Let this be a lesson to us all. If you're going to borrow library books from your local library, please be reminded that "borrow" is the operative word. You get a library card (generally for free) and thereby enter into an agreement wherein said library lends you books for a few weeks...and then you give them BACK. If you don't, you get hit with a meager fine. Last time I borrowed a book, the fine was about five cents a day. Seriously--it's been a LONG TIME since I've borrowed a book. In other words, there's really no incentive to not return the books that were lent to you for free by the very nice people who work at the library. Sometimes, however, when you take those things for granted, things get nasty.

Just ask Heidi Dalibor, who refused to return her copies of White Oleander and Angels and Demons. Nor did Ms. Dalibor remit the fines she owed to the library from which she borrowed the page-turners despite the notices she received in the mail. Furthermore,she declined to take note of the court citation issued to her when she didn't respond to the Grafton Library's calls and letters to her. The result? She was arrested. Cops showed up at her family's house, handcuffed her, and booked her for violating the "overdue library materials" ordinance! Seriously.

My words of advice? Return your library books, people. Or, at the very least, see what policies your town has regarding whether or not you return them.

Pic by jhoweaa.

My older daughter's soccer coach called last night. I groaned when he told me he'd set soccer practices for the same day of the week that my daughter has dance. Now, one evening a week, she'll go from one dance class to the other, then directly to soccer practice. It's too much, in my opinion. But she's adamant that she doesn't want to give either activity up. Luckily, soccer season is short-lived.

I know that, down the road, we'll have this conversation again. We're lucky that there are so many great programs out there for our kids to take part in, but yet there has to be room in the schedule not only for family time, but for downtime too. It's got me wondering, how does a parent know when to say when to after-school activities?

According to Scholastic, extra-curricular activities benefit kids in a myriad of ways -- academically, emotionally, and socially. But kids need to play a role in deciding what and how much they want to take on. (In other words, trying to turn an uninterested child into Tiger Woods through early and intensive golf classes isn't really going to do anyone any good). They've also got a grade-by-grade guide to after-school activities for little ones. According to them, our two extra-curricular activities are perfectly appropriate... I just wish they didn't all happen on the same night.

What about you? Where do you draw the line when it comes to extracurricular activities?

Certain students in San Antonio, Texas schools will soon find it a lot harder to get away with skipping school. A new program designed to crack down on truancy will allow the Bexar County courts to fit habitual school-skippers with ankle bracelets outfitted with Global Positioning Systems. The bracelets will be worn at all times and will allow authorities to track the student's whereabouts twenty-four hours a day.

Believing there is a link between truancy and later criminal activity, the six-month pilot program will target truant students with gang affiliations. "We are at a critical point in our time where we can either educate or incarcerate," said Linda Penn, a Bexar County justice of the peace.

The electronic monitoring is the latest weapon in the battle against truancy that Penn started four years ago. And although similar programs in Midland and Dallas have proved successful, there are some critics. Terri Burke, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, expresses concern about the intrusiveness of what comes down to 24-hour electronic surveillance.

"We're all for keeping kids in school, and we applaud any efforts to make that happen," Burke said. "But the privacy issue: What happens with the bracelet or anklet after school is out? Is that appropriate for the school or courts to know where and what this person is doing outside of school?"

The privacy concerns may valid, but what I want to know about is the parents. In other Texas districts, a truant child is the parent's responsibility. You can be fined and even jailed if your kid doesn't go to school. Does this monitoring bracelet shift that responsibility from the parents to the courts?

It cost the school district over $300,000 in legal fees, sent teachers to sensitivity training, and trampled the constitutional rights of students, and yet, many in the Florida community of Ponce de Leon still support principal David Davis' "witch hunt" against gay students and those that supported them.

While he was principal of Ponce de Leon high school, one of Davis' seniors came to him to report that other students were taunting her for being a lesbian. She probably thought that Davis would do something about the situation. Well, he did, but not exactly what she had hoped. He told her that it was wrong to be a lesbian, told her parents about her sexual orientation, and began a "relentless crusade" against homosexuality. He asked students about their sexuality and told gay students to stay away from the other kids.

The town of Yuma, Arizona sits very near the border of Mexico in the southwest part of the state. It sits so close, in fact, that a wrong turn may lead you right out of the country. As will boarding the wrong school bus, which is exactly what a 6-year-old boy did last week.

The boy was supposed to be on his way home from school, but accidentally got on the wrong bus. He got off the bus at an unfamiliar stop and wandered into San Luis Rio Colorado, Mexico. His mother said he was disoriented and thought he might walk to his grandfather's house, which is in Mexico. The boy was rescued by a passerby, who returned him safely to his home.

Officials at Gadsden Elementary School District are looking into the situation and promise to correct any failures they find the school transportation system. I think a small boy being allowed on the wrong bus and ending up in another country where he is picked up by a total stranger pretty much qualifies as a failure of the system.

Don't mess with Texas, they say, and that's especially true if you're a student in that particular state. The Human Rights Watch and the ACLU recently released a report on corporal punishment in the United States. They found that 25% of the reported 223,190 instances of corporal punishment last year happened in the Lone Star state. An astonishing twenty other states still use this form of physical punishment.

In the South, African-Americans are 1.4 times as likely to be hit than white students, and African-American girls are especially at risk. They're hit twice as often as their white peers. The two human rights groups want to see corporal punishment banned in the United States, saying that hitting kids creates a hostile environment, teaches violence, and creates a barrier to learning. And every now and then, kids get seriously injured. At school. By their educators.

Spanking is a hot topic issue among parents, and no less so here at ParentDish. But beyond my own personal views about spanking, I think that giving another person -- especially another person that you may not know very well -- the right to hit your child at their discretion and outside of your prescence is sheer insanity. I'm grateful this isn't an issue in my own state, where corporal punishment is illegal, and hope that these groups are successful in bringing awareness to this issue. What do you think?

As kids head back to school with new backpacks and sneakers and grins missing teeth, you're breathing a sigh of relief. Right? Isn't that what you're doing?

Well, maybe not if your child is going to school for the first time (if that's the case, deep breath, everything will be FINE....) But for kids heading back to school for the second year, or the fifth for that matter, you know your child is re-entering the realm of structured routines, after school activities, and yes, homework.

Is it a good thing? The homework, I mean. Some parents say it's the best thing ever--and they hound me from day one for more homework, more homework. Others say the opposite, and wonder why I ever send any homework home at all.

In my opinion homework in the elementary grades serves only one purpose: to get young students into routine of doing homework in preparation for the later grades. Other than that, I think it interferes with the meaningful and enriching activities children should be doing after school and at home with their families. Call me a renegade, but there is quite a bit of research out there to support my view.

Don't get me wrong-I'm not saying children should go home and play video games all afternoon. I think every child should spend time with books every single day--reading independently and being read. I also think that parents should involve their children in other meaningful academic activities that are incorporated into daily life--like playing math games, or doing research on a topic that the child is interested in.

But homework for homework's sake when your kid is 6 years old? I'm not convinced.

I'm curious. Do you think homework in the early grades is important and necessary--or is it overrated, and perhaps taking precious time away from other activities children could be doing?

I'm not sure there could be a worse headline, as far as I'm concerned: "Church Attendance Boosts Student GPA's." Luckily, it's not quite that simple. Researchers did find that going to church affects a teenager's grades, chances of dropping out, and sense of school community as much as whether or not the parents had college degrees, but it's not so much God's work as it is several other, identifiable factors.

The reasons for the improved performance include:

• The students have role models they see regularly from multiple generations.
• Parents are more likely to be in touch with the parents of their kids' friends.
• It is more likely that their friends' families will have the same values and expectations as their own.
• They tend toward higher rates of participation in extracurricular activities.

Other studies that have identified benefits of church attendance also pointed to the social networking and psychological aspects of being a member of a church as the key factors. If your kids attend church already, these findings may not be of much use to you, but not everyone goes to church or has any interest in doing so. For those of us in the latter category, this research has great value.

When the police in Auckland, New Zealand were called to shut down a loud party last Friday, they probably expected that the party-goers would be a bunch of kids. What they probably didn't expect is that the kids would all be about five years old. But that is exactly what they found when they responded to a complaint made by what can only be described as a cranky neighbor.

The One Tree Hill Kindergarten was in the midst of their annual disco party, rocking out to Bob the Builder and the Chicken Dance when noise control officials arrived on the scene around 6:30 pm. Teacher Jenny Skerritt said the officials seemed a bit "red faced" as they ordered them to turn it down or shut it down. "I don't think it was that ragey, but it's all a matter of perspective I guess," she said.

Perspective, indeed. The babies sleeping in the very next room obviously didn't think it was too loud. Nevertheless, they turned the music down and continued with their party. And just for kicks, they plan to frame that noise abatement notice for all to see.

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School should be a safe place, one where kids can concentrate on learning, not on staying alive. Sadly, however, that's not always the case. "If you're afraid you're going to get beat up after school, it's hard to concentrate when you're in algebra class," said David Kopperud of the California Department of Education. In 1998, the World Health Organization surveyed more than fifteen thousand sixth through tenth grade students and found that nearly a third had been involved in bullying.

There are serious consequences of bullying and not just for the students directly involved. The American Medical Association estimates that as many as 160,000 kids refuse to go to school each day because of bullying. The kids miss out on their education and the schools lose their funding. Further, kids can end up with problems that affect their relationships, self-esteem, and emotional well-being. The U.S. Secret Service found that three out of four school shooters were bullied.

These days, there's an added twist to the problem -- the internet. Bullying has become "more extreme, more humiliating and more public," according to Elayne Savage, a psychotherapist and author of "Don't Take It Personally: The Art of Dealing With Rejection." She sees the effects of bullying in her adult clients too. "You never forget the hurtful slurs and actions," she says.

How do your kids get to school? How did you get to school when you were a kid? Taking the yellow school bus, walking or riding a bike may all seem like normal methods of getting to school. In the modern world, we drive and carpool as well. But what about in urban environments where a lot of parents don't drive or even own a car? They take the subway.

And they do it ALONE. That's right--I've seen it myself. Kids popping onto and off of the subway without a parent in sight. How do they manage it? And why, you might wonder, do their parents let them do it? Well, necessity is the mother of invention and a lot of other things, it turns out. Kids are going in one direction, their parents in another (to school versus work), and the main way to get around town in New York, for example, is underground.

Turns out, it's probably safer too. Driving in this city is a disaster on a good day. You're a LOT less likely to get into an accident on the subway than you are in your car. Plus, the kids tend to travel in packs on the subway. I never see a kid get onto an empty car at an odd (non-rush hour) time. They pick which car to meet up on and collect as the train makes its stops toward their final destination. I know because I can hear them screeching above my iPod.

Need some pencils for the new school year? How about a ruler? If you've got a cent, you can get them -- at Staples and OfficeMax, respectively, in some areas. Target regularly offers school supplies for next to nothing in the weeks leading up to the start of the school year. (Wanna meet a teacher? Hit Target at 8am on a Sunday in August -- they'll be there stocking up on pencil boxes, crayons, and -- literally -- hundreds of folders for their classrooms.)

As the economy nose dives, parents aren't rushing out to buy brand new supplies when last year's zizzors (as my daughter calls them) work just fine. Retailers are running scared and are offering lots of "loss leaders" -- items priced below their cost -- to get shoppers in the door. This is nothing new, of course -- it happens every year -- but this year retailers are dropping prices even more than usual, even to the point of offering products for free.

Naturally, the stores are hoping you'll buy other, more profitable items while you're there and that's usually the case. Still, if your kid's backpack still holds books and their binders still hold paper, do you really need new ones? Are you buying all new supplies or making do with what you have as much as possible?

Yesterday, I took my five-year-old for a back-to-school haircut. She'd decided she'd had enough of her long, straight hair and wanted a chin length bob. At home it seemed like a good idea, but when the stylist lifted her scissors to cut off that first length of hair, I nearly had to hang on to the counter to stop myself from snatching her back out of that chair.

That's pretty close to how I feel about the upcoming first day of kindergarten. It's not about the hair, of course, it's about the letting go and letting her grow up. Kindergarten is a huge milestone, but part of me wants to scoop her up and tell the world, "You can't have her yet. She's still all mine."

NYMetroParents has some good advice for parents facing that first day of kindergarten, two that especially stick out for me. The first is that, no matter how ambivalent I might be feeling about school starting next week, my game face is always on for my daughter. We talk frequently about how much fun it's going to be, how exciting it is to start "big girl school," how it'll be great to see her preschool friends again and make new friends as well. Though I'm watching her closely for signs of anxiety or nerves, I keep my personal angst to myself.

This summer, the Olympics are providing lots of great family entertainment. The opening ceremony's parade of nations inspired my son to plop his globe on the kitchen table for an impromptu geography game. The gymnastics and swimming competition stirred discussions about health, discipline and sportsmanship. But it's the Olympic host country itself that is generating the best conversations.

My kids have always been fascinated by China. Evidence of their love for all things Chinese abounds. My Chinese bathrobes have been absorbed into their play clothes collection; they beg to use chop sticks (even if we're having spaghetti); they can be convinced to eat new vegetables if I proclaim them "Chinese"; they love Mulan; and my four year-old regularly breaks into a foreign language she claims is Chinese. We have high hopes that the Beijing Olympics and accompanying coverage will expand their knowledge of China beyond Kung Fu Panda and Chinese restaurants.

Thanks to years of careful planning on the part of the Chinese government, China put on the most spectacular opening ceremony in recent memory. Viewers were rightfully dazzled by the combination of Chinese artistry and technology. If my kids are any indication, interest in China is at an all-time high.

No parent would want to have to deal with a situation like this. Your teenage daughter is acting a little odd (more so, even, than one would expect of a teenager) so you decide to check things out a bit and there, on her cell phone, you find a text message from her teacher. "It happened around 9:35 at night," said the girl's mother who didn't want to be identified. "It said, 'I don't want her to find out, I don't want her to get hurt. I need to meet with you.'"

Checking the phone bill, she found many calls and messages from the teacher, at all hours. "He called her at midnight," said the mom. "They were on the phone for 30 minutes." She notified the school by phone and in writing, but, so far, the response has been a bit unimpressive and certainly not what one, as a parent, would hope for.

The school district admitted that the teacher did "communicate with [the girl] at times of the day and night that was concluded to be unprofessional" and apologized for a "lack of professional behavior." The district also said that a letter would be added to the teacher's file. As for the teen, however, she's still in his class.

After the local news media contacted the school district, the mother says they are starting to take some action and may remove the girl from his classes. I think if it were me, I would make darn sure the teacher were removed from the school, unless there were a pretty darn good reason why he was calling my teenage daughter at midnight.

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