My son 2 can be cheeky and I think nursery are overreacting

[sluoa]

The last few weeks I've had some reports about the unfavourable behaviour of my son. He's 2 and a half.

Things like, not listening well and also some struggling to share.

I see it at home too. He snatches toys from his older sister, tantrums when he doesn't get his way and is generally pretty active and head strong.

I've never thought or considered that he's neurodivergent and when being told today he had a not so great day and when I said - I know, yesterday he was very cheeky at home. I do set boundaries and consequences with him etc. but he laughs in my face/ sticks his tongue out and that's what he did today at nursery.

His behaviour isn't amazing but I have an older child and her worst age was also 2 and a half. She did similar stuff and just kind of grew out of it. The nursery at the time also made some comments similar to the comments made today. They're leaving it up to me if I want to get them to investigate.

My son is very clever, he speaks really well, he potty trained before two years old and he's just generally switched on for his age. He's very active and physically able. The issue I'm seeing is his defiant behaviour. But I just thought it's age related. My daughter was very very similar. The only difference is that he's an escape artist and she wasn't. He gets out of his car seat, he can lock and unlock doors.

I'm not saying the nursery are wrong and I know better, but similarly I don't really want him on this SENCO track until he's older, if he still struggles.

At the moment he has days where he is well behaved and days where he's not so well behaved.

Should I just start this process or am I right to wait ?

How many children do you have? If it's one then you got lucky. 99% of 2years give not one damn about boundaries

Not true. With their parents yes but with other adults even the terrible ones show some restraint or atleast reacts when told off. Some needs more reinforcement than others. I would turn the question around and ask them how they are dealing with his behaviour. Is an adult always present ? Most conflicts can be avoided or atleast dealt with quickly without escalating but it takes adult presence on the floor and not in the staff room chatting. Don't want to bash nursery staff but I've seen excellent staff and some who just treated it as any job without implication or interest in the children...

My son was exactly as you described.
at that age, he too was bright, head strong and physically busy. He grew into himself with no SEN. He’s still bright, head strong and physically busy but acts age appropriately in terms of behaviour and I now know that the qualities that were in him even at a very young age, will one day serve him very well.

Your son is two. I wouldn’t be pushing for assessments at this stage especially as you aren’t worried.

My daughter was a terrible snatcher (I had to give chase to return things on a few occasions) and never listens. She got bitten a few times last year and the nursery said the unnamed biter was frustrated he couldn’t get her to share (she has an iron grip so stronger than normal toddlers).

We did lots of work on the sharing, huge praise when she shares and she has improved ten fold! She has just turned 3 and still has days when she is tired that she finds sharing difficult but she is mostly really good at it and will offer other kids a turn (with some prompting). They are growing and learning, it is too early to know for sure. There could be a chance my daughter has ADHD or Auditory Processing Disorder (I wonder if I do) but her nursery were very nice about it and said some kids just find sharing harder so we have to work with her on it.

My friend always says (and I think she’s right) that it is hard for kids to take stuff in when adults are standing over them giving out you have to crouch down to their level and speak softly. I think my daughter’s nursery are really good at that - I’ve seen them with kids having melt downs and they are brilliant!

I think you're right OP. The behaviour you describe is not at all unusual for a two and a half year old in my experience.

@sluoa I worked in nursery for many years. I am not from the UK but part of my training was to study early and middle child development.

Everything you have said about the nursery staff tells me that they do not know or understand child development. They have very unreasonable expectations of your child for his age and stage of development. Personally I would be looking for a new nursery.

A toddler room (2-3year olds) typically have multiples of the same toys because at this age they are generally unable to share or understand the concept of sharing. As children get older they gradually learn the concept of sharing. They have to learn the concept of turn taking first. They also have to learn the concept of ownership (what belongs to me, what belongs to other people).

I just want to copy and paste a summary of what is normal development for a two year old:

https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/child-development-6-two-to-three-years

Summary

• The most important thing to remember is that your two or three year old is still a baby.
• Temper tantrums are common in this age group.
• They may play with other children for a short time, but aren't yet capable of true sharing.
• By two, many children are naming lots of things and, by the end of this year, most are saying short sentences.

I'm a mum of two ND young adults and can remember back to the terrible twos with them. None of what you are describing are indicators of being autistic and at that age you wouldn't find many professionals who would be ready to diagnose it. There are waiting lists that are at least three years. There are multiple stages before you are put on the list, to make sure they are seeing kids who are more likely to get a diagnosis. I think that it's appropriate to see how he develops. Kids can act out to get attention and sometimes you can solve it by reminding them once that we don't do/say that and then ignoring them until they stop.

I do have concerns about a nursery where there's lots of negative feedback to many parents and especially with a child coming home saying something that she's obviously heard a staff member say, that's totally inappropriate.

Honestly given all this I’d really consider looking at switching to a childminder or smaller setting a lot of CMs work together to create small nurseries (9-15 kids type thing) it might be a better fit for your imo totally normal child

I honestly wouldn't worry at all.

My son was a handful when he was 2. Although nursery weren't suggesting anything out of the ordinary I felt so embarrassed every time they told me he had a meltdown, tantrum when he didn't get his way, one day he even dropped his lunch on purpose.

Nursery however told me it was typical 2 year old behaviour only after I did enquire further.

He was in a room full of other 2 year olds also going through terrible twos and to be honest if I spent 5 days a week with 25 other toddlers I think I would be overstimulated too.

We stuck through it, before he turned 3 he moved into preschool room and those tantrum moments seemed to cease all together. I did give him a lot of time at home in terms of teaching him patience, waiting his turn and how to deal with frustration and he is now a lovely 3 year old, just started F1 and enjoying it, thank God!!!!

Yeah you're right actually, Im thinking from parent one on one perspective where they are pushing boundaries and testing limits it's easy to forget that they have different reactions to different people. I agree that it's quite likely a staff issue

Also a mum recently wrote on the group that her daughter kept shouting ' those fucking boys ' and the mum was really shocked and thought she might have heard that at nursery. So something to be said about the vibe there.

Aah, the old, "my child never picks up bad tings at home, it's always those OTHER children, or the nursery, or the school....." trope.

Separately, if you want to wait until the new year, I think that's fine. But I agree with other posters, if nursery are suggesting that you take this forward, that suggests they think the problem is more severe than perhaps you are accepting. And while many of these behaviours are fairly normal for the age, I think it's also normal for these behaviours to be unlearned pretty quickly for most children. If they're not learning how they should be behaving, that's a problem.

Also, nurseries are flly aware that getting a child assessed or help at this age is hard, so to be suggesting it means they think it's a real issue.

OP, he sounds very like my oldest who went through a stage of being an absolute terror at nursery. Of course we had boundaries/rules/consequences etc. he still did it! He has always been very stubborn and we just had to find the approach that works for him.

He is now doing really well at school and is training in gymnastics to a high level with the opinion from his coach that he will be competing at national level when he is old enough. No ND or issues at school.

we were also pushed to get him assessed and we absolutely didn’t need to. IME a lot of nursery schools don’t have huge knowledge of SEN assessments because kids are usually older when they go down that route.

My son was just the same. At the time, 20 years ago, there wasn't a systematic assumption that every toddler not confirming perfectly to expectation was neuro divergent.

What they picked up very quickly was that he needed clear boundaries, affection et mental stimulation. He was moved to the preschool group at 2 1/2 and that was the change of him. He loved learning to read and counting, and he had a fantastic room staff who knew how to give him the right balance of discipline and affection. He suddenly loved going.

By the time he started school, he was one of the best behaved child and continued to be so through the years. He is now a very mellow adult with no issues at all. He is very sensitive and introverted, but nothing that has hold him up.

Trust your instinct.

I’ve got 3 kids and this is exactly the age where they learn to deal with their emotions and impulses better. Personally I would wait and hope that he outgrew behaviours.

How’s his speech ? I spent a lot of time role playing and helping my kids practice different ways of expressing themselves. For example if he wanted the attention of the person holding the toy then saying their name is better than grabbing. Likewise if he also wants the toy then asking for a turn later is what he’d ideally do.

How is his sight and hearing ? Not being able to hear properly is a massive problem because it’s hard to make that transition when you don’t understand people and they don’t understand you.

That was the type of behaviour my ADHD son engaged in. He hit his milestones and was also quite switched on. It took about 2 more years for him to see a consultant and get a diagnosis. They won't make a diagnosis without a lot of evidence in several different settings often nursery, home, school, hobby groups etc. Nothing wrong with allowing the nursery to start what is usually a very long process. If he grows out of it in a year you have lost nothing. If you don't allow the start of the process which begins with nursery keeping a detailed record of DC behaviour over a 6 month period. By the time you agree there is a real problem your DS might be 4 or even 4.5 years and starting school. Think how disadvantaged he would be if the process only started at 4.5 years and then a diagnosis only made at 6.5 years then an Education Plan would take another year or more so 7.5 years before he got support in school. Nursery will see hundreds of DC behaviour and they are telling you your sons behaviour is below that of other DC.

I think he does have additional needs. I've worked in a nursery and that's not the behaviour of a 2 year-old. He needs some intervention

It is the behaviour of a 2 year old.

What's wrong with questioning? It would be mad to just blindly go along with what any and every professional told you to do.

Are they suggesting he's autistic? If so there would need to be much more evidence then a bit of poor behaviour and a tantrum at 2. Tantrums/meltdowns at 6 yes maybe, but not 2.

Or are they suggesting ADHD - in which case he would neve be diagnosed by a doctor at this age.

Maybe it would be worth speaking to them and seeing exactly what they think might be wrong with him and why. I would however go down the pathway, he won't get diagnosed if he isn't ND but if it does become more apparent as he gets older then it will be good not to have to wait years for assessment. We had to wait 18 months and that was 10 years ago now.

It sounds to me that people in the nursery are observing more than they're telling you. This drip feed they're giving you is to gauge your reaction in the first instance and test whether you're going to react negatively or positively to the ND suggestion.

This is exactly what happened to me with drip feed by primary school who were terrified of backlash they'd obviously experienced in the past when parents in denial are presented with the suggestion. ( It's a natural response for most I think including me).

My child, now a teen, was incredibly intelligent at that age, met all milestones, no speech issues, no lining things up, incredibly sociable ( still). Child now officially diagnosed Autistic ( PDA )/ADHD in time for secondary ( so grateful for this). Despite all this, assessment request was declined by NHS. We ended up paying. It cost a lot.

I agree at this age it's a bit early to know and any assessment request could be declined. If the nursery are willing to start the ball rolling and support the presentation of evidence to enable an assessment I would grab that with both hands. Wait lists are years for many.

I cannot stress the importance of a diagnosis and adequate support. Now may not be the time and you're right that it may not be this. It took me years to see it personally. Looking back at videos however, it's so obvious now. Sometimes other people see what you can't

From reading your first post, it’s not the initial behaviour that stood out:

(Things like, not listening well and also some struggling to share.
I see it at home too. He snatches toys from his older sister, tantrums when he doesn't get his way and is generally pretty active and head strong.)

that seems fairly standard for the age group, they are still learning about all this stuff. It was this bit:

(I do set boundaries and consequences with him etc. but he laughs in my face/ sticks his tongue out and that's what he did today at nursery.)

it sounds like he thinks it’s all a game, so it might take him longer to grow out of it if he is not recognising the link between his behaviour and the consequence.

It does sound too soon to know whether this is a development phase or possibly ND - why not have a chat with nursery about whether to try a different approach to reinforcing the boundaries and see if that helps?

No it's not hun

I'm not entirely sure what they were really suggesting.

They sort of said ' oh no not special needs but more behavioural issues ' or something along those lines.

They didn't mention it again today. They just said he had a better day and was more up for listening.

Apparently he was more open to listening to them.

Apparently when they were playing games they had to tell him to stop taking charge all the time. But he listened better.

My plan is next week to sit down with them and ask them how they handle his behaviour and give more concrete examples and make sure we are aligned with what I'm doing at home and then I'll see how things go until the new year.

Oh wow could you be more patronising?

it sounds like a smart 2 year old who is learning to push boundaries. Literally how they learn to behave

He is 2 years old, he doesn't know what rude means. I am all for children behaving but i couldn't get upset with a 2 year old that stuck their tongue out.