“But Miss Star, I really have to go. If you don’t let me go now, I am just gonna go in my pants.”“Okay Joseph. You can go in a few minutes.”“It’s been a few minutes. Can I go now?”“Wait one more minute Joseph! Someone is already in the bathroom.” I stood there and looked at my watch for a few minutes. “Okay. It’s been a minute. You can go now.”“I don’t have to go anymore.” After our bathroom break I took my third graders, including Joseph, outside to play kickball. Not five minutes had passed before he was at my side again.“Miss Star. I just went in my pants.”I looked down at Joseph to see a wet spot slowly forming on the front of his pants. As he began to cry, from embarrassment and the fact that he had wet pants at nine years old, I realized that maybe this was not the time to exercise my power. As a camp counselor, I had to find a happy medium between friendship and authority. On the first day of camp I decided that I was going to be the coolest counselor. I didn’t give any of my third graders rules or consequences. I let them do whatever they wanted and they didn’t get in trouble (by me at least). BAD IDEA!!! When the time came to put my foot down about issues, such as Joseph, it didn’t work too well. “Miss Star, I really have to go again.”“No Joseph. You just went.”We stood in the hallway and argued back and forth with fifteen other kids staring at us. They were amazed to see me, Star, actually angry at someone.“Joseph, just shut up and get out of my face! I don’t want to hear another word from you today and you can never go to the bathroom again!”Not the best way to handle the situation, right? If I had only set down ground rules in the beginning and let the kids know they couldn’t walk all over me this probably wouldn’t have happ...
