Does anyone have any strategies for directing a lovely but very dreamy 6 year old DS to ACTUALLY DO THINGS

[Anchovy]

A polite way to put it is that my DS has developed a "rich interior life", LOL.

He is 6 and in year 1. In general terms he is an absolute poppet - bright as a button, very affectionate, funny, very happy. He is also doing well at school - reading fluently, popular, nice group of friends, absolutely loves going to school.

However over the last few months he has become so dreamy that it is very hard to get him to do things sequentially. He has absolutely no sense of urgency whatsoever. When he is supposed to be getting dressed you will find him sitting on the floor with pants, vest and one sock on thinking earnestly about whether Darth Siddius is more evil than Darth Maul. When I asked him to get table mats out yesterday he ran round the kitchen island twice, did a bit of hopping, annoyed his sister, and when I asked him what he was supposed to be doing he had no idea. He has just started at an out of school football club and spends a lot of time bimbling around on the touchline clearly having forgotten what he is supposed to be practising.

Is this just a developmental phase? Is it a boy thing to be such a bubblehead? I know I make it sound funny but it is starting to impact on his school stuff a bit and I think we need a few strategies for getting him to just get a bit more focus rather than this being a slippery slope to Planet Bubble.

Any views?

Michael Rosen has 7 step/children. Some of them are grown-up now (and one, tragically, died as a teenager), but I imagine he's had some involvement over the years in getting at least some of them out of the house in the morning! I suspect he doesn't care that much about things like being late for school.

I'm still laughing about Niecie's DS getting interrupted by his own thought processes with only 1 arm in his T-shirt.

ROFL at this thread. Especially the Star Wars thoughts. ds this am - MUM where are my socks - Me: I've already told you 3 times that they are waiting downstairs for you. DS: Oh - Do you think that Ja Ja Binks is a boy or a girl ?
Hi Bink thanks for the two word distillation - I shall try that.
I haven't posted on the other thread for a while as I think I am just more accepting of the dreamyness traits than I ever have been before.
I do wonder whether lawyers as mothers have a lot to answer for.

DS has dressing issues too. He has more than once put on his pants without taking off his pjs. He put on his school sweatshirt back to front and then proceded to argue with 3yo DD who told him that he had it on wrong without even looking down to check for the school badge. And, yes, sometimes he will have a garment half on and his nose in a football annual or be giggling away at a Captain underpants book that he has already read a dozen times.

Lawyers as mothers ... or is it at all possible that we went into this particular career in some kind of perverse anti-intuitive own-dreaminess-busting urge - and that our offspring are just chips off our block? (I know I did. If I were to do a job that didn't involve getting stuff done to demanding standards & deadlines I would just ... space ... )

(This doesn't apply to Anchovy, who is a lawyer of another stripe!)

Indignatio, you're missed on the other thread. It's gone very quiet without you - and I did try to revive it with a positive "hopes & dreams" kind of spin.

Feeling positive today - ds is going to definitely be offered a place at a follow-on school (he might need to have transitional support, but follow-on school's HM sounded like he really wanted him, wasn't just agreeing to tolerate him).

Great news Bink. I can't remember if you are north or south - if south, have you considered Alleynes for ds ?
Intrigued by the type of stripes an Anchovy might possess.

go-faster ones!!!

I was thinking about this last night as I was walking home and thinking exactly what I was trying to urge DS to do. Funnily I also questioned whether I was projecting my lawyer-like tendencies on my boy, who is just a completely different personality. We do run a fairly tight organisational ship at home, with both DH and I working full time

The thing is, I really do want DS to be independent and self reliant, and I do think you have to start that early. I don't think it is too much to expect him at 6 to dress himself/make his bed/fold up and put his jamas away etc. I also don't think it is too much to expect him to do it on a reasonable and clear timetable, particularly when him being s-l-o-w and dreamy inconveniences everyone else.

The losing uniform thing would/does infuriate me. His jumpers are £35 a pop. I know that is not his fault but I do think a bit of respect for his uniform is not a bad thing (I don't expect it to be clean at the end of the day, btw, just there most of the time!) I have pointed out his chances of having a guinea pig (current Year 1 must have accessory!) are infinitessimally small when he can't look after his jumper!

At weekends he is allowed to lollop around to his heart's content!

Wonderful thread, and so true. I may have to print out Anchovy's ds's thought process as it's priceless. Ds1 is just turned 7 and although he's not too bad some of the time, I have noticed a recent upping of his dreaminess and inability to process requests. He was far better when he was 5. He's also one to get distracted while dressing, so we have a lot of complete nakedness, which in itself I don't mind, but we take the the train to school some mornings and I think it's a bit much for the other commuters . One recent classic was when I noticed at bath time that he was removing two pairs of pants - he had clearly got two pairs out by accident and then just spaced out and put them both on. And then not noticed ALL DAY that he had two pairs of pants on.

Any of your dreamers born in march? My ds1 is and i was told by a friend (heavily into astrology) that pisceans were deeply creative and imaginative!

ds2 (10 months) is also a piscean... might have to lock up the star wars videos if we ever want to get anywhere on time

I'm a Fish (end Feb) & rather a typical one, much as I scoff at astrology.

Ds was I think meant to be a fish - due around 20 March, but in the end turned out an Aries - early April. (Having a nice old daydream in utero, obviously)

lol

Not just pisceans, sagittarius are meant to be airy fairy too, my DD is sag.
Look here for example, says they dislike control and routine!!

I think it's actually 'mutable' signs that are meant to be quite wishy washy and pisces and sag are both mutable.

I think qualities said to come from astrology can often be spot on, especially if you have a full reading, a book I have describes everyone I know to a tee based on their sign. It's the crap in the papers 'daily horoscopes' that messes up astrology.

My dreamer was also born (late) at the end of March. not sure what her star sign is.

But I refuse to accept any such wishy-washy pseudo-explanation for her character, sorry.

There should be an emoticon there to suggest [scepticism despite the fact dd fits your astrology theory so well. and in fact I think my forgetful DP might be a saggitarius]

My dreamer was also born at the end of March. A coincidence?

Possibly, but who knows eh?

I think even if you dont believe in astrology accepting thats just the way your child is made (for whatever reason) is probably the best way to work any of this.

My dreamer is end of March too lol!

I agree with those that say their dreamer is a joy - my dd is infuriating, but kid and always looking for the joy and beauty in things

oh no will I have to overcome a lifetime's scepticism here?

Are we going to find that the thread is full of mothers from stressy/achievement oriented star signs (what would they be?) coupled with Piscean and Saggitarian offspring?

I am a sagittarian and quity dreamy verging to inaction !
Great thread, btw. I have a volcanic ds who needs directions.

No, no, no - looking at the astrological side of it is not going to help me with getting DS to remember his judo kit.

(Ds is October born - ?Scorpio - so nothing to add to this theory anyway.)

My dreamer is July so not relevant here either.

If only it were as simple as saying he was born the wrong time of year! Mind you, I couldn't tell you what was in ascendence when he was born, or his moon sign.

yes, I've got one of those too - turned 6 in November.
At football practice he became intent on making a pile of newly cut grass, prompting the coach to comment 'this is football, not gardening class'...
I think there is a risk that we over-organised impatient types are so intolerant of less focussed behaviour that we can end up taking over too often. I think foxinsocks strategy has to be the right one, even though it is very difficult to stand back ...otherwise I think we will end up turning out men who are masters of the 'wilful incompetence' strategy and require their women to structure their lives (even if they are kind and lovely and all the rest of it....)

Re turning out wilfully incompetent men ... I agree, & have as much horror of that as the next feminist, but -- how can I explain ds's constant choices, as his very particular schoolfriends, an entire sequence of Bossy, Together, Socially Adept little girls? I suspect that the will-to-powerlessness (make that will-to-fecklessness) is more inbuilt than we can conclusively sort ...