Can being clever be a reason for bad behaviour?

[GooseyLoosey]

Question says it all really.

I am told that particularly clever children often have particularly challenging behaviour. Is their intelligence an acceptable reason for this or is it merely an excuse.

Ohh, meant to say, I agree that you sound like a fantastic teacher Goblin, ds would love you.

Goosey that sounds horrid. He is being bullied and that in itself is enough reason for any child to behave badly. How old is he? If the situation between him & his peers is irreperable would a change of school help do you think? Or could you take him out of school entirely & homeschool for a year or two?

I agree you can't tell people his problems are due to being bright (even though they are) - they will resent that. Can you cobble together a cover story that doesn't mention giftedness & alludes to other problems instead?

see Belle got there first with the change of school suggestion. It is worth considering - can transform a child sometimes.

Of course he's going to retaliate to being bullied. I'm not surprised he's hitting back. I don't think that there's anything that he can do differently to prevent this, once the little shits target someone then that's it, it won't be because of anything your son has done, it will be the same if he's short/funny/quiet/thin/fat/tall, they don't need an excuse to bully a child, they just lock on. What are the teachers doing to help your son?

Snorkie - he has just turned 7.

I keep thinking that things have got better with his peers and then something else happens. He is generally an optimist though and usually sees things as OK - when he deals with them on a one-on-one it all goes really well. As I say, he is clear that he wants to stay where he is.

I don't think he would like to be homeschooled - believe it or not, he loves social interaction and I think I would struggle to provide enough of this at home for him (as I now have no confidence in dealing with his peers or their parents).

Sorry, about keeping on ranting - am finding this cathartic though.

Do you know Belle, even reading the words "the little shits" makes me feel better. It shouldn't and I know they are children etc., but it really, really does!!!

That's what they are, what sort of child thinks it's OK to try and pull down another child's underpants or ram their head into a filling cabinet? These children need to learn how to behave.
What are the school doing to help your son?

I agree with the statement that high intelligence doesn't always mean mature emotional behaviour. DD is exceptionally bright but emotionally is still the age she is, which is 6, and still has tears and strops.

If he wants to stay put that's a strong reason to try & make it work. 7 is a long way off a natural school change too though, so you need to be a bit pro-active and do something - the question is what.

Would karate or a martial art extra curricular be a good idea do you think? What other extra curricular stuff does he do? Learning an instrument is often good for a bright child, but not sure that would help with the social interaction side so much.

Belle - the school have tried. Initially the boys in the class had regular meeting with the head where they could all talk about what wasn't working for them and try and sort it out. We didn't want ds singled out and saw it a group dynamic that had kind of gone wrong. This did actually work.

This continued for a few months and then as things got better it stopped. Clearly none of the parents or children were aware that this had come about because of their treatment of ds.

Then it gradually all started again and ds became very upset and for the first time ever did not want to go to school and actually said he was trying to get himself expelled. I took him straight to the head and we discussed this and she met with all the boys again.

They they started on ds in front of dh and he snapped. He shouted at the kids and burst into tears. I think the other parents got an idea then! We went back to the head who held a huge inquiry and they admitted what they had done and apologised!

Not sure how much was relayed by the school to the parents, but some clearly knew what had gone on. Cue lots of invitations to ds for the next few weeks.

Everything fine for a week or 2 and then, the boy who is probably the alpha male in the class, starts it all over again. Oddly he is nice to ds when there is no one else there and they get on well, but when he is playing to an audience, there is a problem.

I really want to explain to the parents what has happened, but that is kind of a one way street from which there is no going back.

Snorkie - you are right about the extra curricilar stuff, it does help. He plays football, cricket (depending on season), swims, does tae kwon do and time trialing on the bike. He loves it all and seems to get on just fine except where the same group of boys are involved. We cannot avoid them though without moving and ds really wants to make it work with them. I obviously need to work though my resentment towards them and their parents without letting ds know I feel this way.

Are there some other sympathetic parents that you can talk to? gossip can be a very powerful thing.

I'd explain to these parents what little sod's they have, enough's enough.

Intersting you say that about the gossip - I have been taking that approach and have now told quite a few people what has happened in the hope that it gets back to the parents of the children concerned.

Do you know, I have fantasy conversations in my head where I tell them exactly what I think and then am so nice in RL. My friend tells me I am too English and just need to be straight with them - then I would feel better and they would know the score - its just not so easy.

I have rather digressed on this thread! Sorry!!

You've not digressed, you've gone from seeing it as a problem with your child to the problem being that your child is being bullied so he's just reacting to this.

The head needs to get the parents in.

It's not a digression at all! This - the bullying - is the root of the behaviour, not specifically your DS's intelligence, which I suspect is a factor in the bullying and possibly partly why he can't 'sort it' himself, for all the high IQ/low EI reasons mentioned.

BTW when I said parents can't interfere I meant they can't control every minute of the interaction, much as some try to, and direct it. Hence the suggestions about letting your DS try and talk it through later. Peer relationship should, all other things being equal, evolve naturally to allow people to learn interpersonal skills. There are points where parents can and should INTERVENE, which IMO is different to interference. You need to intervene here, but you already know that.

I am really on your DS's behalf. What those boys are doing is just not fair and not right and is probably exacerbating any difficulties with peer relationships he may have. Those parents should know better as well. It's bullying plain and simple.

Thanks both - this is putting quite a different perspective on things for me.

Rightly or wrongly, I have always seen ds as the core of the problem - he is different and he does things which annoy other children and therefore, he must change. I still think that he needs to develop more emotional and social skills, but maybe these kids are causing some of the problems rather than reacting to them.

What to say to their parents though - how do I put it so that they will listen and understand rather than just get defensive?

I think first you need to detangle what is your DS's issue and what is the children's issue - what might be the children reacting to DS, what might be DS reacting to the other children. At some point one of the parties is going to behave unreasonably or unexpectedly. Or both.

Once you've identified how the other children aren't being reasonable (or as reasonable as children can be) you can bring that up with the parents. If they say it's your DS's fault then going through the process above will have helped you reason out what is going on and put you in a position to explain it to them.

Arbitrary example. DS wants to play football. Boys say okay as long as you're the goalie, sensing that DS is desperate to play. DS agrees. Boys repeatedly kick the goalie, justifying it that goalies get kicked lots (not a justification but bear with me). DS gets upset and lashes out.

DS's problem there is not understanding or being able to communicate that it's not fair the goalie gets kicked lots or able to negotiate a better deal. He's also not controlling his reaction to their behaviour appropriately

BUT

if they hadn't repeatedly kicked him, then he wouldn't have reliated.

So next time DS wants to play they knew they got away with it last time and do it again, so DS gets upset, so DS doesn't want them to play and intentionally tries to ruin their game so they can't play the game which ends up with him getting kicked in an attempt to play something else.

When you bring it up with the parents they're seeing the end result, that DS is lashing out and hear parts 1, 2 and 4 of the original from their sons and then see DS 'ruining' the game. They need to hear part 3 from you to get the whole story.

IYSWIM. It's not a great example...

I guess what I'm trying to say is be prepared for them to blame you/DS, accept responsibility for what is his part in it (because both sides are probably to blame) but get them to accept their part.

The road back from bullying is tough though Both parties need a clean slate but getting that through to children isn't always the easiest thing in the world.

Very sensible advice and well put! You are right that I need to accept ds's responsibility. I think that so far I have always done this and never sought to off-set any blame or resonsilbility on to anyone else. I think perhaps this has been unfair on ds and has let other parents believe that it was all his fault. I have just focused on the problems that were mine to deal with and somehow believed that everyone else was dealing with their end of any problems.

I think it's really difficult for children. If the bullying was a result of ds's behaviour then surly most of the other children would steer clear and the teachers would say something to you? There is sometimes a trigger, sometimes the 'victim' says something to wind the children up but sometimes children bully for stupid reasons, more often then not it's because the victim has something they don't or is very bright, they are an easy target, it's normally anything that makes them stand out from the crowd.

Social skills and very bright children don't always go hand in hand. Child A really wants to play so will keep asking child B, child B gets annoyed so pushes child A, child A then reacts back, Child B then goes home and complains about child A, this carries on. Have you tried some role play with your son? Discuss the common problems that he's having at school and try to work out how it gets there, then give him alternative suggestions. I've had to do this, all I used to hear from the teachers that ds had been annoying the other children, after talking to ds I managed to work out that he'd repeatidly ask the other children to play incase they changed their minds, once I explained how things worked to him then things were alot easier for him.

Sorry.

I'm not saying that bullying is justifiable, it isn't. There's no excuses, I'd go to the head teacher, she needs to get the little shits parents in. Don't talk to them yourself, they won't believe you.

The answer to whether to talk to the parents and what to say is a difficult.

For me, talking to the Mum was difficult but worth it. I took things one step at a time, willing to retreat if things were not going too well and tried really hard to say "mmm" where I didn't agree and not to let either side over analyse what was being said. As there are issues on both sides, I think there is a good starting position for a conversation.

I also looked at the school's behaviour and bullying policy. IME, schools err on the side of circle time, encouraging victims not to defend themselves (non retaliation, which I do get). They don't encourage others to tell tales and don't involving parents as much as I think they should. Instead, I would prefer more children being told that their behaviour is unacceptable, full stop, encouraging the "telling school" philosophy and having a closer relationship with parents without fear of offending them (easier with some parents than others!).

I have a friend who is a school governor - their responsibilities are significant and if you do go to them, even informally and talk in general terms, they need to take action.

And if all else fails, remember the scene from "It may contain nuts" where the Mum shoved a filthy toilet mop in the bully's face and said "stay away from my son" - imaging doing that (but unfortunately, you shouldn't actually do that.... )

Bullying in schools seems rife. At ds's old school he was bullied, the head refused to believe him ("all the children here come from good families"), she then said ds was to blame , that he shouldn't ask the teachers for help. He was in the room when she said all this so he didn't ask for help. He tried talking himself out of any problems, it made things worse. He tried walking away but they just followed him, he tried defending himself (raising his arm to block the hit) and he got into trouble for hitting. I collected him from school when he was pushed into a filing cabinet, all the teacher said was there was an incident and ds could see his part in the situation. Ds later told me that the boy had interupted ds's game so he ended up playing with him, the boy started cheating, ds asked for help from the teacher (who did nothing), the boy continued to cheat so ds said he didn't want to play any more and started to clear the game away. The boy then grabbed ds round the throat and pushed him into a filing cabinet behind ds. The teacher didn't tell me all of this
A child just can't win sometimes.