6 year old showing violent and agressive behaviour at school ~ need advice

[Cyndii]

Hi my 6 year old is showing violent and agressive behaviour at school ~ need advice. School have been patient, not sure if they escalate the situation as now I have to call the school 1-2 times a week to bring him home which meams I have to leave work. I have spoken with a senior behavioural psychologist and he is meeting with the school & us on thursday afternoon. Out of my mind with worry. Has anyone ever similar problems with their child and what did you do?? I feel that he has a low frustration tolerance and then he looses control of himself, lashing out with kicks. HELP..........

We do have similar problems with ds (now 7) and a lot of his behaviour is due to him being on the autistic spectrum. He has a statement and fulltime 1:1 in the classroom now so it is rare that he has an outburst these days but before he had support things got very bad.

I'm not saying that your ds has SN but it may be worth getting him assessed by a paediatrician.

Hi Cyndii, lots of sympathy as I have been through the same with my DS whos now 9. He's also on the autistic spectrum (although exactly where is still up for debate!!).

I have lost count of the amount of times I have been phoned by the school about one thing or another. DS has been excluded several times for hurting other children (and even a teacher once). He now has 1:1 support at school which is helping hugely.

Definitely get him seen by the Pshy. Im not saying there is anything wrong, however my DS was treated as a naughty boy for along time before we found out he was aspergers. It was only when his behaviour at school became so bad, I sat and thought about how 'odd' he was about other things. Nobody told me anything or offered any sort of help. I had to find it out and ask all the right questions myself and push for every appointment.

Its well worth knowing what the school can and can't do as well, as they can and will take the p**s. For example they can't just call you and ask you to collect him, this would be a voluntary exclusion and is illegal. They should be putting in place something called school action to help your DS, and envolving the SENCO. www.ipsea.org.uk are brilliant for all this sort of info.

Theres loads of great people over on the special needs forum, and we are all practically experts on education having waded through the system ourselves. Please pop over sometime.

Could you ask the school to keep a diary of what is happening just before he starts lashing out. Identifying the triggers can be a huge help in deciding what to do to help your ds.

The school also need to look at what they can do to deal with this at school rather than just excluding him, eg letting him go somewhere quiet to give him a chance to calm down.

Does your ds have an IEP? If not then you should ask the school to have one drawn up for him with targets to help him with his difficulties.

What exactly are the signs of aspergers and autistic spectrum. DS is in other aspects of his life fine, no hassles just with school and one particular cousin, a little girl. He is very intelligent and academically is so very well able for the work and his reading is fantastic. If you could give me "telltale" signs of what your sons were showing I would very much appreciate any help. Today we plan to meet with his teacher to start a "contract" with him hopefully achieving a star each day if he has had a good day I shall reward him when he gets home. He seems really pleased with this but we won't get too hung up if he doesn't achieve a star just start the off again the following day. Thanks

Yes the diary is great idea. Thanks I'll suggest that when we meet with the principal and the psychologist on Thursday. Sometimes I beat myself up trying to figure out whhere I have gone wrong........ it's so stressful

The NAS guide for signs of AS in school-age children is here.

Signs will vary. My 2 boys are both on the autistic spectrum but are very different to each other. Both are very bright and have no problems with school work. They both have a need for routine and like to know in advance about what is going to happen. They also both have sensory difficulties, eg very sensitive hearing and vision. Ds2 dislikes wearing clothes but ds1 has no problem with this. They both have good verbal skills but often have 'quirky' language and can seem very old-fashioned. Ds2 is 4 and people often say that he sounds like a little professor. Many children with AS can seem very clumsy and have problems with balance. Ds1 is like this but ds2 is the exact opposite and is very good at physical stuff.

Thank you Coppertop for that link, I think the only aspect that ds has similar is his frustrations at school. But reading your comparisons with your sons it's not so clear cut, each son differs. He has a good network of friends since he started school 2 years ago and he goes to their house and they come to ours with no difficulties. I observed at the weekend that he found it difficult to loose at basketball (no balance problems). Now dh & I think that we might have overly encouraged him in an unaware manner that he is so great at things that he now gets frustrated that he can?t do things perfectly immediately but we have said that practice makes perfect. thanks again

There was a little boy in my ds's class who used to lash out. He was very big for his age which made it worse as he could really hurt. What helped him was a clever teacher realizing that he hated to be crowded - he used to kick out if nybody was sitting too close to him on the carpet, or if anyone leant over his shoulder. He is still volatile, but if he's given space he can control himself now.