Bedtime Education

I just finished tucking the kids in for the night, and Connor and I had quite the interesting bedtime discussion.

Let me preface by taking you back a few days/weeks first: Connor's kindergarten teacher has been put on modified bedrest, as she is pregnant with twins (due in April). Her maternity leave substitute, as best as I can tell, has all the warmth and understanding of a drill sergeant. Suffice it to say that Connor, the ever energetic and talkative kindergartener, and this woman are not exactly transitioning together very well.

After talking with one of my colleagues about what can be done, I am encouraging Connor to work on just one of the many things that this woman seems to have a problem with--his talking. It seems that if he could talk a lot less, it would improve things on many counts. (Now, I don't want this to read as though I believe my child is perfect and has not committed any infractions. I do not delude myself with visions of perfect behavior from him. But I refuse to post all the gory details of the situation here on the Interwebs for everyone and their brother to read. Just trust me when I say that it is a bad situation for everyone concerned.)

So tonight, as I was tucking in my first-born, I reminded him about our deal--that he will remind himself not to talk so much. We went over specific strategies and tactics that he could use to help keep himself out of trouble. I tried to close the discussion with a little pep talk about how we would make school seem more fun again, but that school will always require some work and self-discipline. I even pulled out the big gun: if you really want to become a fire-fighter when you grow up, then you have to get through school first.

He then asked me how much school he would have to endure. And I told him about all the levels of school, and I mentioned that Mommy and Daddy would like for him to go to college, too.

"Then can I go to fireman school?" he asked me. I told him that yes, he could (although, I'm hoping he will set his sights on a less dangerous job somewhere in the next 15 years or so).

"But how will I find a fireman school?"

I told him he could look it up on the internet.

"What if the internet is wrong?"

I then had to explain the concept of reliability of websites to my 5 year old.

I can't be certain whether this was an amazingly smooth stall tactic to keep from having to go to sleep right away, or if my child really cares about such things at such an early age. Either way, his thought process is a little scary to me, I gotta say.