Please help! Am desperate -my son’s behaviour has really deteriorated since starting school in reception.

[muppetgirl]

Ds 4.9 started reception in sept carrying on from the nursery so same building, different door. He knows all the staff, routines etc. He started to lose concentration, mucking around, not listening and was tired. The school said they thought he was too tired to be at school and have suggested he does an afternoon less. Wed afternoon is arranged like this so he doesn?t do Wed afternoons (other children have this option to) just before Christmas we were told he was still too tired and that they would be happy for him to do another afternoon less. I was a bit shocked but took mon board what they said. Ds had a form of glandular fever last year and does suffer with tiredness but the paediatrician seems to think he?s fine now. This term he?s gone from bad to worse, he?s called his head teacher ?silly? in front of reception, y1 + y2 when collecting a merit badeg in assembly. (he said ?thank you silly?) He?s mucked about in assembly and has been told off by the deputy head yet still carried on. Today he was sent to nursery as he threw straws in the air when asked not to, missed a bit of playtime clearing it up then put the straws in his mouth and started eating them whilst being told not to he carried on. His teacher seems very touchy feely and syas thing like ?you have made me sad? which ds finds funny ?not the way we speak to him, we speak to him not down to him.
He said to me the other day ?I?m not arguing with you I think you?re wrong? ?I?ve listened to you, I?ve heard what you?ve said and I don?t agree with you? His teacher has asked if he spends a lot of time with adults as he?s very advanced verbally. He can write a little though gives school the impression he can?t write a thing so much they?ve said he?s behind. (were given 5 words to practise writing, ds practised 5 mins each day and can write all 5 legibly independently yet at school he was asked to write over the teacher?s writing and it was awful) He knows his sounds and is reading decidable books, yet school give him books where new words are introduced each book and it is more death by repetition rather than phonics and decoding. After the teacher told me what he?s done today I had to pick him up with a friend and we got into a discussion in which he was asking how could God die. His friend and I all got talking and ds said to his friend ?Don?t listen to mummy, she?s just wrong?
I feel he has no idea he?s a child that he doesn?t respect any adults. We are strict at home, have reduced his bedtime due to the tiredness (6pm not 7pm though today he went to bed at 5.30 due to the bad behaviour and was asleep by 5.50) we have said no telly and he now has to earn a tv programme through good behaviour. By good behaviour we ask him to listen and try his best, we don?t expect perfection!

I love my son early but feel dh and I are constantly telling him off and constantly hearing he?s been badly behaved at school. I feel his teacher isn?t strict enough with boundaries and sanctions. (she was almost apologetic today that she had to ?be tough on him? I said GOOD!) He?s always been hard work but fun and inquisitive with a huge zest for life. He?ll ask any question he wants and sees life as one big problem to solve but at the moment he seems so unlike the happy boy I once knew.

Ds 4.9 started reception in sept carrying on from the nursery so same building, different door. He knows all the staff, routines etc. He started to lose concentration, mucking around, not listening and was tired. The school said they thought he was too tired to be at school and have suggested he does an afternoon less. Wed afternoon is arranged like this so he doesn?t do Wed afternoons (other children have this option to) just before Christmas we were told he was still too tired and that they would be happy for him to do another afternoon less. I was a bit shocked but took mon board what they said. Ds had a form of glandular fever last year and does suffer with tiredness but the paediatrician seems to think he?s fine now.

This term he?s gone from bad to worse, he?s called his head teacher ?silly? in front of reception, y1 + y2 when collecting a merit badeg in assembly. (he said ?thank you silly?) He?s mucked about in assembly and has been told off by the deputy head yet still carried on.

Today he was sent to nursery as he threw straws in the air when asked not to, missed a bit of playtime clearing it up then put the straws in his mouth and started eating them whilst being told not to he carried on. His teacher seems very touchy feely and syas thing like ?you have made me sad? which ds finds funny ?not the way we speak to him, we speak to him not down to him.

He said to me the other day ?I?m not arguing with you I think you?re wrong? ?I?ve listened to you, I?ve heard what you?ve said and I don?t agree with you? His teacher has asked if he spends a lot of time with adults as he?s very advanced verbally. He can write a little though gives school the impression he can?t write a thing so much they?ve said he?s behind. (were given 5 words to practise writing, ds practised 5 mins each day and can write all 5 legibly independently yet at school he was asked to write over the teacher?s writing and it was awful)

He knows his sounds and is reading decidable books, yet school give him books where new words are introduced each book and it is more death by repetition rather than phonics and decoding. After the teacher told me what he?s done today I had to pick him up with a friend and we got into a discussion in which he was asking how could God die. His friend and I all got talking and ds said to his friend ?Don?t listen to mummy, she?s just wrong?

I feel he has no idea he?s a child that he doesn?t respect any adults. We are strict at home, have reduced his bedtime due to the tiredness (6pm not 7pm though today he went to bed at 5.30 due to the bad behaviour and was asleep by 5.50) we have said no telly and he now has to earn a tv programme through good behaviour. By good behaviour we ask him to listen and try his best, we don?t expect perfection!

love my son early but feel dh and I are constantly telling him off and constantly hearing he?s been badly behaved at school. I feel his teacher isn?t strict enough with boundaries and sanctions. (she was almost apologetic today that she had to ?be tough on him? I said GOOD!) He?s always been hard work but fun and inquisitive with a huge zest for life. He?ll ask any question he wants and sees life as one big problem to solve but at the moment he seems so unlike the happy boy I once knew.

How do you discipline him when he is rude ie "don't listen to mummy, she's just wrong"?

we talk through with him that that's not the way to speak to people. We have to work a lot with ds on how he talks to people.

Your boy sounds just like mine who is 4.2. We have just moved house and his behaviour has really deteriorated - often calling me a "silly girl" or a "bad girl" and hitting and punching me. He even bit me during a tour round the primary school, in front of the teacher we were talking to. Like you say - showing zero respect. Like your boy, he is usually very happy, always asking questions and with a real zest for life. He is usually well behaved. I have put it down to feeling insecure over the move and just testing me to make sure I'm not going to disappear etc.
It does sound as if your boy might be bored at school. Could it be that he is more advanced than the other kids and is pretending not to be in order to get attention? Perhaps the school has a policy of focusing more on the under-achievers and are not giving enough challenging work to the high-achievers?
I have all this to go through - my son is starting at the school nursery and doesn't start reception until September, so I don't have experience. Am just going on what you wrote.
I really sympathise. My DH and I feel we are constantly doing battle with him at the moment, and he is always going to bed without stories, having bike rides cancelled etc etc. It's definitely wearing me down.

If my dds spoke like that they would have a time out and told it is not acceptable?

Whilst talking through is valid and important if there are no "real" consequences to his bad behaviour than he may as well carry on doing as he wishes?

Many poeple who know him say that he's bored. Devil finds work for idle hands and all that...

I am an early years trained teacher and don't want to go in being the awful pushy teacher parent telling the teacher 'my son's bored' and I totally understand he does have to do things he doesn't find interesting. He seems to mess about when it's a group situation ie on the carpet when the teacher is teaching or in assembly.

He laughs at time out and we stopped using the naughty step when he was 3 as he became sarcastic 'Sorry mummy, sorry for.....(insert whatever Misdemeanour) -can I go now?

Rewards/insentives don;t work as he doesn't care. If you say do this and ou'll get...he jauts syas 'well I won't have...then'

If you get him to do something he doesn't want to he'll do it badly, smile at you and say 'that's not very good is it?'

sorry for awfully written last post

My 6 year old can be lippy and sarky, but no proper apology and time out is repeated and repeated and repeated until the admit the "crime" and apologise. Not always easy I admit. Eg "I'm sorry for answering back because it's rude and I'm not to do it" type of thing.

If he's bright you may just have to prove to him that you can outlast him on the stubborn front?

Much as you are reluctant, I think you need to get tough with the school. He is clearly a very clever little boy who needs more stimulation. He is behaving badly there because they are not challenging him enough. That's my take on it anyway.
Is there nothing that he really loves/would miss if you withdrew?
I really understand how tough this is.

I feel I'm caving though. I'm finding things really tough. Ds 2 is going to be a breeze in comparison!

I suppose I'm looking for something to do to try to change his behaviour. I felt the naughty step was going though the motions without actually changing his behaviour. When I talk to him about his beahviour we talk through the fact that he has been rude, that's not the way to speak to people. He might lose friends if he talks to them that way.

Oh that sounds horribly familiar! Although my dd is very well behaved at school her behaviour towards me and her dad is awful since starting Reception in January. Tonight I dragged her almost all the way home because she is just constantly moaning/silly/not doing what I ask. She does respond to behaviour charts and sanctions as long as I use them consistantly but even that gets so Booooring after a while, I just want her to do as I ask without all the bloody rigmarole. Anyway, no advice as I just shout and then we talk about it rationally afterwards because she isn't stupid, she does understand, so I'm no role model. I'm just riding it out at the moment hoping it will pass like all other phases do. I was exactly the same when I was little though and I didn't turn into a sociopath!

He LOVES his starwars lego game. He used to get 30 mins on it (kitchen timer used so all is fair) and 5 mins taken off for behaviour issues. He unstands this and accepts it and seems disappointed if he loses time. It's the only thing I have ever found that he cares about. His nursery teacher siad that she didn;t find anything but she was tough on him, not taking any rubbish and giving clear boundaries and he respected her. (and often told me how much he loved his nursery)
He lost the game competely after last weeks bad behavoiur and we have told him he has to earn it back. He did ask on monday if he could play it but siad 'oh..' in a slightly sad way but then said nothing else.

If he is rude then there should be consequences. DS has his wii time taken away becasue that is what he really values at the moment.

Maybe as dollius says you have to get tough with the school but I think you might also need to get tough with your son otherwise he is going to begin to really struggle with social situations.

How does he relate to his peer group? When he has friends round to play, what are their interactions like? Is he rude and sarcastic with them too? If so, how do they respond? I ask this because other children are often much less tolerant of this than adults and it would be interesting to see how they deal with him.

I also agree with cargirl that I wouldn't accept any rude/sarcastic behaviour; he would stay in time-out until his apology was genuine and if he did something badly and then said 'Well, that's not very good, is it?' my response would be 'No, so I'm afraid you will have to do it again.'

Have you ever tried actually losing your temper with him when he speaks to you rudely?

I am not a very shouty person myself, but once or twice I have deliberately allowed myself to get into a temper to show my very clever and verbal dd that you cannot speak to people like this, that they will get angry.

Really angry, not sad or whimpy in a oh-uyou-make-mummy-very-unhappy kind of way, but actually angry. Totally ineffective if you use it often of course, but if done infrequently it has a certain shock value.

"I feel he has no idea he?s a child that he doesn?t respect any adults."

But his way of speaking would be unacceptable in an adult. Adults don't speak to each other like this and I would make sure I let him know this. Call it baby-speak and tell him only small children do it.

And tbh being bored is no excuse for rudeness.

I think it is worth you speaking to the school and telling him that you experience this sort of behaviour at home when he is bored and that he seems to be doing as little as possible at school. Hope they work out the subtext without you having to do the pushy parent thing!

I would try and work out some sanctions for him when you witness his least desirable behaviour. Does he like computers some of the kiddy education websites are supposed to be good ( and interesting and stimulating?).

Time out will only work if he acknowledges that his behaviour is unacceptable. How would you discipline him if he did something like deliberate bite another child, just explain that it was unkind? Work out what motivates him and use it as a tool.

Children who don't respect adults aren't the nicest to be around. I am not saying your ds is like that but if you don't find a way to nip it in the bud he may end up unpopular in the future perhaps?

lot of x-posts!

he finds his peer group quite immature, yes he's not used that word but he prefers older children. He doesn't seem to relate to silly behaviour and when I meet up with friends he quite often goes and plays on his own.

cargirl -no due to training I don't tend to lose my temper but on saturday I totally lost the plot with him and shouted and screamed like I never had before. I think all the frustration came out. He looked very scared and nearly cried. I told him he was clever yet chose to act like he couldn't do anything and that I didn't understand him and all other things.

I think telling him that his behaviour is babyish when he speaks tou sarcastically/as though he is above you is a good idea, he needs to know that adults in charge and i also agree that the school need to get tougher, if his teacher isn't dtrict enough is their any other teachers who are scarier? that he could be sent to each time he misbehaves?

Maybe I'm missing the point, but he doesn't sound that out of control to me. He does sound verbally quite advanced (mind you, my DS4yo has speech problems, so I would say that).

I don't see a problem with what teacher said, (made her feel sad) she said her own feelings simply, it wasn't talking down to him.

The thing is, if he says
"I?ve listened to you, I?ve heard what you?ve said and I don?t agree with you" -- personally I think that sounds perfectly polite. I'd reply, "You're free to disagree, but we are still doing it my way".

As for straws thrown up in the air, what happens in school time the school has to deal with. They sent him to nursery, when they inform you, you smile and say "Sounds good!" and then mostly forget about it, what more do you (they) expect you to do?

I think maybe you are being too hard on him, expecting too much. Try to think of him positively, not as a little creature you need to constantly control and moderate.

I think the sanctions bit is the difficult bit. He doesn't care about missing out on things. He may underneath but doesn't outwardly show it. I have to say I don;t belive in time out after a difficlut child I was teaching hit a child with a ruler and then screamed at me 'I want my time out' as she then was entitled to sit for 10 mins and do nothing whilst the rest of the class got on with their work. Seemed a little topsy turvey to me. (I was supply so not my class)

I agree I am going to have to speak to school on a more formal footing. I have told the teacher about what is going home and written to her to let her know what we are doing at home to help -early bedtimes, earning computer time. I now need to know what they are going to do to help him concentrate and listen and show them what he does at home so they have some comparison.

Am I missing something or did cargirl copy and paste the op with the sole purpose of including paragraphs?!!

I agree with lljkk, he sounds perfectly normal to me

Perhaps you need to tell him clearly what he is doing right? Perhaps you need to model him polite ways of saying things and get him to practice etc?

If you're in a vicious circle of him being told off all the time it can't be much fun.

I'd let the school discipline him for stuff that happens at school and you just sort out what happens at home, he shouldn't be in trouble twice.