School talk: new parent reception

Whoa! I am not good at small talk!

We had a reception last night for parents of kids new to the program. I was able to stand up and talk to this large group of people about issues in gifted education, no problem. I could do it all day. But when it came time to mingle, I was not a shining star.

I think I told no less than fifteen parents that their child was doing well and now that I think about it, that is a fine thing to say at this type of gathering. Not the time to go deep. What bothers me in retrospect is my forced enthusiasm. Not "Your child is doing well." Instead "Your child is doing so well!" Bold letter indicate cheerleader pep and energy. Not my usual style.

My final social triumph was the father who, after talking with me, grabbed his car keys and said with anger that he would wait for his wife in the car. He did come back to remind me that he is a tax payer and thus, pays my salary. The implication was that this is not money well spent. In my defense, the fellow was a tad angry and odd to begin with. Maybe I should have picked up on those social cues. But when he said, after expounding for quite some time about how rotten public education is, that "I know I'm opinionated but any teacher who lets her kids sit on the floor during school is doing a bad job", I just let it slip. I said "You know, I'm opinionated too and I have a lot of experience in education and on this one, you are wrong."

When I started writing this entry, I was feeling kind of bad about my performance last night. After rereading this, I'm feeling okay. I have more important things to concern me than this. So there.