Class Clown

We had our first pre-school parent-teacher conference last week and Tai's report was remarkably consistent with the past 6 conferences we've had since he started "school" at the age of 8 months.

We've conferred with four different teachers about Tai and they all tend to use the same types of adjectives to describe my boy. It goes something like this:

Intelligent

Articulate

Perceptive

Observant

Considerate

Kind

Loquacious

Gregarious

During one of our first conferences, back when Tai was about 10 months old, we were told that he and another baby could not be seated near each other at lunch because they would get too silly. Tai would purposely throw food on the floor and his friend would laugh hysterically and then throw some of her food on the floor. This would please Tai and he would then fling some more food off his tray.

(Those of you who know Tai and his circle of friends undoubtedly know the identity of his partner in crime.)

During the next two years we received similar reports from the toddler teachers. Our first indication that Tai requires an audience should have been when the teacher pulled up the slide show of pictures and explained that she searched and searched but could not find a single photo of Tai playing alone.

We were then told that Tai needed to work on "letting other children have a turn to speak at lunchtime" and that the toddler room had instituted a going-around-the-table system for taking turns sharing stories at lunch. Each time a child started in with their story a teacher had to remind Tai not to interject.

So now he's a preschooler. Not the oldest, or the most popular, but he still enjoys a loyal following. He told me that he sits with the same crew each day and lunch including -- you guessed it -- his old partner in food-throwing from the baby room. What he neglected to tell us was that he sometimes has to be separated from his audience in order to settle down, stay seated, and actually eat.

We were asked at this most recent parent-teacher conference, "What is mealtime like at home?" because they were trying to figure out if he's as silly and fidgety for us as he is for them.

The answer is yes.

Although Minh and I are now officially "over" Tai's sense of humor and do our best not to encourage his mealtime antics, his sister (unfortunately) thinks he's hilarious. Tai's shenanigans elicit deep belly laughs from Quynh and requests for "more! more!" She's also taken to imitating his physical comedy routine, whether that means balancing your cup on your head or pushing your chair away from the table mid-meal.

We are in trouble.