If the boy only applied himself, he'd be AWESOME. This was the class before graduation for Drew, and for whatever reason, he was goofing off a bit. He did sit nicely during practice while waiting his turn, and there were plenty of instances where he was behaving fine and following stuff, but there were other moments-- UGH! When I yelled at him to stop whacking this one kid with one of those swimming noodles they use for sparring practice, Ma'am interjected for me not to say anymore and let the instructors do their job to get after him. I bit my tongue, but thought, "Then where the hell are they? I don't want the other kid to be beaten up senseless by Drew with that noodle!". I mean, as I said to JC tonight, this is why I'm not getting his mouthguard and "punches" (boxing gloves) yes. He'd do it wrong and try to beat up a kid-- he's not ready yet to do that. When he went a little crazy with the noodle again when switching partners, they took the noodle away and had him sit, but the purpose was to get him to watch how it's done correctly. He felt he was being punished. I couldn't open my mouth without Ma'am getting after me again, so I didn't. She caught that the instructor needed to tell him what was going on, but he was already in an upset mindframe. He chilled out, but it just set the tone for the end of class. He was happy that he got another stripe, and he also FINALLY got his permission to test form. And that helped raise his spirits a little.

It's just very frustrating, because Drew is a good kid-- don't get me wrong--but I KNOW him. He's the kid who needs to be front row and center in order to have him focus and do what he's supposed to do. I'm not expecting them to pay attention only to Drew-- the class is too big for that. However, if they want him to focus and do well, they have to pay more attention to him at certain times and give him more one-on-one instruction. And when they aren't doing it, I get annoyed at him and them and interject, but then *I* get in trouble. Geez. He can do this stuff, but I think their solution is to have him take class twice a week, and he's only 4, I'm not doing that anytime soon. I took ballet lessons for 12 years just once a week, and did quite well that if I lost about 60 lbs., got in shape, and reacquainted myself with "procedure", for lack of a better term, I could jump right in and keep up with the pros for the most part. I don't expect Drew to become a TKD master anytime soon, so if he feels he likes this and wants to commit to getting a high rank, then we'll talk. But no one is going to tell me otherwise.