Small Things

Should my 5 year old be learning about drugs at school? Or at all?

My kids' elementary school is participating in Red Ribbon Week, "to encourage students to be 'Drug Free' and 'Say No to Drugs.'"

We got a flyer listing an activity for each day, beginning with every kid being given a red ribbon to wear all week, then signing a drug-free pledge, wearing crazy socks to show their commitment to being drug-free, tying ribbons on a fence to commit to being drug-free, and then on Friday the Halloween parade's theme is "Boo to Drugs."

I'm wondering now if I'm the only kindergarten mom who is uncomfortable with this?

First of all, my kindergartner doesn't know what drugs are. As I read the flyer that came home for the weekend, I wondered, are they going to teach the kids what that word means? Sure enough, in the middle of a classmate's birthday party on Saturday morning, as my daughter, who was dressed as a black kitten, was biting into a cupcake decorated to look like a spider, she looked up at me and asked, "Mama, what's drugs?"

I took a deep breath, summoning wisdom and words, and tried to, quietly, give an accurate definition, the same way I explained it to my second grader back when he first asked. (Probably during his kindergarted Red Ribbon Week.)

I said that "drugs" is another word for medicine. That they can be good for you and make you healthy, but can be bad for you if you take the wrong kind or too much. That's why doctors have to give you drugs when you need them, to make sure it's the right drug and the right amount, and won't make you sick. Even vitamins are a kind of drug, that's why you can only have the one I give you, to make sure it's safe. Some people take drugs they shouldn't, and it's not healthy.

This is what I feel should be step one. Explaining the actual word. I know that doesn't quite cover the use of the word in "Say No to Drugs."

Then she asked, "But why did a policeman die because of drugs?"

She stumped me there. What did the school tell them? Wish they had briefed me first, so we could be on the same page.

So I looked it up.  According to www.imdrugfree.com,  "Red Ribbon Week commemorates the ultimate sacrifice made by DEA Special Agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena, who died at the hands of drug traffikers in Mexico while fighting the battle against illegal drugs to keep our country and children safe." 

So the school thinks 5 year olds could absorb that? While not knowing what drugs are, and wearing crazy socks? And then sign their name to a piece of paper, pledging to be "Drug-Free," which essentially means nothing to them.

Personally, I believe making a pledge and signing your name to something is  a big deal. My daughter has never done that, this would be her first time doing it.

I get that there are neighborhoods and schools, unfortunately, where small children do encounter drugs at an early age, and it is relevant to them. But that is not my neighborhood. I don't believe it's a developmentally appropriate topic for my kid, or her kindergarten class.

I suppose you could say, what's the harm? Maybe the message will stick with them if they do it every year.

But I think making a big deal of something that confuses them, and making them "pledge" a meaningless commitment, does do harm.  It makes the words meaningless.  And by the time illegal drugs, addiction, and substance abuse is on their radar, the "Say No to Drugs" thing has become a childish elementary school slogan, just for kids who have no idea what they're talking about.

The best autumn sundae: Pumpkin Caramel

Today at the grocery store I discovered Dreyer's Limited Edition Pumpkin ice cream (Edy's for you East Coasters). I am always looking for a flavor my son will like, he's not a fan of chocolate, and he's never that thrilled by vanilla and strawberry. So when I saw this, I new my pumpkin-pie-loving boy would love it.

I was content with that prize, but as I was leaving the coffee isle, I spotted the Hershey syrup bottles, and they have a new caramel variety! The boy loves caramel! So I also picked up a can of whipped cream and left quite happy.

I guess you could say I'm a little soft on the boy this week. He had an expander appliance installed across his upper palate, which I have to crank open twice daily. The day it went in he was miserable. He absolutely could not swallow, which the orthodontist warned me would happen initially. He drooled and spit and slurped until he was slightly panicked and I was super annoyed, andI  told him he would just have to figure it out because he would obviously have to eat and drink, or else starve to death. Not a great parenting moment. I was completely worn down by his two younger sisters' antics in the dentist office by then, but I should've known better.

When we got home, I took his two crying sisters upstairs for naps, while the boy drooled into the bathroom sink, crying pathetically, "How can I even LIVE!? I can't even SWALLOW anything! I can't even LIVE!!!!!! Wahhhhhh!" My heart was breaking for him even as my eyes were rolling over the melodrama.

I sat him in front of cartoons for an hour or two to help him chill out and forget about it. He held his spit cup and filled it as though he had a mouth full of chew. Unfortunately, a sister came along and spilled it on the carpet, and when their father got home, he stepped in it in his socks. "AWWWWW! What the #@!*! is this?!"

"You really don't want to know. Trust me."

Anyway, I made all the kids pumpkin caramel sundeas after school today, and they were a hit. After dinner, my son jumped up to make a sundea for his Dad. Unfortunately, after they ate their sundeas and I went upstairs to fold laundry, all three kids apparently got the whipped cream out and tried to spray it in their mouths, releasing all the CO2, and making the can of cream useless. So Dad just had ice cream with caramel sauce.

It was still yummy!