My 4 year old son is hitting adults and other children

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Forgive the length.

A little background:

My son is "young" for his year, he has just started at primary school after a year in nursery. His birthday is in early June. He is also an only child, and is highly likely to remain so (and only grandchild on both sides of the family at the moment). The statistically aware part of me realises these might be disadvantages for him. They might not be, but it's all context.

He is very strong willed, which personally I delight in, I'm hardly a shrinking violet and neither is my wife, but neither of us expose him to, or encourage, violence of any kind. We're both firmly of the opinion that violence is unacceptable as a way to interact with others. No matter HOW tempting! ;-)

He had a troubled start in nursery, crying, melting down, not interacting well etc. This gradually changed and by the end of the year he wasn't clinging to one teacher, melting down regularly etc. He was a normal, well adjusted kid in the class. Over the summer he was in a holiday club two or three days a week, and between myself, my wife and my in laws, we managed the rest of his care ourselves. He had a dramatic first day at holiday club, in line with his worst days of nursery, but after that behaved fine.

Cue first day of primary school, this Monday. Major meltdowns, crying, talking (shouting really) over the teachers, refusal to cooperate, hitting other children occasionally, the full spectrum. That was the morning, he'd settled in the afternoon. My wife and I were called into the school, of which more later. Tuesday was a better day, morning not perfect but he's 4, it's to be expected, afternoon better. This morning he hit another child for no obvious reason, simply ran over with a plastic toy and hit the child in the head which caused a small gash, which obviously bled. The school called and I had to take him out of school for the day.

Do I suspect he will calm down, get over this phase etc? Yes. That doesn't solve the present problem.

At nursery (and now primary school) the first instinct of the teachers was to medicalise the problem. I'm not averse to this, I actually work in a related field so I understand it, and I also grasp that this is a way to help my son. He's been seen by an educational psychologist (luckily on his worst day ever!) whilst at nursery, and the school recommended he see a paediatrician. The findings of the educational psychologist were that he was behind average in his emotional development (cognitively/intellectually he's ~ 1 to 2 years ahead of his age. He reads at a 5 to 6 year old level, and is similarly capable with his arithmetic, for example), and thus is having trouble relating socially and in regulating his emotions. The findings of the paediatrician were that he was a little lagging in his speech/conversation, but not out of normal range, and other than that, he was a "normal" little boy. Whatever "normal" means.

If he is autistic (a suspicion of a nursery TA) or has some other lag in his emotional regulation/speech/whatever, that's fine. It's just who he is, we'll have to do what we can to help. I confess I am a little disturbed that the first port of call for "child behaving poorly", even very poorly, is to try to find a medical reason. Like I said, I understand why, but it strikes me as a disproportionate reaction.

Lastly, this new primary school of his (a very good academy...the ethics of that aside) have a "zero tolerance policy" for violence as children move up the school. Already they have impressed upon us the seriousness of my son's actions and that should it continue to when he is ~6 or 7, he'll be excluded. Another reaction I find disproportionate. And yes, if some little brat hit my precious darling, I'd feel the same way, and indeed have felt the same way.

In all honesty I am scared. I don't want my child to hit anyone, that should go without saying, and obviously I don't want him excluded from a good local school I worked hard to get him into. I don't want to make the standard excuses for him, I want to resolve the problem as best I can.

I'd appreciate any advice people have on a) dealing with The Boy (little rascal that he is), and b) getting the most out of the school/dealing with the school.

Hi,
Been in your shoes (ds now 11) so will try to help a little.
Go with the paedtrician referral - this will tell you whether its an emotional thing or whether there is something like autism playing a part in his behaviour.
This will then enable informed decisions to be made of the best way to deal with it.
In my case, the paedtrician proved that a medical decision was not the right route and the problems stemmed from inexperienced teachers unable to deal with a child functioning educationally two years above his own age yet in maturity roughly a year behind his peers.
But, ds did need very firm boundaries at home and school for about 6 months with us both using the same reward chart and targets. So, as an example, it was written at home 'ds will not hit' and earned a star.for each half day he didn't. Educational psych identified that his school needed to follow through. I always find it odd that they send children home, yes remove privileges and play time etc but what does being sent home do other than reinforce that bad behaviour brings mum or dad back.
The other thing that works is a jar for marbles where he earns 1 marble for a determined period of time leading to a reward.
The other thing (sorry if this sounds patronising) get his hearing and eyesight checked as this can cause them to misunderstand what other children are doing in a very noisy classroom.
If the assessment does end in diagnosis then you have access to the extra help he may need to access education.

Thanks for the excellent reply, Labro.

Okay, entirely my mistake, I forgot to emphasise that we DID see the paediatrician and she concluded:

"The findings of the paediatrician were that he was a little lagging in his speech/conversation, but not out of normal range, and other than that, he was a "normal" little boy. Whatever "normal" means."

Hearing and sight were also perfectly okay. (Good call, btw, it's an obvious one to overlook, not patronising at all)

As for the school yes, the "send 'em home" thing strikes me as a bad idea potentially too. I get why it's done: he wants to be in school, the safety of the other children (Don't even start me on that!) etc, but eventually it will be a "reward". And it's a reward with my job, and my wife's job, we cannot afford to have happen too often.

I've made a meeting with the school tomorrow and I am going to try to negotiate a little more coherence between our management styles as you suggested. Thanks.

Ask to see his teacher, then ask to meet with her and the Senco (special needs co ordinator) and ask if they need to draw up a IEP, which should have small achievable targets on it and what their response/reaction to anything will be. Ask for a home/school communication book so that you know whats happening without the public 'can we have a word' at pick up time. Schools often have talking groups/circle time/social groups in reception where they can be with fewer children and learn how to get along etc.
I did end up moving my ds to a private school but that isn't the only way to get these things sorted!

How about role playing situations with your son? He taking both roles in situations to help him to understand how his behaviour impacts on others. If he is behind in his social/emotional development he may not realise the implications of his actions and this may help.
How about children friendly books which will may provide scenarios and helpful advice on how he can manage his behaviour. I use this book with children who struggle to sit still:

www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9781931636841?redirected=true&gclid=CO_77-CrsrkCFfLHtAodkAIAcA

and this with children who like to blurt
www.juliacookonline.com/books/personal-behaviors/my-mouth-is-a-volcano/
they give child friendly advice like blowing the ideas out of your nose instead of your mouth! The kids love it and it does help those with a tendency to shout out.
The author does loads of different books and there may be one which you find will suit your son alongside these.
Good luck and hope he settles soon.

If you are asked to take him out of school it is far better that it is made an official exclusion and documented as such because should your ds need support later down the line (supposing that his difficulties aren't entirely down to emotional immaturity) you will need to have written evidence of the exclusions and the support the school have given to date.
Should school be unwilling to record it officially you are well within your rights to refuse to withdraw him and instead ask the school what are the supports and strategies in place to enable ds to stay in school.
You do need to document everything, every incident, what the school said and what strategies are being used and how they are implemented and whether they are successful.
School should have access to a behaviour support team and I'd expect there would be some sort of SEAL (social and emotional aspects of learning) programme in school that ds could have access to.
For me I'd ask for a second opinion from a developmental paediatrician and a referral to speech and occupational therapy. It's not medicalising his difficulties it's about determining whether there is a developmental difficulty behind his behaviour.

Sorry but I've taught many 4 year olds and I'm the mother of a June born (prem birth) boy and what you describe can't be put down as normal 4 year old behaviour ...it really isn't.
The school can't just ask you to collect your child they must by law make a fixed period exclusion so you need to discuss with the head how they plan to deal with any future issues and how they would like you to support the school to help your son.

Thanks for all the really useful tips and ideas everyone. They're going onto my "to do" list for tomorrow, if you see what I mean. Especially lovely are those books Ketchupontoast, thanks for those.

Tiggytape, your reply really interested me, so a few things to calm those alarm bells (hopefully):

Strong character and academics: of course we value these, but equally, you're right, they're not the be all and end all. My post was long enough as it is without a full accounting of personal philosophy! Interdependence is as valuable as independence.

"Small gash" is how the wound was described to me. Also, maybe I grew up in more of a Tom Brown's School Days environment, but I'm not overly concerned about my son getting a whack or two as he goes through life. In fact when this HAS happened, I don't think parental drama helps. I calm things down and chalk it up to life's ineffable variety. Obviously that's a world apart from older kids bullying each other etc, and I have zero desire (I'd be horrified) if my son turned out to be a bully of any kind. Hence why I want to fix this issue asap.

My ds was the child who bashed, kicked, pinched and scratched other children. Believe you and me the majority of parents are most definitely concerned that their child has been whacked by one of their classmates and your ds and yourself will quite quickly become isolated. Ds's classmate's parents drew up a petition to have him removed from the school ( after he hit a few children in the course of one week) so please don't underestimate how others will feel even if you don't think it is too big a deal.
I have to say I agree with Mrz IME your ds's behaviour is more extreme than a typical 4yo might behave. Ds has autism and had his own TA and so was never excluded but how you describe the first two days would be probably equivalent to ds's more challenging days in primary and were more a rarity rather than the norm tbh.

He started school this Monday and after just 2 days they are recommending he sees a doctor? And he already has? And they have already assessed him and diagnosed him? That's fast work! Have to say that as a primary teacher that wouldn't have been my first response!

SENCO may ask to bring in behaviour support or the Educational psychologist. He definitely needs an IEP and a agreed plan for how his behaviour will be managed. What are the consequences for his actions what can he earn when his behaviour is positive. Ask about what intervention programmes they use, we use something called Time to Talk.

School will have mentioned exclusions to make sure you understand how seriously they take this, even with such young children.

Were they aware of the problems he had settling into nursery? Was any form of plan settled on to deal with it if it occurred when he started school?
I would expect that with the right support from you and school he will settle and learn to deal with his emotions in an appropriate way. It is good that you acknowledge that he needs support for this transition as it is the only way he will get what he needs.

You might want to get advice from the SN area.
If you are in England try contacting your local Parent Partnership, if you still suspect ASD I would also contact the NAS for advice.
Do not allow the school to just send your son home, they have to go through a formal exclusion process which will involve bringing in outside help. Do make it clear you are willing to help in any way possible to support their dealings with your son.

It is not enough for the Paeditrician to say I can't diagnose anything, goodbye. You need advice if nothing else.

A child acts like a brat in class & is now labelled SN?

Judging by your OP, it sounds as though you've sheltered your ds from any type of confrontation & he is struggling to cope in his new, unfamiliar environment & is perhaps feeling intimidated by the different situations, attitudes he's being exposed to, etc, therefore acting out his insecurity as aggression. He's socially immature, it seems.

The school are being vvv unreasonable to send your dd home & exclude him.

*ds

I would say that the child's behaviour means he has SEN. Whether he has SN or not would be determined by a proper assessment and not a fobbing off by the paediatrician.

OP, how do you discipline your son?
And, is being a year behind emotionally really enough to see a sign of SN?

Amazed he is being labelled like this after just a week.

As a SENCO I would not say the behaviour described would necessarily indicate SEN

There are alarm bells ringing for me when you say you delight in his strong will.Does that mean he rules the roost at home? Doyou have boundaries and consequences that are rigidly adhered to?

Sorry haven't time to make a more detailed reply but no way should you be requested to take him home did the rest of the day without it being an exclusion. I see schools doing this all the time to keep their exclusion figures down. If he is having difficulty settling in then the school should be on to it and providing some extra 1-1 support to get him through this challenging patch.

Thanks all for the replies. Lots to get to! Please appreciate it's tough to give a full and nuanced picture, there's things I am forgetting to mention, things I have phrased ways I did not think would be controversial etc. Cheers.

1. Coco27, PigOnStilts and others concerned with the "delight in strong will" and discipline angles.

What I mean by delighting in his strong will/character is that he is a wilful character, a strong character, and rather than seeing this as a negative or something to be squashed so he is obedient, as some people do with children, I think it's a good thing. Something to be channelled and managed. No he definitely does not rule the roost at home, and yes he gets appropriate discipline for his age/behaviour. So, he has things he needs to do explained to him, he is expected to comply (and largely does) with instructions, he's not shouted and screamed at, indiscipline is ultimately dealt with with a "time out" in his bedroom or a removal of some privilege/treat. Yes, we have boundaries and rules that are rigorously adhered to. He knows when he has behaved poorly and he faces reasonable, age appropriate consequences for that.

On the positive reinforcement side his achievements are rewarded appropriately (a series of stickers building to a little treat, or for bigger things an activity/reward he might want), he's given a lot of love etc. We're well-educated, relatively capable parents, if new-ish, and obviously whilst we make mistakes (goes without saying, see the poet Larkin for details) we've done our "due diligence" with respect to reading around etc, and we try very hard (occasionally against character!) to parent in a constructive way.

2. blueskiesandbutterflies: Sheltered from confrontation? Er. No. Not even remotely. He is confronted on his behaviour as and when it is appropriate. I.e. when he acts up, he faces the consequences of his actions, it has ever been thus. Not in an overly punitive or negative way, but in a constructive manner. We try very hard to educate and support him. There's a world of difference between confronting his poor behaviour and knee-jerk punishing for every annoyance. He's 4, he's learning. He also has a very diverse family background and is exposed to a wide variety of attitudes, situations and behaviours, so trust me it isn't that! ;-)

I do agree though that the large part of this is that wonderful intersection of personality, new environment etc that makes a kid insecure, and this behaviour is how he is expressing it. The problem for now is, as correctly alluded to by Tiggytape, there's 29 other kids in the class. THEY have needs too and we need to keep my son's behaviour in sufficient limits so that his negative impact on them is minimal/non-existent. (Sorry Tiggytape for not expressing myself well, I am on side with what you are saying)

3. Re: initial paediatrician consult. I do not think at all that we were fobbed off, forgive my relative short hand I'm trying to present a lot of information in as short a space as possible. The assessment he was given identified his speech and language being slightly behind the average (do people need an explanation of bell curves, Boltzmann statistics and means etc, really? Please say not!), not enormously so. The tests/analysis the paediatrician performed were the standard basics re: senses, assessments for autism etc, in other words a pretty thorough first pass. This means the issues are likely behavioural/developmental as opposed to traditionally medical or cognitive. Everyone involved, new school, parents etc expect that this is a phase he'll grow out of rather than a medical problem to be managed, based on the data so far.

4. My wife and I asked for a meeting with the school today, something I've just come out of. We've set up an IEP with the SENCO (Thanks to those people who mentioned that) and we're getting him, on the school's advice, whatever help we can. It was a really positive meeting, not least because based on a few things said here I had a few key words/ideas to research ahead of the meeting which gave my wife and I a much better idea of the system/things we were dealing with. So thank you all for that.

5. Insanityscratching, I have been describing the worst days for my son too. This is not his normal behaviour, rather it is an exaggerated extreme of his behaviour. I possibly posted yesterday with more emotion than was accurate! My son probably had 1 meltdown a month at nursery, but was difficult at the beginning of his time there and improved across the year, the final three terms (or half terms as I would have called them) he was a normal member of the class barring one bit of time at the end of the day where he just couldn't wait easily with the other children to be picked up (he wasn't alone there) and had to sit quietly with his favourite TA for 5 mins.

6. Smartiepants79, Ah now you've raised the meat of the problem from the school's perspective. No, this primary school were NOT informed by his nursery about my son's difficulties/behaviour/whatever you want to call it. And they're not happy because they would have had something in place ahead of time if they had. We (my wife and I) naively assumed this was the job of the nursery, and that paperwork etc followed my son to the new school. We assumed this was there ahead of him in fact. It wasn't. So the head of the new school and the SENCO are a bit peeved at the old school and we are all now working together (hence today's meeting) to get something in place ASAP. In fact I have, in the course of one meeting, gone from being very concerned about all this, to very impressed with the new school, and very happy we can all work together.

Apologies for the length of reply and thanks again to everyone for the wonderful advice.

One other question .Is he an only child? It is very hard for them I think after school holidays when they have used to being the centre of attention over the last few weeks , to suddenly be plunged into a class of 20-30 children where he will get very little 1 to1 attention.Maybe he just needs a few days to settle back int o new equilibrium

It occurs to me that building his emotional understanding would also be a useful activity. For example trying your best to name his emotions when he's feeling them so he feels validated (it can be a very powerful experience for an adult to come down to a child's level & while looking them in the eye say "I can tell you feel really angry / sad / jealous - that's a tough feeling to deal with sometimes - can I help?")

My DD struggles similarly (academically bright, emotionally immature & very sensitive) & another very helpful tool I've found is basic meditation (essentially learning how to breathe through strong emotions by focusing on breathing out slowly). Simple stuff, e.g. hold up the fingers on one hand & wiggle them pretending they're birthday candles & invite your ds to blow them out slowly.

I also use a rainbow / fairy / unicorn visualisation (i.e. the things my dd loves) & suggest colouful light pours through dd gradually starting at her head & working down to her toes. Maybe you could try a visualisation where you ds helps you gradually land a rocket? Whatever you choose the point is to bring his attention from his head gradually down to his toes, with light that relaxes every part of his body as it touches it - if he goes for it eventually he will be able to calm himself just with a hand on his tummy whilst focussing on breathing out slowly - at least that's the stage dd is moving onto now & it really is helping. Of course I am assuming he's angry when lashing out, but this may not be the case! Have you asked him & does he have any sense of how he's feeling when he's lashing out?

Although it may seem counter intuative I'd also consider getting him signed up to a quality marshal arts programme (certainly possible from 5) as the discipline and challenge could be a very positive outlet - perhaps a few private lessons first if he needed settling before being in the first instance.

I'm no expert, but have just found these techniques very useful - I do realise they might not be everyone's cup of tea! I think your ds stands the best possible chance of overcoming his behaviour difficulties with his family & school working so hard to support him.

Can I ask - sorry if I have missed it in your post, what have you done/said to him about his behaviour this week?

I would say a huge number of children at this age are emotionally behind where they might be and being a year or so ahead academically shouldn't influence behaviour at all. It doesn't sound to me like he has special needs or autism but obviously I don't know him. He actually sounds, and please forgive me for this, like a naughty little boy who is stressed this week and lashing out, slightly more extremely than other children but it would indicate to me he needs firmer boundaries and punishment rather than an assumption that he is autistic or has medical needs. I can see why the school think 'get it investigated asap' but he is scared, he is new to school, he doesn't know what to do and is frustrated, he can't communicate how he feels (like 99.9% of other kids that age).

as a completely different approach could you try some of these books? the school or library might have copies. www.amazon.co.uk/Brian-Moses/e/B001HOPXFA/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1378472075&sr=1-1
it can help children communicate their feelings and emotions and make them realise it is normal to feel like that but you have to control those feelings. Do you think this might help.

as a parent though I wouldn't be happy if a child had hit my child on the head for absolutely no reason and I would be wanting the school to take some sort of action about it asap.

It sounds as if you have had a lot of good advice here, although I would say that my ds (youngest of 3) does hit out, pulls hair and gets very cross if he doesn't get his own way. We adopt a similar approach to discipline and have a zero tolerance policy (although not possible when driving which is one of his flashpoints). There are two big differences - ds only does it at home to his sisters but it gives us the opportunity to address it rather than being in a more formal setting. Secondly he is not quite 4 so a year below and in a nursery setting where this behaviour is not as unexpected. I know it doesn't change your situation but it is partly the randomness of the school year that puts him in this situation when he isn't mature enough.

On a practical point try to organise some play dates asap before he gets a reputation. A few on to one sessions with you there might help him make a few friends so he is too busy to be frustrated. Ask the teacher whether there are any children whom he relates well to and take it from there.