My daughter’s teacher has been complaining about our 19-month old child. She said that our kid is strong-willed and hard headed.

The teacher also said that she has a tendency to hurt herself when she is frustrated. According to the teacher, our baby goes dabog dabog (pull a tantrum) when she doesn’t get her way, stomping her feet in frustration.

This unfortunate news was met with shock by the husband and the grandmother. 

“They don’t know our kid!” they exclaimed. “She’s not even 30 and don’t even have kids. How can she be a good judge on whether a child is hardheaded or not? All kids her age are the same way!”

That’s what parental love is — if other people criticize your child, you become a protective tigress and immediately defend them. 

In my husband’s case, he can’t help but think that the teacher is picking on our kid, singling her out. “She’s been complaining about her over the last two days,” he said. “Does she complain about other kids too?”

My own mother is at a loss too. This is the first time a teacher has actually criticized my child. Most of the time, teachers love and adore her.

To be honest, I am a bit surprised too. 

My daughter is sweet and helpful. She is very active and likes to learn. In class, she’s usually in front listening intently to the teacher. And while she is stubborn and opinionated, a little bit of personality does not hurt anyone. 

“Do you want a pushover for a daughter?” my husband asked. “You said you wanted personality. Well, you got personality.”

Personally, I think being defensive is an automatic reaction by any parents who love their child. It’s easy when other people adore our kids. It’s hard if other people don’t like our kids as much. 

I think maybe the teacher doesn’t like our child as much. In defense, our child doesn’t lean towards her as much with the other teachers. While she can easily show affection to other people, she is a bit wary with this one, which may cause the teacher to single her out. 

Regardless, I’d like to believe the alternative — that the teacher is telling the truth and our kid truly can be stubborn and hard headed. She is our firstborn daughter and the first grandchild after all. 

If that’s the case, this might be an eye opener for us. That our daughter may not be as sweet as we think she is, and we may have to adjust how we deal with her a bit so that she won’t turn into a complete brat. 

In the end, we chose our school for a reason. They chose their teachers following strict standards, and we have to respect that these teachers know exactly what they are doing.

It’s very tempting to paint the teachers as the bad guys. That they are wrong and we know our children better. 

But if we fall into that trap, we don’t do our kid or ourselves any favors. If we think we can do better, why don’t we homeschool them ourselves?

The truth is, we can’t do it better. 

We aren’t trained teachers and we don’t have the time to teach our children. The school has been there for decades and the teachers are properly trained and must follow a strict curriculum. 

Teachers deal with a lot of children everyday. 

Because they observe a lot of kids, they can see disturbing patterns earlier. If left unchecked, our daughter might become increasingly difficult. 

So even though the news is hard to accept, I thank the teacher for opening our eyes. For bringing this to our attention. 

Again, teachers are not the enemy. They are our partners in teaching our kids academic knowledge and common sense. It’s critical that we work together to maximize our kids potential.

How about you? Do you get defensive when your own child is criticized?