One of those parents. . .

I had an opportunity to be "one of those parents" this week.
Skye and Isaac are taking swimming lessons, Monday was the start of a new session so they were being tested to see what level class to put them in. Now Skye is the stronger swimmer, but doesn't have the confident/independent personality that Isaac has. I had tried to prep both boys to make sure that they told the instructor that they could swim on their own, etc. so that they would be put in a correct level. Well, when Isaac was tested and the instructor tried to help him, I heard him voice loudly, "I can do it!" and continued to show well what his swimming ability was as he was asked to do different skills. Skye was being tested by another instructor at the same time, and he insists that he did tell the instructor that he could swim, but when the instructor went to help him he just let him and didn't even try to show that he can swim at all on his own. So when the testing was finished Skye had been placed in level 2 and Isaac was placed in level 3. Skye was devistated that his little brother who can't swim quite as well (although it's getting close between them) was placed in a higher class than him. So the next day, at the first day of classes, I went in to have a talk with the director to get Skye moved up to level 3 as well. I felt just like "one of those parents" and hope that I didn't come across totally like that. But the end result was that Skye did get to move up to level 3 as well and he and Isaac are enjoying being in class together and really are both doing well and working hard. I did have a talk with Skye about speaking up for himself and really showing what he can do so that situations like this don't arise too often even before I talked to the director. Hopefully he'll remember and be willing to speak up, show more next time.