It's me AGAIN. My DS is spiralling and I just do not know what to do...

[dejags]

This is going to be very disjointed, but I'd appreciate any views.

DS1 is not an easy child (there was a long thread about this a few weeks ago). His teacher has been really struggling with him and today asked if she could temporarily move him to another class because he has been so bad this week.

He just doesn't listen to her, he totally ignores her in fact (to the point of being rude). Today DH went to fetch him, all the other children were lined up ready to go home. He was nowhere to be found.

Eventually he was found in another area of the school, showing some other children his guitar (today was show and tell). This is despite very firm rules from me to the effect that he was not allowed to take the guitar out of the classroom.

The teacher had asked him three times to pack up his things and be ready for hometimeand whilst she was getting the others sorted out he just disappeared out of the classroom.

When DH and the teacher finally found him, he just totally ignored the teacher i.e. he turned his back and walked away whilst she was asking him why he wasn't where he was supposed to be (in a very nice way). DH was mortified that our son could be so rude to an adult.

I just don't know what to do with this child. I have totally backed off from school (as per the Ed Psych's request) in the spirit of allowing him to find his own place and engendering in him a greater self respect and knowledge that we love him unconditionally.

This hasn't worked. It seems that unless I am nagging him day and night (and this has it's own set of perils) he just flounders.

For being so rude to his teacher and generally being a disruptive and rude to all around him today, we have told him he cannot attend a friends' party this afternoon. DH (I am at work) says he has just sat in one spot and said nothing since he was told this, he is totally silent and uncommunicative.

I am at work and trying not to stress about it, but I am starting to get really worried on a deeper level that something is wrong with my DS. He just thinks he is an adult and that he can speak to people out of the family home however he pleases. He would never, ever in a million years disrespect me like this.

Oh I dont know...

DS's class all did a drawing of under the sea. His was the ONLY one which was a total scribble.

What a lovely boy he is though. So affectionate and tactile with me - he loves to brush my hair and tells me he loves me all the time.

Well, at the end of last term we were quite worried and wondered if DS should see an Ed Psych. however, teacher thought not and said he was just a very lively child who had not yet developed his social skills enough (also that this was a very middle class school and in another school DS would not stick out!) She is actually really lovely and I think appreciates DS's good side and genuinely likes him - which is why he will try and behave for her (unless his good brain is "turned off"). I wondered also wheher lots of little rewards would work as I remember from your previous post that your teacher had not put your DS on a particular good behaviour chart? Extravagant praise for every little good thing does seem to work for us. DS did however point out to me that if you were good all the time you didn't get stickers and charts - so they can suss the system out.

DS also responds to reasoning e.g. if he lashed out at somebody because they were rude to him in some way, I pointed out that he was the one that got in trouble because he was always more violent in response. So he has learnt to walk away in some situations.

The other thing is, you can also try and make it less of a "obey those in authority" rather being nice to people so they are nice to you - DS totally understand this reasoning and he's five, he just can't control himself enough to do it all the time.

Florence the star chart was a dismal failure.

That's what triggered my last plaintive thread begging for help

He just didn't respond to it and ended up telling lies and getting in a real upset about his status on the starchart.

I don't do star charts or anything like that with mine. Ds just wouldn't be very motivated by it and he's too impulsive to keep his eye on really long term rewards.

yes I remember the star chart. I think the problem is, they have to be achievable and fairly instantaneous. In Little Angels, they recommend you try a smiley face chart for like, every 10 minutes for an hour at a time.

DS has a much simpler system, he either gets a smiley face or he doesn't. Then if he has two smiley faces for school, DH tells him "something he doesn't know" (like what is dark matter!) as part of his bedtime routine. Actually it's more just a way of keeping track and when he is good, getting a smiley face is a way of acknowledging it pretty much then and there (so grumpy faces are like yelling but quieter!) The teachers are also pretty good at doling out little stickers for sitting still and doing good work. We put all the stickers from school on his wardrobe but we don't otherwise try and count them.

We do a reward system but not a star chart. he can earn tokens for doing as he is told etc and he gets to spend tham on activites etc of his choice. We used to get school to put stars in his home/school book to let us know how he had done at school and he earned tokens for those too. At school he could earn up to 8 stars a day- 3 for the morning; 2 for luchtime; and 3 for the sfternoon. Basically he got one for ok, 2 for good and 3 for excellent behaviour. He very rarely got none even at the beginning and this year he has been doing so well that we have stopped doing it.

Oh, dejags, I just went and found your other thread. You must have thought my money jar suggestion below pretty unhelpful - sorry.

I will have a further think as to what else might be more use!