Help me parent my dd (5) better: honest views welcome

[rhetorician]

Ok, I feel like I am not doing a very good job. She is doing ok at school, but i think she isn't doing as well socially as she might. But she's had no difficulties at school and had a good report coming out of her first year. But our main problems are at home. I have taken on board the need to pick my battles, so (for example) don't make a big deal about messy eating, playing with bugs and slugs etc etc. Big issues that are constant sources of difficulty are

1. Ignoring what we say to an extreme degree, and not stopping things she is doing when asked (e.g. You tell her not to do something and the instant you've stopped talking, she's doing it again)
2. Unwillingness to listen when being disciplined, this is usually brief and to the point, but she changes the subject, squirms away, tries to make some kind of deal
3. A few issues with boundaries: touching people's faces, pulling their clothes etc, touching things in shops, people's houses. No sense that things belong to other people, although she is fairly ok with bodily privacy
4. Tuning out, being in her own little world, but also often hyper, running around a lot
5. Socially she is shy, and she struggles with new people/situations, but she is much better
6. Constant friction and low level meanness to her sister (2.9), but suspect this is nothing out of the ordinary.
7. Never seems to learn from punishment/ correction.

I could go on...

We use incentives, e.g. You can't do x until you've done why. Sanctions for poor behaviour, e.g. No tv, no playing outside, etc etc. reward charts work up to a point.

Give me your views....

I am exhausted, and feel out of options. I should say she is great 1:1, is funny, quirky and interesting, but we just seem to spend all our time telling her off. Because every time you turn your back, she is doing something she shouldn't

Would a timer work? Ie watch TV till timer goes off then get dressed? Or a visual timetable?

Timer works fairly well, as does turning things into a game. She is just a bit "too much" IYSWIM, too rough etc. Also reacts very badly to shouting etc.

I know this might not be much help but it does sound quite normal to me. My almost 5 year old DD does some very similar things and I too despair of her at times. We are currently in the phase of breaking other peoples things, ignoring, mimicking me when angry, hitting her baby sister and generally playing up. She is quite confident but shy with new people and situations but can be manic and very high energy too.
I get the feeling that there is a lot going on for a 5 year old and they are testing things out especially after being 'good' all day at school. I think you are probably doing a fab job but it just doesn't feel like it.

stumbelina, yes! that's all true. It just seems a bit more than what's normal to me, but I'm not exactly very experienced...

She is my eldest so I don't have that much experience but my mum had 4 of us and tells me that DD is perfectly normal for her age. I know I get quite worn out by parenting especially now we have another DD so I am not as patient as I could be. I am also aware that I expect a lot from my DD as well. I expect her to be more grown up than she is just because she can be so mature at times. I forget that she is actually still just a little kid finding her way and that even though she acts all grown up at times she isn't. I read once that kids try out behaviours on people they feel safe with and I guess that is how they learn boundaries in a safe way.

As a youngest child myself I didn't have a lot of boundaries as my mum was in an abusive marriage and I never really got those lessons so I know I struggle to teach my DD what is right and age appropriate. I am such a different mum to my second DD because I have learnt from experience with my first. Everything I do with DD1 is new and a bit of a learning curve, everything with DD2 has been tried and tested and I feel more confident. Does that make sense? I think this difference in parenting style is sometimes picked up on by DD1 and she can feel qUite jealous (hence a bit of sibling rivalry).

Parenting is challenging, first and foremost because it can be relentless but also because it can expose the gaps in our own parenting. I have certainly had to question some of the things I was taught and grew up believing and also have had to try to be a bit kinder to myself about the whole thing.

My 5 year old ds is like this. He's not shy but all the other things you've written are exactly the same.
I find him so hard at the moment because everything has to be an argument and he never ever listens.
I'm hoping that it's a short lived phase.

I find I parent my younger dd differently too, but I think this is down to their different personalities more than anything else. The same parenting techniques that worked with ds won't work with dd and vice versa because they are both so different.