changed our lives. The boys took it all in with such fascination and wonder, it was pretty cool. She also left me with some tools to get started with for reading. With only 17 days left until my scheduled c-section I really don't have energy to lesson plan or get super creative. We're just trying to get through the days and learn something along the way! Here's a typical day so far...

start with Bible... nothing fancy just pick a Bible story, devotional, talk about it and pray!


Do a lesson in this book with Kai - he's on lesson 70. He loves it some days, others he doesn't, but it's working really well at teaching him to read.

These blocks are the best! Again, Kai doesn't always love it, but it's teaching him word families.

Jude and Ezra join in sometimes, but I let them participate as they feel like it. Today, this is what they were doing while I was doing this with Kai. They like to get in on the action, too, though. Here they are all working at their little desk. Too cute, of course Jude just scribbles and Kai and Ezra have to comment that he's not doing it the right way, and I have to explain that he's just a baby and when he scribbles he's really doing a great job!





Here are some more shots of the classroom and the stuff I'm using:

Kai and Ezzy's workbooks and journals

Our bookshelf

and boardbooks! I am so blessed that literally everything I have has been given to me and passed on by friends and family members. Amazing, huh?

With rainy season here, we have to make sure we take advantage of sunshine in the mornings and get outside while we can.

Our view

backyard "pignig" as Ezzy says. I love that they had to bring their books out too. We enjoyed this time of reading and eating before the rain came and Jude's nap time. While Jude napped Kai and Ezzy wrote "stories" (dictated to me) in their journals and drew pictures to go along. They love doing that and come up with some crazy stuff!

So that was our day today. I feel really good about it, except for one meltdown by Ezzy in the afternoon because he wanted his beans "molido" and they were "entero." This actually escalated into a tantrum and afternoon tantrums are really tough for me to handle, I just start losing my patience. Luckily daddy walked in the door in the nick of time to take over that one!

So I guess we'll see how tomorrow goes!