Kael pulled the fire alarm again!

I don't know what the urge is inside of Kael that makes him want to do what he knows is wrong, but he pulled the fire alarm again.  I stopped by the school at about 3:30 to drop off a check at my brother's classroom only to find that his wife and kids were there too.  I asked what was wrong.  "Roger was stung by a bee again."

He was stung by two bees earlier this summer and had a dramatic reaction that left him breathless and gasping for air.  He had developed an allergic reaction to the bee stings that almost shut down his respiratory system, and he started to feel the same reaction when he jabbed the EpiPen into his thigh.  That was shocking to hear about, but what was more shocking to find out is that it was indirectly caused by Kael.

After pulling the fire alarm, the students had to rush outside and wait, before getting the "All Clear" to come back in, at which time Roger was unfortunate to get stung by a bee.

How do you punish a kid who may not know the devastating results of his actions?  Well, we started with "time out", for the same 4 minutes as recommended, but this time we added a harsher sentence. After his time out, he had "time away" from all of the things he loves to do.  No t.v., no toys, and no books.  The sad part is that he just got a book from R.I.F. (reading is fundamental) and was excited to read it when he got home.  It was a Scooby Doo picture book, his favorites!  So, without the fun things to do, he did the only thing a bored kid could do, he took a nap.

Only, his nap turned into a slumber, as we tried to wake him for dinner, he rolled over and went back to sleep.  We woke him up, so that he could go to the potty, then he went back to bed.  I think he knew that he could not do the things he loved to do and was too sad to do the things he needs to do like eat.  Well, it may sound cruel and unusual punishment, but if it got the point across, I didn't mind being the bad dad and sending my kid to bed without dinner.

This morning I talked to him again about the severity of pulling the fire alarm, and without provocation, he held his head down and said, "I sorry", and that was enough for me to know that he understood he did wrong.  I still wanted to get my point across and had him apologize to his uncle and his teacher Mrs. Hasse, which he did, and unlike his apologies to get out of time out which is usually a quick "sorry" then off to play, he took the time to say an entire sentence of " I sorry I pulled  fire alarm", and you could hear the remorse in his voice.