Andrea and her emotions

This Andrea did it again today. I was just counting my luck as bright for her good behaviour for the past one week after speaking to her father. I thought I have understood her emotional upheavals of transition from Kindergarten to Primary 1. Wonder what happened to her today?

Well, it could be the Math group work that must have upset her. From the beginning of the lesson, I have already noticed Andrea's teary eyes. She must have cried after her father has sent her to school.

You know Andrea is so well taken care of? From the moment her father drives into the school compound, Andrea is waited upon by some faithful friends so that she will not miss her father or have the urge to go home. This arrangement has helped Andrea's father a lot. He does not need to spend time alighting from the car to pacify Andrea before going to his work. When Andrea alights from the car, her classmates would "usher" Andrea and her father can just drive off. Well, the crafty classmates with their warmth will make Andrea forget momentarily about her father and would follow her friends to the play area. I even gave Andrea's friends some Math games so that they can play with Andrea and keep her occupied.

I know Andrea's father had a tough time handling Andrea's emotions. At times he even lost control of handling her that he brought a cane and tried to cane her in the boy's toilet for acting up. But, Andrea's father didn't realize that it was her past attachment with her parents that led her to behave in such a way in the present as she could not readily adapt to formal education where she had to spend many hours away from her loved ones.

Of course, Andrea would cry after a while but even Andrea's parents have noticed a gradual change in her that her crying before coming to school has gradually reduced.

I have also made it a point to talk to Andrea during recess to ensure that she is coping well with her emotions. She is smiling more now. That makes me really satisfied.

Well, I guess Andrea must have been in one of her low emotional state this afternoon. It must have been Xavier who triggered the whole incident. Andrea wanted to use the model blocks to set-up the answer to the problem they were solving. Xavier must have tried his mischief of interfering with Andrea's work. But the way Andrea acted has even taken me back. She cried that she wanted to go home and lay on the floor and started rolling around when I tried to control her from crying.

But giving her that personal touch and holding her close to my body actually helped calm her down a lot and it took a good 15 minutes to stop her from crying. At least this time she did not wail wildly like what she used to do previously. The class has been very understanding too. They went dead silence when Andrea acted up. My monitor even went to the General Office to get another teacher up to manage the class so that I can bring Andrea out of the class to calm her down further.

Luckily, Andrea was smiling once again within the next 20 minutes and was ready to go back to class. In class, Andrea continued with her group work. The lesson went on smoothly. When I spoke to the parents a few minutes ago, they were surprised that Andrea did not insist that she wanted to go home. Andrea's parents were thankful that my way of managing Andrea has helped her cope with her emotional outbursts progressively. Andrea's mother even shared that Andrea got excited with the model blocks and really wanted to show me her solution which she felt good about as she could solve the problem. That helped me understand that Andrea became overly emotional when Andrea was getting all excited to show her work to me and there came Xavier who interrupted her efforts.