Many years ago, Billy, an eighteen month old boy, joined our day care. He was adorable, bright, curious and interesting, like many children are.
We also really liked his parents a lot. Interesting, charming, warm. Highly educated and both in creative work worlds.
Billy began his experience at the daycare as a happy, curious, friendly child. His parents established what seemed to be a perfect schedule, alternating his pick up and drop off every day. I.E. Dad brought him Monday morning, mom picked him up Monday night and dropped him off Tuesday morning while dad picked him up Tuesday night.
During the first three months, he seemed to change his behavior noticeably. He was losing his happy nature, was often crying, having difficulty being positive and pleasant with the other children and was even sometimes aggressive.
Because we were not getting meaningful input from the parents, we decided to record his behavior daily. At the end of three months, a pattern was clear. His most problematic and aggressive day was Tuesday. Initially we were unsure what that meant except we realized it was also true for most of the children.
What appeared to be happening is that everyone seemed really happy and cooperative on Monday as well as really pleased to be back with their friends. What occurred on Tuesday was more of a reflection on what they had been allowed to do over their previous weekend. So it was more challenging the rules and guidelines than anything else.
Any of these behaviors are not uncommon with toddlers but by the end of the second year, we were becoming concerned about the direction he was taking. Coincidentally, each parent had a business trip planned and a set of grandparents came to take care of him.
When leaving the day care one day (also a Tuesday) the grandparents were horrified and hysterical when Billy left them and ran across the street while a car was coming toward him.
Fortunately, he was not hit, but the incident opened the door to what was happening in his life.
Billy’s parents had separated prior to enrolling him in our day care. This was vital information they did not reveal and in fact, they had deliberately arranged their schedule so we would not know what was going on.
We scheduled a meeting with them and helped them understand how difficult, confusing and damaging their silence and schedule was having on him.
We also provided clear guidelines for both parents to follow, they needed to be on the same page. Fortunately, they made a commitment to follow them and communicate with each other and our staff in a more productive way.
There are so many messages to take from this incident.
1.Parents must be consistent. Weekends are mostly less scheduled than week days, but behavior standards should still be expected.
2.Parents and caregivers need to believe in the same parenting philosophy and practice it.
3.This situation obviously had an extremely dramatic moment, but every child is confused and may be angry and fearful when their lives are not guided by clear directives and consistent expectations.
4.We are still experiencing those challenges in many different ways.
The reason this incident came to my mind was because this last Tuesday was so challenging. We are still seeing the same patterns with children coming back to day care having been through a very disorganized and exhausting weekend.
Make sure you are taking their needs into consideration, but do not forget what behavior standards are important to you.
Good luck!
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