Parenting / Behaviour Management

[Singlemum1985]

How do you handle your G&T child with regards to behaviour.

My DS is rarely 'naughty' in the usual sense of the word but the way he talks and answers back is just so infuriating! There is only the two of us and DS thinks he is an adult (he is actually 5). He speaks to me in the same manner I would speak to him, no matter how many times I have explained how inappropriate this is. I understand that because he understands much more than other children his age it must be frustrating for him but goodness me he's pushed my buttons (and knows it!!) today! I swear blind he thinks he's my husband and not my five year old son sometimes!

Sorry I really needed to vent!

www.verywell.com/how-not-to-argue-with-gifted-children-1449080
Any help? What sort of things is he answering back on?

catkind thank you so much for the link! My first thought after reading it (apart from the great advice) was sheer relief that it's not my bad parenting and it's quite common for gifted children to argue in this way!

My DS will argue his point over anything I say that he doesn't agree with to the point of exhaustion! The trouble is after an hour of his very articulate verbal reasoning on why it's actually me in the wrong and not him I tend to agree with him (not that I ever let him know hahaha).

Example: I asked him to come sit eat his meal in a restaurant yesterday. He'd been in the play area with his friend and our meals arrived. Five times he refused arguing various different points until I finally said come here so I can talk to you. His response was ' I am not discussing this with you here, I'll talk to you about it when I get home' ! Now obviously this is something I would say to him but when met with this response from a five year old I didn't know whether to laugh or cry!

Ha, not being in the middle of it I can laugh, but yeah, that's the sort of thing DS has come out with too. In retrospect I don't think you should have let it get to 5 times, but know it's tricky when you don't want to make a loud fuss in a restaurant. I think my response might have been "then I'm afraid we'll have to go home and discuss it right now." Not nice to have to bail out on friends but it may take a dramatic early exit from somewhere to convince him you mean business. One early exit from toddler gym was held against me for months by DD (and she was only 2 if that!!) but the change in her behaviour was remarkable.

I have had a very similar situation and my response was, "Do you want to leave the play area by yourself or do you want the embarrassment of being dragged away in front of your friend?"

Perhaps I should add that when asking a child to stop doing something and do something else I tend to tell them they have 5 minutes. A 5 year old has no idea how long 5 minutes is so as long as you wait a moment or so, generally they are OK to leave. (Well, after one last sneaky go on the slide).

JustRichmal My 4 year old certainly knows that "5 minutes" is not a moment, if there's a digital clock available she knows for sure, and would manage an analog clock at certain times. But even without that she knows it's counting to sixty five times - which might be shorter than 5 minutes but certainly not a moment. And will know it's longer than various songs.

Now sure, part of that is from us talking about songs and counting etc. as ways of teaching time passing, but surely most kids have more of an idea than none of time passing. Especially Gifted and Talented ones.

Well yes, this is mumsnet.

JustRichmal - the beginning of telling the time, is to gain a sense of time. My DC would all know the difference between 5 minutes and 1 minute at the age of 5 - and I would think that would be fairly usual at that age. Especially if doing something they enjoy where time goes faster.

I usually did the 5 minutes, then a warning at 3 minutes and then 1 minute, and then we did whatever when it reached 0. It worked for mine - but would be awful if you didn't do whatever at 0 (eg. you got chatting to a friend).

I think OP you do need to make it more clear to your son that you are the parent. If necessary ask him if he wants to have to keep track of time all the time? And in that situation I would say if he wanted to be the grown up that would mean acting like the grown up - so no playing in the play area, but sitting chatting nicely.

OK, I should have said "a short time" rather than a moment or so. I just think you have to adapt it to the child and if you have a child who will count out 5 lots of 60 while they play, then maybe a stop watch would be a necessity.

I went through a phase where I used 'because I am the Mummy and I say so' with DD. That proved very effective at dealing with her negotiation.
I was clear consistent never wavered in my policy.

Thanks for all your lovely advice!

The article you sent me catkind has been a godsend! It could have been written about my DS! I have already seen changes since I started implementing some of their suggestions! So lovely to read that's it's not just my child and other parents of gifted children go through similar senarios. Thanks again! 😀👍

tbh it's not even just the parents of children identified as gifted, OP

my dh was a very late developer, struggled with basic reading and maths, had to have special support for years - but could talk the hind leg off the proverbial donkey

at 16 he has caught up in English (so all that early back chat must have been good for something) but will be lucky if he scrapes a C in maths and does not appear to understand any science at all

but unsurprisingly he does very well in any subject that involves reasoning

When he was 5, I would have dealt with insubordination by simply removing him physically from the play area. At 16, we have reached some kind of generally amicable truce which is based on him realising we are fairly decent people as parents go and it pays to have us on his side, and us realising that he works much better if he is not threatened with loss of face.

dd who did appear to be gifted from an early age was far more compliant once she got past toddlerhood

I otoh was an argumentative little horror. My db (who has now passed me in our common field) was sweet and compliant. It's all the luck of the draw ime.

wow - catkind thank you for that link - I literally said about my son this morning 'it's like living with a small lawyer' - nice to know the sheer exhaustion from constantly being 'on' to deal with him and his endless questions and arguments is relatively normal!!

Tee hee, glad the link is proving useful; can't remember if I picked it up here or another forum, an MN win anyway :)