For their homework, Daniel and Michael were asked to list the names of books they had read on a sheet of paper. They had to fill in the date they had read the book and the author and review it by means of a sad face or smiley face.
Michael said, “It is only for books in Irish you have read at school”. He filled in the details of his Irish textbook, closed up his books and zoomed off about his business.
Daniel assured me that it was for all books you had read that day and was determined to fill in all 10 spaces. He wouldn’t cheat either. He gathered around him a selection of books (all of which he had read before), including even an Irish one, and dutifully re-read through them all before carefully noting down the details on his list. It took him forever.
I noted that all of his reviews were positive as was Michael’s. My children are uniformly positive when asked for their views by authorities outside the family. I tackled Michael later. “Why did you give Féasta a smiley face? You hate Féasta.” “Oh, I like the bit where they have the party,” he said.