Those of you who WERE dreamy children ...

[Bink]

... can you remember what used to wake you up/bring you out of your dreams/get you to focus?

My ds (who's nearly seven) is having yet another week in outer space - dreamy and distracted and vague and unproductive and unco-operative at school (unco-operative more because he spaces what's expected of him than because he's being oppositional, which he isn't really) - and, though it sounds like a minor problem, when it's constant like this it's really exhausting for everyone, the teachers, the other kids, us.

He wakes up for maths (sometimes), piano, and novelty - like a school trip to the library. What used to wake you up, and do you have a sense of how, or why?

i was always told i was a day dreamer and that i had a tendency to drift off or go into my own world. I just remember having it drummed into me that i should do well at school and always trying my best was normal. I could spell very well and read junior books and knew my 10 times table when i was still in the infants .. not much happened to me tho .. SAHM!
My 6yo has has a similar problem and i am forever having to repeat myself constantly .. yes, very tiring. She is doing average to well at school and i try to encourage her as much as poss. Have to explain a bit more and say 'we have to do this .. can you do that ..?' 'please remember to .. can you remember that ..?'
not much help, sorry.

Well - there's the obvious option, which I'm sure has been tried, of making him sit in the front of the classroom. It's much more difficult to "space out" (and get away with it) when you're situated right under the teacher's nose.

And then there's another option that is less obvious, and certainly more extreme: I have friends in NYC whose son had serious difficulty concentrating in class, and consequently often didn't understand what had been taught, and so would fall behind. After much discussion and frustration on all sides, they finally resorted to hiring (with the school's input) a classroom assistant whose task it was to keep their son focused. The "helper" also made some efforts to assist generally in the classroom so that their ds (or his classmates) wouldn't feel odd about this person being there just for him. They did it for two years (!), and it was terribly expensive, but they felt it made a huge difference.

Let me know if you'd like me to get more specific information for you about how they managed the practicalities.

I was a dreamy child. dreamed my way through many lessons including a lot of A level classes. I just forced myself out of it in the end, because I was quite competetive academically and wanted to do well. which meant I had to concentrate. but I still find it hard listening to lectures, for example, i just don't focus, I would rather read it in a book. Am an academic now which is quite suitable for daydreamers.

dd1 nearly 6 is very dreamy. she does wake up at school for "worksheets" - she's not great at listening but when given a specific activity to work on she concentrates better.

Bink

No good ideas, but will watch with interest as my dd (5.10) is only Planet Zog most of the time.

oh yes, Earlybird's post reminds me. I used to choose seats near the front of the class in secondary school as I knew that at the back I just wandered off mentally. It didn't help that we were sometimes seated alphabetically and I'm at the end of the alphabet, so was regularly placed at the back. where i daydreamed away.

...oops, ON Planet Zog, I mean.

I've always been a bit like that, I still am. Nothing worked for me I'm afraid but I realise I'm doing it now. Doesn't bother me really I just know that I can't focus for any length of time unless it's really important/interesting or my adrenalin is pumping.

Is he more focused after exercise?

Yes, he's put at the front - the school is keen to try anything & everything (they're going to bring in an observer sometime soon, too). Being at the front probably helps, in that it would probably be worse otherwise, but it hasn't sorted things.

Earlybird - your helper suggestion: that's a dilemma of mine - as in, it would certainly help, but I'm nervous of creating a dependency - I'd like him to learn to manage himself, rather than being managed (he's very sweet and easy to manage, as a one-on-one). Perhaps we should have a separate CAT word about how serious your friends' child's problems were? (I need to talk to you about girls' schools, too, don't I!)

fennel, yep - he's spookily like his grandpa, who's an archaeology prof. I do know that at least some of his spacing is following idea hares - he does lovely & genuinely interesting hares - but again I guess I'd like him to have an ability to mentally bookmark the hare while staying with the class. Hmm, sounds like I'm asking the moon. Thing is, he's so able. He spaced through a history lesson, not writing down what was on the board, then when I managed to get him to focus at home he produced all the information (with no board to copy from). So I do think he's capable of having these things asked of him.

Exercise is a clever suggestion - yes, he is often more focussed then - though not always (unpredictable, again, sigh).

Thank you everyone - so interesting - any more??

Bink, in our day (she says, reaching for her Zimmer frame) nobody really noticed or cared if you were off with the fairies. I do remember the occasional terrifying teacher putting her face right down in front of me and shouting in my face when I had clearly missed a major trick, but most of the time I was just left to get on with it.

Then at about 13 my ability to get by just coasting started to wear off. I had a set of bad exam results and it dawned on me that you actually had to work at schoolwork. This was a completely novel thought to me clearly no-one had ever thought to point it out to me! and took a little while to get the hang of, but I managed it just in time to do the straight As at O-level thing.

Dd1 was like this in Y2 as well. I remember once having to go into school for something unconnected and witnessing a little tableau in which she was standing out by the coathooks apparently in a daze but clearly contemplating something, while literacy hour was well underway. Then the teacher (horrid, unfriendly, didn't get the 'point' of dd1) came out and yelled at her.

As with me, the shouting was completely ineffective. The dippiness wore off eventually, some time around Y4, and she can now concentrate pretty well when she wants to. I can see why you're worried, but it sounds like a 'fitting in with school routines' issue rather than a problem in itself, IYSWIM.

frogs dear your school days sound just like mine. I think I woke up some time around age 14, which funnily enough was when we started doing subjects we'd chosen for ourselves.

Giving myself deadlines helps me, if I work in, say, hourly slots of time I can focus more easily. I think it gets easier once you're at work because you have deadlines to meet.

That said, I can not focus in a meeting for more than half an hour.. I am just incapable of it, I drift off even when I trying to stay focused!

Always more focused after exercise though, maybe encourage him to play footy at lunchtimes and a sport after school? You mention Piano, playing an instument will focus the mind too. Keep challenging him.

Does he do mundane tasks in a dream? like cleaning his teeth etc? I do. Loading the washing machine etc are always done whilst I'm thinking about something.

Have you asked him what he thinks about when he drifts off? is there a specific theme or is it anything and everything?

Deadlines are still the only thing that panic me into action, I'm afraid.

Bink, my father described me as being in my own world. Sat at the front of the class all my life - short. Did not help.

I guess I am better at absorbing information when it is not given to me verbally, but presented on paper - hence my being on mumsnet rather than socialising! Like fennel, I blank out in class and in lectures. I just cannot concentrate if someone is droning on.

That said, I combined this in later years with intense pressure-cooker focus just before exams. Just opened my textbook, wet towel and all - studied for 3 weeks straight. Once out of the exam hall and having tipped out all my facts, I am back to my dreamy state. Did not do too badly, I might add. Managed to qualify and practise as a lawyer in the City for a good many years.

I think when your dd is older, he will be able to adapt. At 7, I had just started school (not UK). Did not take tests or anything seriously until my complacence got me a lower grade at 12+ entrance exams. From then on, I studied for exams - last minute though. So got by on self-study. Never needed teachers.

Even now, I only wake up when it is a subject close to my heart. Otherwise, still drifting ... Guess that does not give you much hope!

Oh, and making lists of small tasks can help as well.

He thinks about Dreamland. Which is a Brontesque cosmomachic collaboration with dd, featuring amphibious whales, a god (female, hurray) called Sunbaby, time finely adjusted so that you can be older there while you visit (during the night) but revert to your own age when you come back. And so on. Obviously it's more interesting than school, but dd manages to keep it under control so why can't he? (Rhetorical.)

Agree tinker, about deadlines. Otherwise I will be on mn the whole day!

I am/ was biggest daydreamer in the world. Luckily was quick enough at school to catch up on the bits I day dreamed through. University was a nightmare, could only manage to listen to a lecture for 90 secs before I drifted off, into my own wee world. I swear no exaggeration. Can’t listen to people giving directions, switch off at the….turn 2nd right then blah blah blah..off I go into own wee world!!
Thought it was just me, crap at listening, however when I did my post grad and we covered learning styles, it was like a light coming on in my head. I realised I was a “Visual Learner”, as soon as I realised this loads of things came together and picked up loads of study tips for myself.
Does your son
Facial expressions show his emotions
Think in pictures or words.
Have a Vivid imagination
Read a lot
Remember what was read or seen but doesn’t retain what he heard for very long.
Sensitive to the ways things look or appear

I now know, I have to take notes when I'm at a meeting, and have my highlighter pen as well!! Otherwise within 2 minutes of an important meeting I'm away.."Why on earth did he wear that tie to work? Did his wife buy him it? Oh maybe it wasn't his wife, maybe it was his lover..." and off I go inot my own wee world

It may be a completely the wrong advice, but it may be worth looking into. Have a search on google under "Learning Styles"

oh, post below was in response to MDBaby, by the way.

Bink, awwwww. YOur ds and dd sound really creative. I do remember my elaborate daydreams - at that age, probably involved having wonder woman flying nun super powers (giving my age away). How can fractions compete?

Been thinking about this thread. I haven't been worrying much about dd1 even though it's fairly clear her dreaminess does sometimes get in the way of her performance at school - she's only 5 and already a lot better than 6 months ago at getting on with the work. But she's terrible at things like getting dressed in the morning, and she loses a school sweatshirt almost every day at school. we once had 6, now we have just one!

You could think about how to play to his strengths. like, I was very good at reading and creative writing as a child. Dreaminess can be put to good purpose. actually that arty creative side got lost for me when I did start buckling down to getting the good grades at O and A level. then i stopped any creative writing or artistic activities, for ever really. But can you get him writing, reading more, or doing more maths perhaps, on a one-to-one level so he can get engaged in it? find out what grabs him and get him doing "topics" or "stories" on it.

Sorry crossed posts with a couple of posters

my worst was teenage fantasies of being a spy. as well as a sex goddess, Wimbledon star and pop star. All about equally unlikely in real life. but for example on A level physics trip to a nuclear power station, our ID was tested on entry and from there I was away, spent the entire trip pretending i was a spy checking out the enemy power station undercover (read too much John le Carre) and I did not pick up one useful fact about the physics of it all.

i used to never know what was for homework as i just wasn't listening, which used to cause problems too.

it's all coming back now reading this thread.

Hmmm - As a student, I think I coped with the daydreaming by taking copious notes in class. However, it may be that that made me learn by rote, instead of actually thinking about what was being taught and truly grasping it.

Bink - the son of my friends did have other issues. One of his problems had to do with sensory stimulation, which was identified during the long process of discovering exactly why he was unable to concentrate/absorb information effectively. There were visits to educational psychologists, and even a weekly type of stimulating exercise/physical therapy which all combined to teach him what he needed to do to manage well. For them, it was not just a passing phase, and turned out to be more than simply "not paying attention properly", though that was how the issue first manifested itself. Your sons dreaminess might have nothing in common with the dilemmas of this other boy.

As before, CAT me if you want me to find out more information about exactly what they did. Also happy to offer whatever info I can regarding schools.

RedTartanLass, that does describe him! I will follow that up, definitely. Thanks.

And fennel, it "all coming back" is exactly what I'd hoped to hear by starting this thread. (Though is it OK if I have a chuckle?)

More input very very welcome, though I must really try and finish this here term sheet.

A bump in case any evening people were dreamy children?

thanks ...