This morning I was talking with DS (7yrs) and asked him what 8+4 was - stimulating him working out a problem in the parts I knew he easily could. Except he couldn't do it. Same with 7+6. I told him not to use his fingers because he was able to do this months ago. He couldn't. Recently we noticed that he's not able to tell the time on a round clock any more. We've noticed with some other things - spelling for example - that he's forgetting things he used to be able to do.
He used to LOVE school, but now complains about an aspect of it almost daily. The complaints are quite vague though and difficult to pin him down on.
His teacher this year is very strict and seems a bit old fashioned. She's late 40s I think, if that counts. They have a behaviour system where there are five broad areas of behaviour, each containing multiple subsections and at the end of every week they get these areas shaded on a chart in their homework book. Green, Orange or Red dependent on their behaviour in all the components in each of the five. For every Green, they then get three "keys" on another page. When they have about 40 (I haven't counted) keys they get a present (no idea what). Additionally, there's a board related to this in the classroom and people can see how many reds and oranges and greens classmates have. DS has cried more than once at home because of this system. On Fridays, when the colouring gets done, he's usually angry or subdued after school. Another parent told me her daughter (a very quiet, studious girl) is stressed by this system and while she's usually all green, she complains that the teacher isn't fair with the pupils about it and that the system is easy for kids "with no friends who are clever" (and she's not a friend of my son).
It would appear that in class he's not being a total pain, because he usually has green, sometimes orange, for that section. He says he's not listening because everything is "boring". But his use of "boring" is quite wide and he doesn't want to talk about it.
Outside school he's able to do Lego Technic above his years and has no problems with anything in afterschool sports, he's started playing the piano and is good at learning the notes, so his brain is definitely working!
Is it possible for classroom stress from this to be "turning off" DS' brain?! Or any other ideas? The school has a psychologist who I thought of contacting but first I have to go through the teacher telling her why. I really don't want to discuss this with her yet because ordinarily she's very defensive.