6year old has given up!!!!!!

[josey]

My 6 year old Ds has stopped working at school since going back from the Xmas holidays, nearly every day i have had unfinished school work home for him to complete.
I have tried, lots of different things to encorage him, but I dont seem to be getting though.
I have phoned the school and Im going to see his teacher tomorrow, i feel really awful about it.
Has anyone been in a similar situation? if so has your child pulled through.
Im wondering if it is my fault for not keeping him back in nursery, he is a December baby
any help/suggestions would be gratefully received

6 (Year 1?) is still pretty young to be fretting. Sounds unduly pressured to have ot send stuff home. Perhaps teacher could limit his/her expectations of what he produces so he does achieve something in lesson time, building up his confidence. Was he achieving more before Christmas or has he just never quite got there yet?

he is in year 2 - I know that he is young etc and one of the youngest in the class, im just worried it will spiral out of control, and its almost a full days work that is being sent home.
as far as i can tell there is a couple of things that he isnt understanding so he has a total mental block then thinks he cant do it so day dreams.
he probably haddent 100% got there before Xmas but was achieving more

I think you need some ideas from the teacher tbh. It isn't good enough for him/her simply to pass the problem over to you with little support so you are doing the right thing in setting up a meeting.

He sounds a little like our ds(Yr3) who has dyspraxic traits so finds it physically hard to do things with fine motor skills like writing, has difficulties in concentration and following multi step instructions,and is easily distractible. He still doesn't produce as much as other kids in his class but gets lots of positive praise for what he does do and as his confidence is growing so is his productivity. He has also been labelled as dreamy, slow to do tasks such as dress for outside and so on in the past.

btw it is estimated that 1:20 kids(ie at least 1 in every UK classroom), mainly boys, have such problems but most go unidentified and get no help .

thanks you - I have found that very interesting its amasing how unnoticed it is,i think i will deffinately get it looked into.

DS he can write although not the best,and he hates it with a passion, it was suggested at last parents evening that he should used alot of lego as this should help develope his hand skills, in the likes of if you ask him to get his shoes and school bag from his room, by the time he gets there he has either totally forgotten and goes and plays or does one and not the other because he couldnt find it or someother excuse similar though they are together etc I could go on.

Hopefully I might get somewhere tomorrow, what gets to me is that is just written on his work book, "was not working today must catch up do page 11" something like that there isnt even an explination of the work that is coming home, yeah he is only in primary 2 but im worried that i will do something to teach him wrong iykwim, its very frustrating - im so nervous about tomorrow, i feel as though ive been naughty

good luck tomorrow , hope you get some clarification of what is happening at school and what might help.

Your poor ds. It sounds like he needs more sturcture than he is being given at school so when you talk to them try and focus on what you and they can do to support his learning and ove it forward. does he need to work on his own sometimes without distraction? does he need small clear acheivable targets when he's working... like 3 sentences before the sand timer finishes. He needs rewards to encourage him as well. Sending the work home is pointless and unecessarily unpleasant in my opinion and I am a year 2 teacher.
Can he see and hear ok ? Can he be given small prompts to keep him on task like a pictorial reminder of his task.
Make sure you talk about the areas he is strong in and try and see what sort of learner he is. lots and lots of boys find writing a chore so he is not unusual in that.
Goodluck

Morning!!

Had exactly the same problem see thread :

www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=43&threadid=136638&stamp=060112164107

in the end, it sort of sorted itself out, yes I got upset at him and told him it mattered... that if he didnt do his work in school and we had to bring it home he wouldn't have time for other activities. It clicked with him on the thursday, might be because 1. I told him off "seriously" on wednesday night or 2. because he had to miss his swimming lessons because he had to go home and do his work or 3. because Xbox rights were removed! or more probably a mixture of all the above!

Together with the teacher handing over stickers as an incentive and making a fuss of him when he worked... He came home for the rest of the week and the following one really proud of having done all his work... Got fussed over and allowed back on the Xbox!

It really is the school problem and they have to deal with it, as others have said it is unfair of the teacher to dump you with the problem...

I did also go and see the headmaster who said he would keep an eye on things

Good luck and let us know how you get on!

thanks guys, mimsie encouraged to learn your problems sorted itself, have had a missed swimming lesson, telling off and a ps2 ban, but it just seems to revert back, he was issued stickers a week past Friday as got 40/40 on a maths thing they do on a Friday, and he seemed very encouraged, till the Monday and gave up again.
Robinpud, he has never seemed to have hearing or seeing problems, as he can see and hear what he wants to!! his big problem at the moment is tens and units, he just cant get it, and i think someone is talking to him which sends him right off track and cant get back so "GIVES UP"
I must remember to be strong at the school and remember I am the parent and not the pupil, I know its silly but im always waiting to be told off by the teacher
oh the sand timer might work with him as he is best at the beat the clock when they have to do the sums under stop watch, (thats what he got 40/40 in 2mins)
will post after been this afternoon

Hi josey (and mimsie!) - I was on mimsie's thread as well, you've probably seen.

When you describe your ds as not understanding something and hitting a block that is interesting - I bet that is exactly one of the problems. How good is he at talking you through his processes? - ie can he say, first I look at the number and see if it has got two figures or just one; if it has got two figures I know that the one on the left goes in the Tens column and the one on the right goes in the Units column ... etc.? You might find that doing that helps you (and him) to spot and dislodge the block.

My ds (also yr 2) is having a bout of dire daydreaming & non-performance of even routine stuff like packing his bag at the end of school. This time I am trying to help him by doing "visualisation" exercises: I get him to imagine it's the end of the day and give me a commentary on what he is doing, one by one, in order.

We've also done games about instructions, which have helped - let me know if you want other ideas.

hi
well the meeting went well, teacher also thinks he has hit a mental block that he cant do something so it sets him off in a daydream and he totally forgets what he is doing.
Today with his t/u's he got half way through but took ages, and it was play time so she told him that if he didnt finish he didnt get out to play (she assured me she would not have left him all play time) anyway he finised the rest of the sums in seconds flat, she did have to stop the start of the water works and tell him firmly he could do it though.
his story book is awful, i dont know where he has gone wrong there, so she has agreed to let him only do x amount of sentences then build up from there, is also going to try the egg timer she has done this with other children in previous classes and seen an amazing change, until this wee boy got fed up and lay the timer on its side to have a rest
she will speak to the special ed teacher and see if there is anything we should be worried about as she has noticed him mixing letters up like g and c or if words in a list mixing the top and bottom ones together.
I have arranged to go back and see her after the feb break see if things have improved. fingers crossed.
Bink, the packing the bag things like that ds forgets what he is doing half way through, generally cause something more fun has caught his eye, the end of the day to come home though is the worst i dont know how many things he has lost and forgotten!!!!!!!!!!