M (9y2m) came home today upset with tears sprawled all over his face. When asked why such a display of emotion, surprisingly, he said he couldn’t remember.
As such, an investigation began.
As any investigation would suggest, a good communication should begin with exchanges of information, but an overflow of tears would prove to be counterproductive.
“I see that you’re upset about something. Could you use your words to tell me what makes you so upset?”
“I forgot something.” He managed to squeeze out these words after a moment of self-collection.
“You forgot something? You left something at school? What is it?”
“I don’t remember!” Face began to twist again.
It’s quite interesting how powerful emotions can be when they have the potential to override any logical reasons and even memory.
“Was it your homework? Your artwork? Something you need me to sign?” I tried to imagine what was so important that could cause such breakdown.
“No…”
Realizing that my categorization has strictly centered on what he would bring home, I asked another way.
“Was it something from school you needed to bring home? Or was it something from our house that you brought to school?”
“It’s something I brought to school. It’s that magnetic birdie. Teacher said I could bring something from home to help me when I needed it.”
Voilà. My line of questioning has brought back his memory.
That birdie is a small stuffed animal was given by Second brother, who went to Disneyland for a performance tour and bought home a souvenir as a gift for his little brother. Losing that would have been despairing.
So now that we have succeeded in identifying the object in question, we now needed to locate its whereabouts.
“Where did you last see it?”
“I put it in my desk but it’s showing. I don’t want anyone to take it.” He voiced out his concern and fears with an exact location.
Knowing that school has ended now and the location of the missing item, he has visibly calmed down. Still worried, he wanted to know if it is where he had left it.
“What would you like to do?” I asked.
“I want to know if it’s still there.” He stated his needs.
“If you said it’s in your desk then it should be there, right?”
My statement obviously did not ease his concerns, so I followed up with another question.
“What can you do to make sure it’s there where you left it?”
“I dunno…” Stuck once again, the painful look was about to creep up again.
“How about asking your teacher to take a look for you?” I suggested.
"How?"
"Well, how soon do you want an answer?" I asked.
"I want to know now." He was determined.
"Then, what's a good way to reach her NOW?"
“Writing an email asking her?” he suggested.
But then he hesitated and said that the teacher only checks her email first thing in the morning. I reassured him that even if she checks her email in the morning, she would have arrived before anyone else has arrived to school anyways.
I offered my phone and suggested him to begin writing the request.
“I don’t know what to write,” he reluctantly said.
“Tell her what your problem is, and what you need her to do to help you.”
I opened up a new compose window under my email account and input the teacher’s email address in the To slot before handing him the phone.
“I don’t know what to say,” he still had no clue how to begin.
“Describe what your problem is. And tell her what you need her to do for you.”
He began his first draft.
I took a look at his first draft and offered some revision suggestions.
“You will need to describe your item as if she can see it with her own eyes. You gotta think in her shoes.”
“What do you mean? I dunno how to do that.”
“You gotta imagine that she has never seen your stuff before. So when you need to describe your things as much as you can so that when she reads your descriptions, a picture will appear in her mind.” I suggested. “Describe the size, the shape, the color, the texture, what it looks like to other people.”
His next edit was more explicit, but it still lacked some common courtesy and letter writing etiquettes.
“When you ask someone to do something for you, what’s a nice way to ask them so that they’re willing to do it for you?”
“What?” This whirlwind of commotion seemed to knock him off Pleasantville.
“People usually say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’,” I prompted.
Together we found places in the letter that would fit those words of pleas and appreciation.
“When you write a letter, it’s like you’re calling out to that person,” I added. “When you have something to tell me, you’d say ‘Mama!’ Writing letters is the same way, you need to start the letter by addressing to that person.”
The letter contained grammatical errors, but I decided to overlook that at this juncture. The lesson that I really want to impart was to let him know that there are options to ease the problems at hand and that being calm and logical is the attitude to take instead of letting emotions overwhelm you.
He hit the send button at around 3:23 P.M.
And to his surprise, his teacher replied “It is there!” at 3:24 P.M.
Crisis averted.
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