Last December, a second-grade teacher from New York got reprimanded for misdemeanor. It was a shock by looking at the title because inappropriate contacts between teachers and students had been popular in the news lately. However, this time it’s different. The second grade teacher was concerned that many people were out of jobs in this bad economy and it would be a huge burden for parents having to prepare gifts to answer their kids’ prayers to the Santa Claus. What she did was simply to reveal the true, harsh reality to the children that Santa does not in existence in real life and they should not push their parents to get expensive and impractical gifts. She meant well.
Many young children start at an early age, believing they were princes or princesses. They don’t care if there are only few princes or princesses existing in real life. They want to be sure that they are one of them. It’s a sense of value and importance.
As kids grow a little older, they learn about many other creatures, wizards, and fairies in their life. They enjoy the comfort when they lose a tooth, because the tooth fairy will take good care of them, and even award them some money in exchange for the broken tooth.
Throughout the year, they experience various characters, such as Snow White, Cinderella, Simba, leprechaun ….They waited till Halloween so that they can get into a costume as a real character to trick-o-treat in their neighbor’s houses.
Only until certain time, kids start finding out more about the reality. Very often, it’s during the third grade in the elementary school period, that younger kids learned from their old siblings that Santa does not exist in our area or Santa does not deliver gifts at all. No more reindeer and no more stockings. How sad! I have seen young children bursting into tears when their Santa dreams got shattered.
This second grade teacher meant well. However, she spoiled her students’ Santa dream, a bit earlier.
