'I hate school' (in yr 1)

[niminypiminy]

Title sums it up really. DS2 says he really hates school. He hates all the work, says it is boring, has few friends (and can be really reluctant to play with even those he does have). He is 'ill' several mornings a week, and very bad-tempered everyday when he comes out.

I've talked to him to try and find out what the problem is. I've talked to his teacher (who he likes), who says he seems quite happy in school. He's the most able boy in his class but is very demotivated.

WWYD? I can't move him out the school, as his brother is extremely happy there, and the logistics of two schools would be impossible. Plus it would be very embarrassing -- I'm vice-chair of school governors.

If you genuinely believe that he is unhappy despite what the teachers are telling you then go and look at other schools and see if you think that he will be happier elsewhere. I had a very similar issue with my DD, also in yr1. She hated school, had not made any friends and wasn't behaving well as an attention seeking device despite performing very well academically. Everytime I spoke to her teachers they dismssed me saying that she was perfectly happy when I knew that she wasn't. Like you I have another child who was perfectly happy at school and there was no question of moving him to another school.

I moved her 6 weeks ago leaving her brother in the old school and the change in her is overwhelming. She is happy, motivated, working well and enthusiastically and has found a little group of friends who come and greet her every morning. My logistics are a nightmare, I have had to change my work days to accomodate her school hours as I am unable to arrange rota but it is truly worth the inconvenience. I wish I had done it sooner.

DS hated Y1 and Y2 - according to him, his teachers were surprised and said he seemed very happy at school.

He moved (forced move as he was at an infants) to a new school in Y3 and couldn't be happier. I think the change in attitude with being in juniors has helped as much as the change of school - he likes the greater independence and less mollycoddling.

He did struggle to adapt going in Y1 and resented that he couldn't play all the time. In fact he saw going to school as stopping him from playing full stop. Now he's older he seems to "get" the value of school a lot more.

DD is at the same school that DS hated and absolutely adores it (she cries in holidays because school is shut), so like you, it wasn't an underlying problem with the school.

Another here with a child hating Y1.

We will almost certainly find a new school for Y2.

i understand what you say about being a school governor (been there, done that)... but, in the end, it is about what is right for your child. I believe strongly that different schools suit different children and it isn't (necessarily) a vote of "no confidence" in a school if you decide to send your child elsewhere.

As for the logistics issue....only you can answer tha one. Difficult - or impossible?

(and is there another school which looks like a possibility, in any case?)

The logistics would be a nightmare. We don't have a car, so it would mean one of the children going home with someone else every day while DH or I collected the other. But there are a couple of schools not that far from us where we know people.

Damn, damn. I guess I was hoping to hear about someone who'd managed to sort this kind of problem without moving the child...

I know of a few children (almost all boys) who struggled with the more formal learning process in year 1 in both my dd's years and between them. However all except one were happy by the time they went up to year 2, the other one hasn't really reconciled going to school yet, and he's at secondary now, having gone through 2 different school at juniors.

Is that more what you wanted to hear? (it is true though)

If he is really very able, could it be that this particular teacher is not differentiating appropriately for him? You could ask him questions like...

What does he do when he has finished the work the teacher has given? What do other children in his group do when they have finished work? ( a subtle way of finding out if he is finishing much earlier than the others.) What work does he find easy and what work does he find tricky? What are the best/most enjoyable things he does at school? What kinds of things would he like to learn? Could you do some interesting science or history work (or whatever) with him at home to help compensate?

If the work is too easy and he is getting bored this could be a cause of de-motivation.

Also - what kind of games does he like to play? If he doesn't happen to like football, this can sometimes leave boys in particular on the edge of things friendship wise. If this is the case perhaps an after school club doing something more his style would be appropriate and help him interact more with others. (Beavers, drama club, swimming etc)

Isn't there a difference between being unhappy about having to go to school and being unhappy at school? What the teachers may well be saying is: the child appears to be very content and well balanced during school hours. Which may well be correct.

Parents get a different kind of hassle from their children because it's they who are "making" their children go to school. Therefore it makes perfect sense for the child to create merry hell at home in an effort to prevent being taken to school. It also makes perfect sense to stop making merry hell once you're in school because presumably you realise that this won't make teachers stop teaching and perhaps bring out a bouncy castle instead. Kids aren't stupid.

The children who definitely don't want to be there are often the ones who start truanting the minute mum is out of sight.

My DS disliked infants and is still not keen on school now he is a junior, resigned to it all is perhaps the best description. I like the school, it's generally popular with pupils and parents, all his teachers have tried hard to capture his interest, to little effect. In DS's case I'm not sure moving schools is the answer. He is simply not interested in the NC. It's nothing to do with differentiation, which the school makes as good a job of as most, he simply doesn't enjoy most school topics and loathes anything to do with making things and using his hands, particularly group work and project work. He is top table for all subjects and doing fine academically. If he moved schools, the new school is still likely to ask him to follow the NC and do art, music, singing, dancing, science and french, work in groups and do projects. If I were you I would work harder on finding out what the problem with school is and what would make it better. Perhaps moving schools may help, perhaps it won't. (By the way he likes cricket, running, sport generally and esoteric maths problems, if they involve cricket statistics. Most schools don't provide much time on these!)

Anthonytrollope, you have described my problem exactly. Except that you could substitute 'reading the Arabian Nights, train maps, and playing the piano' for your boy's list of interests. (By the way, your DS and my DS1 who is obsessed with cricket would probably get on like a house on fire.)

Learnandsay, I have been treating this as an issue about trying to manipulate me for a long time. I am firm, he has to go to school (in fact has 100% attendance). But I think the problem is deeper.

The teacher is differentiating. To be fair to hear, she is very concerned that he doesn't like school.

It could well be that we went to all the hassle of changing schools, and the logistical nightmare that would cause, and we would have the same problem. The funny thing is that his brother is the one with an ASD, yet he is very happy at school. DS2 is neurotypical, yet hates it.

I'd be trying to uncover why he is so unmotivated. The teacher says he is happy in school but he says he is bored - what? All day? Maybe talk to him about focussing on the bits of school he likes. After all, not everyone likes everything all the time :)

Ill, tummy ache? Could be worry. Could be threadworms? Worth treating the whole family; one dose. Tired? Does he get enough sleep? Does he have enough energy to play with friends?

Positive story though - my DD was miserable throughout Yr 1 to the extent that I considered homeschooling. Yr 2 and she's much happier and really enjoys school now. Different teacher ( despite the fact that she said she liked the last one) ? Also in Yr 1 she really struggled with her reading and writing and now we are helping her with dyslexia strategies at home she is happier about that side of things. Could his 'boredom' be a way of covering up work that he actually finds a bit tricky?

Please forgive me if what I'm going to say is very very stupid!

I wonder if your son might be attention seeking because your other son with ASD gets more attention than him? - but maybe this is not the case ...

My DS has cerebral palsy and gets loads of attention. His sister is still a baby, but I can imagine when she's older that she might feel jealous.

I also, though, can relate to the fact that he says he is bored. I was so bored throughout infant and junior school, so I used to eat soap to make myself sick (my mum didn't fall for pretend sickness) so I didn't have to go in. I had a difficult class and there was a lot of distraction. As a result we didn't learn much. Plus I was one of the more able children and the learning was just insufficient. It was boring.

I moved schools and suddenly the learning stretched me and I was no longer bored at all. From that point on I loved going to school.

Thank you to all, so much constructive advice and things to think about. I do think it is right that you can't enjoy everything the same amount, and we have talked about this with him. But it's awful if you don't enjoy anything.

I managed to find some time to talk today and discovered that writing really hurts his hand. So that is obviously putting him off.

I'm also aware that he is young in the year and that development doesn't happen in a straight line. He may in fact be happier next year even though nothing very much has changed. DS1 was also very unhappy in Yr 1 (though for very different reasons).

Thank you all for such thoughtful responses.

My ds1 was like this ,he is 18 now and has always been what I now call a "school tolerator" rather than a school lover ,I can see the difference now that I have ds3 who is really enthused about school,he will moan but not in the same way as ds1.

We did move school to one which was slightly less rigid in its attitude to the NC ,but I have also made it clear to him that school itself is non negotiable and encouraged him to find something positive in each day,except in extreme circumstances he had to tell me the positive thing before any negatives .

He is 18 now and in year 13 (thank God),he still tolerates it but is not always unhappy I firmly believe there are some children who are just not school or even child people they will blossom as adults .He was always more mature in many ways than his peers and this at times has made it difficult but as he has got older he has learnt to understand this ,I have tried always to listen and support his worries but not always to validate them.

Interestingly almost everyone I know has had a least one child who has hated year 1 so maybe it is just a passing issue

nim
If writing hurts his hand you should see if you can find a paediatric OT who can assess him and give exercises to help. I have a friend who trained as an OT and is now working as a handwriting tutor. She usually manages to get children pain free within a couple of months.

Do you know or can your DS say what exactly makes him so unhappy? It may just be the same in another school if you don't really know what bothers him - and it can be difficult at that age because he may not really know himself.

Could you go in for a day, couple of hours and help out/shadow/observe/be there. You as a parent may be in a better position to judge what's wrong than the teacher who looks after 30 kids at the same time.

Sarahfreck thank you -- I've just found the National Handwriting Association who seem to be a source of good advice and have a list of handwriting tutors.

I agree Gabid, I think he is sad a lot of the time and doesn't really know why.

His teacher has asked me to tell her about one or two things he really enjoys and she will make those part of his next week's work. That really reassures me there isn't a problem with the school -- even if he isn't happy there at the moment.

Sorry to hear your child isnt liking year one and im sorry if i repeat what anyone else has already said but wanted to share my story.

My lo hates year one, she says its boring and she hates it because all they do is work, now i notice you say your child is very able but seems disinterested, is it that hes actually disinterested or could it be hes not fully understanding the work and this is what stresses him out?

My lo is at the other end of the scale, she does struggle a lot and is behind and i know that for her the reason she hates it is because she finds the work so hard, on the other side of that when I was at school I went through the same phase in infants, I was in the top group but introduced to some work which I didnt get at all and the teacher didnt listen or help and I was too scared to say I couldnt do it in case i got shouted at. Once she found out from my mum that this was the case, she worked more carefully to make sure i understood. I'm wondering if perhaps it could be similar with your child?

Glad you have found a source of handwriting tutors. If possible I'd try and get someone who is either trained as an OT or has had specific training on the underlying muscular, perceptual and other issues that affect handwriting. It is so much more than correct pencil grip and knowing how to form letters correctly. If you are in Manchester, I can recommend someone really good!

Sadly I'm not! Private OTs are really hard to find though and you wait for ever to get an NHS OT assessment (18m for my other child who has dyspraxia)

If writing really hurts, is he holding his pencil tto tightly and pressing too hard?

No substitute for proper check but these pencils grips are really good as you have to put your fingers in the right place. They come with a little leaflet that shows you the correct way to use them.

Also my DD has exercises to loosen her hands:

Tape a sheet of newspaper to the table. Hold a pen very gently in each hand, just resting betweent the fingers with the plams facing down. ie NOT like you would hold a pencil. Then make windscreen wiper movements to draw overlapping rainbows. Elbows should not move.

A sheet of scrap A5 paper in each palm. She then has to scrumple up each paper WITH THAT HAND ONLY. No holding it against your tummy to help! Then try to unscrumple it. Only using that hand.

Also simple finger touches thumb to forefinger, then thumb to middle, thumb to ring, thumb to little. And back again.

My ds1 (Y1) has just got into typing stuff up on the computer. If your ds likes reading then maybe he would also enjoy writing (if it didn't hurt). Could he do writing on the computer at school?

Thanks for the advice Betterwhenthesunshines. Those are really good ideas. I'm loathe to get him typing everything because handwriting is really important. Will buy some pencil grips as a start.

Handwriting is important, but takes a lot of practise (which can also be a bit mind numbing, though important). If he is a lot further on in his spelling/ ideas than his ability to write, he may be getting frustated which won't be helping his dislike of school.