Penny's First Day of School

Penny had a rough first day. It's got to be hard moving from one school to another to another within a two week period. Danya, Gloria, and I went with her to find her new classroom, meet her teacher, and locate the cafeteria. We also waited with her on the spot where her class lines up just until the bell rang. I introduced her to the girls standing there in the hopes that it would help her break the ice a little.

She seemed so small and nervous as we walked away. When she met her teacher she hid behind me, which was a first. I'd never seen her act like that before. It was so hard to leave her there. All day long the other kids kept asking when she'd be back. Danya and Bunny missed her the most. When Penny got home I asked her how her day went. She said, "Terrible" and told us that a boy in her class gave the teacher a "bad finger" and later ran around on the playground grabbing all the girls' "booties and privates". She said that he wasn't punished. He was just told that doing that was a "violation" which seems to be the school's term for breaking a rule. I left the teacher a message to call me, but she never did.

Poor Penny. All week she's been crying all the way to the bus stop (she's never ridden a bus before). She says it's just not fair that she has to go to "the awful place" while the rest of the kids get to stay home. She hates getting up in the morning, too. Each night I've been going over her math homework with her. She says it isn't being explained in class, but it may be that she's just too upset and distracted by everything else to listen. She got really frustrated when Gloria tried to explain the subtraction story problems to her. I think it's a pride issue, of not wanting the younger kid to show her how to do it. Or maybe it's that Glory isn't willing to do it for her, like Danya did the first night. We had a talk about it, and now I'm the one who helps her with it, not the other girls. I hope things get better for her soon.