Sharpening An Eraser

Calfgrit8 told us today that he stuck the eraser end of a pencil into the classroom electric pencil sharpener, and he thinks he might have broken the device. He did it in the morning, and he said he thinks the teacher discovered it in the afternoon right before school let out.

This is one of those things that parents always wish there was an instruction manual for. Talking with CG8, he did it to see what would happen; he didn’t do it to intentionally damage anything — the possibility of damage didn’t enter his mind. So how should a parent respond? What kind of punishment for this?

Well, we decided to not really “punish” him. We made him write a letter to his teacher telling her what he did, and we decided that if the sharpener is, indeed, damaged or broken, we will buy a new one for the classroom. He will have to work off the expense with us somehow (“how” to be determined).

But if it’s not damaged or broken, there won’t be any repercussions beyond just admitting what happened to his teacher.

When I asked him why he did it, and he admitted to just curious to see what would happen, I asked him, “So, what happened?”

He answered, “It just grinded and I think the pencil sharpener broke.”

“Now that you know,” I followed up, “will you ever do it again?”

“Probably not,” he said.

“Probably not?” I said. He didn’t get the hint, so I added, “How about surely not?”

“Yeah,” he got the point.

So he’s got to own up to the action, and will have to work off our replacing the device, but he’s not really getting a punishment. We want him to be honest and forthright with us — if he makes a mistake or breaks something, we want him to tell us rather than keep it a secret. We want him to know if he breaks something, that he has to make things right but he won’t be punished for simple, honest, poor judgment.

This is our stance for now, for this incident. But if he does something like this again, having now seen what happens when you misuse a device, he’ll get a punishment.

I wish I knew if we were handling this correctly/properly. We may never know until he grows up to be a well-adjusted man or a destructive psychopath.

Bullgrit