“Why Did You Send Me to That B*&$!! of a School?” Asked my Kindergarten Son

I fell in love with the Waldorf school’s orderly and technology-free classroom that smelled like freshly-baked bread. 

I fell for the place during the Open House, even though the apron-clad teacher, swirling a huge spoon in a bubbly vat of soup, seemed intent on casting magic spells on my trusting 5-year-old son.

Perhaps I was the one bewitched.

As soon as I visited the Kindergarten class with Michael for the first time, I wanted to gobble up the organic quinoa-and-pork dish the students cooked up for snacks. I longed to don some comfy slippers stashed in my cubby, then hang out on the braided rug and knit finger puppets all day. I was ready to give up my “Marriage was his idea” T-shirt and sport slogan-free clothing, as dictated by the school.

I was even willing to leave my cell phone in the car before I entered the school–to comply with the ban on all things electronic. I was also certain the book-free classroom would somehow be a superior way of learning–even though Michael loved books more than anything in the world.

So I enrolled my spunky, outgoing son, certain Waldorf was the way to introduce Michael to school. Here, I believed, he would be immersed in the wonders of the natural world, avoiding all things electronic, pesticide-laced, or emotionally painful.

But then the mutiny began. Every day, he invented a new way to say, “No!”

“No, not eating your smelly snacks,” he told Teacher on the first day. “Give me back my chocolate Luna Bar, along with some chocolate milk!”

“No, not painting in just one color, why would I do that?” he told me, bucking the school’s paint-with-one-color-in-Kindergarten rule.

“No, not singing those stupid pony songs, we should be singing the ‘Scooby-Doo’ theme song instead,” he complained to me.

But the real mutiny came when he jettisoned himself from the classroom, as soon as he saw me, at the end of his allegedly calming and soulful Kindergarten day. “Give me that Luna Bar,” he’d gasp. “I’m starving. They wouldn’t let me eat my own lunch and said I was supposed to eat their organic mush.”

Then we’d head for the park with the other Waldorf families, where Michael would unleash his rage.

He’d chase kids, screaming, then run up and hit me, shouting, then slump into a puddle of anger and sadness and bawl his head off.

Meanwhile, the other children played politely, nibbling wholesome snacks wrapped in cloth napkins that were tucked in homemade baskets.

When I fretted to the teacher about Michael’s reaction to school, she chanted, “In no time he’ll be just another fish, swimming happily along with the other fish in the sea.”

But no, my fish didn’t swim. Instead, he latched onto the “h” word, a word I had never before heard him utter. “I hate painting day,” he said. “Not going to school anymore on Mondays.” After that, “I hate gardening day. Not going on Tuesdays anymore.”

Meanwhile, I continued to admire the school’s immaculate, light-filled classroom, its soothing smells, and the teacher’s determination to free my child from the horrors of technology and Scooby-Doo.

Yes, I was bewitched—until Michael set me free.

“I hate that b*&$!! of a school,” he announced one morning, after having eliminated all school days but Friday. “Why did you send me here? Not going back. Ever. Again.”

And then it was my turn to bawl, for stupidly ignoring Michael’s loud cry for help and succumbing to the teacher’s spell. I was the one who liked the organic food, gardening days, and technology-free philosophy—not Michael!

The next week, I enrolled Michael in an arts program in our neighborhood. When I picked him up after the first day, he wrapped his arms around the teacher, kissed her, and told her he loved her. He pressed the school’s books against his chest and heaved a sigh of relief. He stroked the bottles of colored paints as if they were lost treasures.

And then he smiled—for the first time at the end of a Kindergarten day.

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Lisa and Michael Cohn are co-authors of the award-winning “Bash and Lucy” children’s book series, and, during Michael’s book-free tenor at the Waldorf school, were featured on the Today Show for Michael’s love of books. Visit them at www.BashAndLucy.com.