Suitable punishment or suggestions required for 10 year old DS

[SecondhandRose]

My 10 year old DS is being a complete pain at the moment. We have given him what we call 'electrical bans'' which includes Game Boy/TV and Playstation but we don't seem to have any improvement.

Can anyone suggest anything? I don't want to ban him from Cubs as that's the only time he sees other boys other than his school friends.

He doesn't bring home his school bag or letters he is given. I don't know about school projects or what is expected of him.

He doesn't bring home his dirty kit when asked. It has taken him 3 days to bring home uniform that he didn't wear home on sports day. He doesn't brush his teeth or wash unless he is asked to do it. I have asked him to wash himself in the morning and use deodorant, he is not doing this.

He wouldn't dream of opening his curtains, making his bed or turning off his bedroom light in the mornings. I have to ask him over and over again to do this.

He doens't practice his guitar even though he agreed to practice for 10 minutes each day in return for getting it and having lessons.

He won't go to bed when asked, he messes around for as long as humanly possible or until I scream at him.

He is happy either on the Playstation, watching TV or playing his Game Boy. If he has an electrical ban he talks his sister into some trampoline action where she ends up crying after 10 minutes.

If he's asked to help with jobs around the house, many of which he is paid for he is not interested and sulks. He will basically do anything to get out of helping unless it's on his terms. Like he is angling for this week's Beano.

Sorry to ramble, what can I do?

Well, back again, glad your son enjoyed the fetes.
This is a bit of a ramble but here goes:
Getting more stroppy around 10 years old? I can definitely relate to that - something about my son moved up a gear when he was 10 - a hint of hormones I think - suddenly he was contradicting everthing I said, arguing for the sake of arguing. If I'm in a good mood this just comes
across as friendly verbal sparring, if I'm in a bad mood, it's irritating uncooperation.

I find ds sometimes delights in verbally (and sometimes physically, I'm sad to say) tripping up his younger brother. DS1 knows just how to wind him up and when ds2 has been bad, ds1 will order him to go his room. I have told ds1 it is not his place to dole out punishments but it falls on deaf ears. He loves playing the older brother and this makes ds2 really mad.

I am finding things work better if ds1 is kept busy with separate activities. This stimulates and tires him out so he is easier company. I also get more one-to-one time with ds 2. At the moment ds1 goes to about 6 different clubs (not every week, we pick and choose - youth club, sports club, drama club etc). He seens to value them more than he did a few years ago. I now never get complaints about his behaviour.

OK I am doing more ferrying around of ds1, but I have cut back on the number of day trips I take both boys on. Suddenly a day at the science musuem with both boys seems like harder work. ds2 and I would have a more relaxed time alone together. I think some of the problem lies in the fact that ds1 is fast outgrowing all things pitched at primary school level. He wants to mix with older children, be more challenged, be physically more active, have more independence. Perhaps your son is feeling this too?

I found a turning point was reached with cubs a year ago - I took scummymummy's fab advice and detached myself from the situation: I told ds1 I could no longer be bothered to take him to cubs as his leader was always drawing me to one side to complain about his behaviour. The leader was not a good one (everyone said he was ineffectual and inexperienced) but I told ds1 wherever the fault lay, I was not interested, I did not care any more. I was simply fed up with being piggy in the middle and unless ds1 sorted it out, I would stop giving him lifts there. It was no longer a 'mummy punishing me' situation - it was
me, as an independent adult, telling ds I could not be bothered with any more hassle on my Tuesday evening.

This line I have found is far more effective. I am taking away a safety net - no longer saying I am punishing you, but it's ok I will still take you to your lessons. I am saying I have looked at this situation, I can't be bothered with it any more, convince me otherwise it is worth my while. I have tried this approach on other issues and it works.

For helping in the house, depending on your viewpoint, I 'take the line of least resistance' or I 'play to ds1's strengths'. Ds1 loves cooking-so I get him cooking ror him and his brother, making breakfasts, helping me cook bigger meals. He also likes a clean house, so when I am in the middle of a panic clean due to guests arriving, I can usually rely on him to help me dust, polish and hoover.

He doesn't like washing up, will just about do it if he has cooked but otherwise no. He hates cleaning his room, so I do it . So I don't really
force him to do the jobs he hates, as long as he does the jobs he likes(ones that are helpful to me).
If there is a tangible deadline - guests coming, us leaving the house to get a train, this helps him concentrate his efforts. No deadline and
it's much, much harder to get him focussed on work.

I have made him help much more in the run up to leaving the house. He knows it is no longer enough to simply get himself dressed and look on while I run around madly filling up drinks bottles, collecting coats, turning off lights etc.He is expected to help and if he doesn't gets shouted at. I expect him to get himself ready well before we leave, so he can help me more. I have said on occasion, unless you do 'A B and C' I can't be bothereed to take you out. This works (unless it's a situation where I have to take him with me).

We do give him some money if he has done very well at school - if it means he has had to work hard, as in the preparation he did for the 11+. But I never give him money for doing day to day household chores - washing up, etc as I've told him doing this is a normal part of family life.

He never forgets his bookbag and all his school paperwork is inside it. I don't put this down to his powers of organisation, I put this down to the school. I think teachers insist all children leave school with their bookbags and try to make sure children have all school letters inside. It is very good training for secondary school. If your son is consisently forgetting his bookbag, I think you need to ask his teacher what is the school routine here? Tell them you have a big problem and you can't ensure ds does his projects on time as you never know about them. It's in the teacher's interest to get homework in on time, so hopefully they can do more to ensure your son leaves with all his stuff. If the bag comes back daily you could the have a home school book, with notes for your son to remember to bring back his sports kit. The teacher could check it over and if no kit has arrived home, punish ds in school. Being shown up at school in fornt of his friends for forgetting to bring home his dirty kit 3 days in a row might make your ds less forgetful? And tell your ds how much he will need to remember at secondary school with the gib kids - all the homework, the books for different classes etc - and how much less patient his teachers will be if he keeps forgetting stuff. Lay it on thick, tell him it's part of growing up.

I do all the above and still my son isn''t as organised and considerate as I would like him to be, but as tactics go, these are the most effective for us.

Great post, Tigermoth. I MUST get ds (11) doing more chores. Sadly at the moment we split along gender lines, with dd happy to help, and the males of the family, well...

I have pointed out to dh that he needs to set an example and that ds is just following his role model.

Message withdrawn

tiddlypom, have been thinking about dh's contribution and funnily enough, my son's housework likes and dislikes exactly mirror those of his father. So 'yes' to cooking, a possible 'yes' to dusting and polishing and a usual 'no' to washing up.

Rose, Playstation does not seem to be a big motivator for your DS. What about banning the things he really treasures? Say no to the next football match. Take away some of his gear, and he can earn it back (or not if he chooses not to co-operate)? He is old enough to understand delayed punishment.

Point is, you need to decide - is this behaviour unacceptable to you? If it is, you need to take action. If it is not unacceptable to you, then don't stress (and don't nag, because they'll just tune you out because they know you don't mean any of your threats, and they might miss it when you say something important)

For the Custardo fans, you might enjoy this story about my brother (he is my hero)...
My brother's step son (SS) kept slamming the bedroom door in a huff (usually when SS's mother tried to reprimand him), so my brother took the bedroom door off the hinges and stored it in the garage! It was brilliant. This 11 year old was STUNNED that he had lost the priviledge of privacy. A week later and after a very sincere apology, the door was back and SS has not slammed a door since! (The thought of loosing the door again at a future time made SS very co-operative about keeping his room tidy.)

A year or so later this boy became verbally abusive to his mum (and even started shoving her off her feet). (I know this is way worse behaviour than what you are dealing with Rose). My brother tried taking away privileges (playstation, tv etc). Nothing worked. Then, he took the light bulb out of the boy's bedroom! and he ended up having to do homework etc at the dining room table.(We come from Africa, and he told the boy, "Where I come from it is a privilege to have electricity. Your mother is special and you are priveleged to have her as your mother. It is not acceptable to treat any woman this way, and especially not your mother. Until you learn to treat her with dignity and respect, all your privileges will be removed one-by-one"). Again, this absolutely stunned the boy who did not believe my brother was serious. He learned that my brother was serious and decided that he could not live without light bulb in his room. He also decided that my brother was very serious about the way that women in general and his mother in particular should be treated. He decided that it was easier to be nice to his mom than to deal with my brother (who knows what he would end up taking away next?).

At the same time, my brother kept telling SS that he was a great kid with a great future, and that he (my brother) wanted to help him to grow up the best person he could be. SS knew in his heart that his behaviour towards his mom was wrong, and that made him feel bad about himself (but he had been exposed to violence in the home before my brother came along, and I suppose he was just acting out what he had seen happen).

When my brother met this family the child was rude, obnoxious, unco-operative and very unhappy with himself (he knew that his behaviour was wrong, but had no motivation to change). My brother was generally very relaxed, but provided a few ground rules (these were not unreasonable or too strict, but there were very clearly things he would not accept). SS knew that my brother meant what he said, and that he when he took a stand on an issue then he was serious about it. The child (after initially increasing his bad behaviour) settled down and became friendly, outgoing, happy, kind, thoughtful. Of course, there were ongoing minor issues as with all kids, but once he had a father-figure who cared enough to set some boundaries this child flourished. He was not a bad kid to start off with (but he behaved very badly), he just did not know what behaviour was ok and what was not.

The point is that EVERY child has buttons that you can push. You just need to figure out what your kids buttons are. And if the issue is serious, then you have to be determined to do whatever it takes to make your point. Also, you have to decide where you want to draw the line.

Also, check if your child is in trouble at school. If he/she is not misbehaving at school then you know that they are getting away with misbehaving at home, just because they can! They are able to control their impulses at school because they know there will be a consequence if they don't.

Of course, there are some exceptions, where kids do have behavioural problems, and that should be checked out if misbehaviour is very severe, but even in those instances, they need to be taught as far as possible how to intergrate into adult society. IN my brother's case SS had been seeing behavioural counsellors who made various suggestions but nothing worked and he just got worse until my brother showed him that for his unacceptable behaviour there would be a consequence that he didn't like. The brilliant thing is that the ball was in SS's court. My brother told him, "you can choose if you want your door on your room, then don't slam it. If you slam it, it comes off". My brother did not argue or fight or get heated. He presented the choice and let SS decide. This empowered SS. In the end the consequences of bad behaviour outweighed the satisfaction of slamming the door.
I don't imagine it was easy with the child ranting and raving and throwing an absolute fit!

Re the school letters thing. 'let him take the fall'.

If he doesn't bring in the letter about the school trip/ needing to dress up for world book day etc, if he doesn't bring home the letter tough it out and let him deal with the disapointment of not getting involved.

I know that it sounds harsh but it only takes the once.

A great friend of mine spent about a term and a half running round like a headless chicken over one of hers who never gave her the info on what was needed for cookery lessons until the morning of the lesson! Yikes. In the end she warned her that if it happened again, no dice. The kid went to school and got an after school DT. never happened again.

They have to learn to take responsibility for their actions. Please, as a teacher, can I beg everyone to do this. It helps us so much and the kids as well.

a question about the schoo letters thing:

At what age can you let a child 'take the fall' without it reflecting badly on the parents? I feel that if my 5 year old year 1 son forgot to bring in his kit, get my signature for a school trip, etc the teacher would blame me not my son for our lack of organisation at home.

I know my year 6 son should organise himself more independently, and tbh he is good at reminding me of school stuff and bringing letters back. However, just say he forgot about a letter for a trip, so I didn't sign it, so he couldn't go - would the teachers really blame him or me? Most school events get mentioned in our school newsletter, so it would be unlikely I'd have had no news at all about it. The teachers know I am a busy working mother and I tend to be in a rush when I see them, and do things at the last minute. I can't help thinking even for my year 6 son, they would put some of the blame on me if he missed something.

I think secondhandrose's son in a year 5 - would teachers expect children of this age to organise all letter siging etc or do they still expect parents to somehow know what is going on?

kiwikath I dashed away yesterday without saying how much I enjoyed reading your message about your brother's way of dealing with his stepson. A simple but very targeted taking away of stuff. I thought it was really good that he kept such a relaxed and positive attitude throughout. I'm sure this is important and it's something I aspire to do myself, thought it can be very difficult.

Thanks Tigermoth

I agree that while discipline is important, it needs to be balanced with encouragement and a lot of positive feedback. Also my brother took a lot of time with his SS to do fun stuff (fishing mostly, which they both love). My brother's stepson had never had much encouragement before in his life. I guess we all blossom when encouraged and nutured.

So relieved to hear that there are other eleven year old boys out there like our DS1! One thing that we have found works for us is taking 10p off his pocket money for minor irritants. While threatening no pocket money at all never really worked for things like keeping his bedroom floor visible or turning the light off, removing 10p at a time (visibly from a pile of change) does seem to have some affect. We also reward good behaviour by adding to the pile (ie for washing up) but we don't put a price on a particular chore and we can just add 10p if he has generally been a nice boy all day.

Respect to Custy, Tigermoth and KiwiKate on here - I really really enjoyed reading your posts. Very interesting thread.
I am already banging on at ds, (six tomorrow bless) about manners, consideration for others, tidiness and so on, being AS important as doing well at sports or in school. I want him to be the sort of man who has to beat discerning women off with sticks when he grows up (but does it nicely IYSWIM)

Secondhandrose,
was just reading through the messages here and came upon your one about his afterschool routine...
After school routine is to stuff his face with snack, watch TV/Playstation
then he moans about dinner 75% of the time, then gets rewarded for it by watching tv.
ok well I have a 7 yr old he is thoroughly spoilt, he has 2 rooms of our home, the biggest for all his toys the smallest is his bedroom. He has a tv/video and dvd in his bedroom... but he is only allowed an hour of tv before bed.
When he gets in from school his routine is ..
Have a snack noramlly a sandwich and a glass of milk, then he can either play for an hour with his playstation or toys, bath time, family time with tv, then he HAS to do 45 minutes of either reading, writing, maths or litracey, while i or his dad are cooking dinner. Then he can either go to bed and watch a film or read or he can sit with us until 9 and then he has to go straight to sleep.

I don't buy sweets, crisps or junk food. I don't allow him fizzy drinks or too many colours. He doesn't stay at afterschool clubs or go to cubs, we do as a family go swimming twice a week and then on weekends we go to many different places and all without spending a great deal of money.

He is also the child with everything, 2 drum machines, karaoke machine, 24" tv, latest Arsenal kit etc etc the differnce is I do not allow him to get away with things. If he is rude he loses time doing things he likes, he can then decide whether he is going to calm down and discuss things with me or whether he is going to go to bed until I decide he can come out.
I have sent him to school with no breakfast when he was playing up one morning and I told his teacher. It didn't do him any harm and it won't do your child any either.
You need to clamp down on this now as given another couple of years he will be too big to put in his room etc he will then be TELLING you what you are going to do instead of the other way around. Get strong mrs, stop giving in to him until he can respect you.