Dreamer of dreams,born out of my due time, Why should I strive to set the crooked straight. Wm Morris

[indignatio]

Hopefully the link from the other thread will work

My stats

ds is 4.5 - summer born
In reception class

Has issues with:-
Easy distractability (school work and practical tasks)
Concentration problems when not totally engaged by something (95% of the time)
Fidgeting
Getting "lost" in the middle of a complicated sentence/explaination.
Bossy manner
Isolation at school
Poor eye contact
Repetition of sentences until he hears the acknowledgement
No herding instinct

On the positive
Very loving boy
Exceptional reader for his age
Good at maths
Lots of "home" friends
If gripped by something, can concentrate on it for ages

dx:
teacher initially thought he might have dyspraxia - no longer thinks so.
I consider that he has more add traits, but would not go so far as to say he has add.
SENCO to informally assess him next week and then meeting to be arranged with parents, teacher and senco shortly thereafter.

Not sure what else I should put in.

I think we do need that mooted meet-up!

• seriously - as I feel the best antidote to this sort of outsidery feeling is as much, fairly casual, non-threatening, social contact as possible - so playdates with parents' friends' children, muck-arounds in playgrounds or soft play places where you do ad hoc hook-ups with random kids around your own age, possibly school playdates but ones with an ice-breaker sort of focus (going bowling? could be anything) to take off the social heat.

So the idea is that, by having lots of other social contact, you dilute the (possibly stressing) effect of the more intense school atmostphere.

I am sort of speaking from experience - at ds's last school, I used to try to get him to focus on others & get over differences & build relationships - and he did end up stressed.

We went to the Star Wars exhibition last weekend, and DS1 was chuffed to bits to get chosen for the Jedi Training School!

I'm sure one of you (was it Bink?) had a spate of random fibbing from her DS. DS1 is constantly making things up at the moment - "I scored 3 goals in football", "I was one of the top 3 in English so I got to choose what we read", "I won the prize for dancing at the Y4 disco". We have chatted about it and he says that his brain can't stop his mouth - he would love to have done all these things, and thinks he is not best at anything .

Any advice?

Hallergerda .

The problem is that it's difficult to do the out of school contact with other kids atm because we are living 35 mins drive away. When we move it'll be much easier to encourage that sort of casual contact.

Hallgerda - was interested that you wrote that the important thing was NOT to seem confident and unbothered. Why do you think that? I always thought the way to defeat bullies was to appear unconcerned - but I may be completely wrong!

DS had 'tummy ache' before school this morning and wanted me to speak to his teacher about the teasing. She was great - really praised him for following something called the 'Three Step Rule' . I gather this is: (1)Say 'stop it, I don't like it ' 2) if they don't tell the teacher 3) Not sure - fire and brimstone would be my choice...
Apparently one of the boys lost part of his play time yesterday and she said she'd monitor the situation closely today. DS went in smiling bravely, bless him.

I think it was us, and same thing - motive is much more wishful (which included an element of wishing to please us) than deceitful.

Hmm, why did it stop? [mulls] We had some talks about liking to be known as a truthful person and how even one fib can damage that for a really long time ... so I think we had a commitment to tell Lots of Truths (to restore the reputation) which made for a few weeks of "Mummy. It's breakfast time. That's TRUE isn't it Mummy, does that help make up? How many more true things do I need to say now?" etc. But gradually we stopped getting quite so many compensatory True Statements, and the fibs haven't come back.

sphil - sorry, the "not" was a typo.

Hallgerda - I did wonder if it was a typo - but thought you might know something I didn't!

No advice Sphil - just hope knowing youre not alone helps. If I have friends around(and I dont that often partly due to the fact that we live at bit away from the school and partly because there never seems to be enough time with parties every second week)I normally have 2 boys because 3 is not such a good number and boys seem to naturally gravite to Dt1. However the boys missed a swimming party at the weekend (I got the wrong date) and after an embarrassed call to apologise I asked the party boy around to give him his presents and to play with the Dt's. Well i wished I hadnt. Dt1 and party boy were saying things like "dt2 is rubbish". It wAs Dt1 that started it really and I know its a natural reaction to not want your brother around when a friend comes ( the party boy was more Dt1's friend anyay) but it really upset me. I had to tackle Dt1 but didnt really work. Then to top it all party boy said "Dt2 is always asking for help at school because he doesnt listen properly "Worried now that he will be picked on for this because children while pretty oblivious last year are now becoming much more observant. The teachers keep saying how popular he is but I am not so sure. So feeling low at the moment too.

Hallgerda - I like your idea of getting me over!! Maybe you could all come over here now that we are a peaceful nation (for now)

Yes it does help knowing we're not alone. I think if this had happened before we started this thread I would have been worrying about it far more. We had similar things happen when DS1 had two friends round from his old school: we had comments like 'DS1 is as slow as a slug in PE' and quite a lot of 'ganging up' behaviour. It's heartrending isn't it?

I asked DS1 how today went and he said 'Only two boys called me names. They were calling me alien freak' .
They lost their play time apparently, so obviously the teacher is on top of it. But afterwards the same boys were doing things like taking his hat and 'doing karate' on him in the playground. He said he didn't bother telling the teacher 'because it didn't even hurt me' - I hope it means that he's shrugging it off rather than just becoming resigned to it.

He seems to have a generally optimistic view of school and says that he's made lots of friends. He certainly doesn't seem unhappy out of school or brooding on it at all. It's difficult to know whether to ask him about it or just let him tell me if anything else happens (which he may not).

Thank goodness it's half term!

Your post reminded me - party boy also said "you are always going to go slower than me Dt2"

cant quite work out Dt2's gross motor issues. Some skills seem to be ok in certain situations but not in others. For example he always comes last in races and doesnt like games like "chasies" for too long but goes at great speed when running around an indoor play area. His balance seems not to be great as he cant stand on one foot well but then can ride his bike without stablisers.

Sphil, I'm glad at least that your DS feels he has settled in well, and hope things are OK after half-term. Maggiems, riding his bike must give DT2 lots of confidence, I'm sure.

Thanks for the 'lying' stuff, Bink. I like your idea of Truth balancing out Untruths. DS1 is also motivated by the idea of pleasing me (overpushy academically demanding mother frustrated by her son's flopsiness) and DH (big football fan and keen player in his youth).

Singersgirl, I think I am also an OADMFBHSF - but not sure this will catch on as an acronym.

We had a bad evening here last night when ds was so far away and not doing what I asked that I yelled and got cross. This does NOT help. Anyone got a strategy which works for them re keeping calm in the face of unfocuseditus.

Sphil, rather than you asking about it, do you have a close friend or relative who could ask him. I have a good friend who always manages to wheedle more info out of ds than I ever could. Then there is no pressure on him to say what he thinks you want to hear - if you get my drift.

I am also a a OADMFBHSF(who yells). Feel REALLY REALLY bad afterwards. When DT2 is unfocussed I know the right thing to do is to let it be for a while and go back later when he is less tired/distracted or whatever. But I find it difficult to do that.Recently I have been trying to reward him during his homework or extra work that I sometimes do. I say "If you can write 3 sentances then you can have X and then we will do your book and you can have Y. I'm sure I shouldnt bribe but it does sometimes work.

Yesterday DT2 moaned, yawned, fidgeted throughout his homework.Eventually he finished and afterwards I noticed he didnt seem too well and looked a bit flushed. he had a temperature of 102 degrees . He is fine again this morning and skipped into school for "Fruity Friday". Its hard to weedle anything out of Dt2 about school apart from when its food related. Whenever they do topics like "healthy eating " or like today where they have to buy fruit he always seems to listen and bring home the instructions.

oh yes I too of course am an OADMetc. - Ignatio (which I am going to insist on as your pet name, by the way) identified that as one of our dreamboats' feature matrix, didn't she?

Terrible thing is that ds CAN produce the most astonishing work - he had to do an "imagine you are a £5 note - what are you spent on in a day? perhaps you get lost" story assignment. It was a day when I was picking him up, but had some work to do - so we sat across from each other at the kitchen table, me with a contract, him with some scrap paper, & both scribbled for over an hour.

His story was about a piece of paper - blank, but somehow "alive" - which is stolen out of its warehouse, crushed through a printing press - turned into a £5 note ... the paper realises it's been FORGED, and has to somehow alert the police - but in such a way that it won't be destroyed (as that's the fate of forgeries). So it manages to write a message on itself which will set off the automatic money-counter at the estate agent's (the forgers use the money to buy a hideout) thereby alerting the estate agent & police but NOT the forgers (who are then easily tracked down at the hideout they've bought). The Queen invites the brave banknotes to Buckingham Palace ...

Isn't it wonderful? If that can be produced, how hard it is NOT to push.

What a wonderful story Bink - I also wonder whether these proud mummy moments make us push because we can see the "Brilliance" there. Also whether I/we get frustrated at failure to go simple things - like remembering to do the task just requested such as putting on shoes - as it seems so simple compared to a 4 year old standing up in assembly today and reading out his 2 page story on Jesus finding the disciples. My proud mummy moment of the day.

Everytime one of us posts about their dc, I end up looking back through the thread (which is getting quite long) to check the age and idiosincracies of the child being mentioned.
As we are all getting to know one another and are discussing meeting up, I was wondering whether an excel spread sheet could be prepared and emailed (via CAT) around for mothers of dreamers to fill in their dc's details. MN is the only "chat room" I belong to so please tell me (gently) if this is not appropriate.

That is a wonderful story, Bink, and shows a brilliant imagination. I have been having Talks with DS1 lately about the importance of Doing His Best as we have the secondary schooling dilemma coming up. He is very competitive, but in my opinion about all the wrong things.

DS2 (5 and in Y1) is now also not completing work. He brought home a whole lot of maths sheets for 'finishing' last night. I made him do a couple yesterday, and I timed him to see how long the first one took - 15 out of 20 sums left to do. It took him just over one minute - but he says he is too tired to finish in the lesson . DS2's teacher is getting fed up with me as I am always going in to see her.

I fear I am One of Those Mothers.

Yep, me too!

DS1 just came home from school and did his half term homework straight away! I nearly fell on the floor with shock but obviously hid it gracefully . This is the very first time he's not had to be coaxed and bribed into doing it at the last possible minute. Mind you, he only wrote "Today they wos a puppit prade" (sic) - but I've learnt to butt out...

No mention of teasing today and he seems very happy so hopefully things were OK.

Think spread sheet is good idea btw - I do the scrolling thing too.

Sphil - great news about the homework

If you can CAT me with your email address, I can send you the start of an excel spreadsheet with ds's details filled in. Feel free to alter and add to it and then pass it on to the next person who is happy to be part of this. I figured this way, we each only had one person's email address and they weren't typed out for the world to see. I am probably a little naive re the internet, but also a tad wary.

I am going on hols for 2 weeks from Monday, so if we want to get this started before I go, please CAT asap

Good news on the homework Sphil. Long may it last.

Lovely story Bink - Your Ds sounds very clever.

Indignatio - like the spreadsheet idea, I also scroll all the time. Hope you have a good holiday. I am catable now .

Maggie, CAT me with your email address and I will send the started spreadsheet to you. If Sphil then CATs you with her email address, you can send it to her. OK ?

Just sent it

maggiems - not with me as yet. Could you try again please ?

Just sent it again. It was my first cat as I just registered this morning. However I got a message to say Mumsnet were sending it on so thought all was ok.

maggiems - neither have arrived - I will try to cat you with my email address.

i think i may not have had my email preferences set up correctly . have tried again

Indignatio - we dont seem to be having any luck. Maybe you will have better luck with Sphil