Sorry it's long! DD has only just turned 5 and has completed her first year of school. Since starting nursery shortly after turning 3, it's never been the smoothest ride. Nursery often spoke to us about her behaviour and difficulties with emotional regulation, but reassured us they felt it was a developmental lag that she'd grow out of, as she was otherwise doing well.
We were slightly hesitant about her starting school as we weren't sure she was emotionally ready, but because there were no other concerns, we were discouraged from deferring her. We hoped another year of maturity, alongside support from us and school would all help but a year on, her behaviour in school is still a concern at times.
Despite support at school and home, she continues to mainly struggle with emotional regulation. Interestingly, we don't see the same level of behaviour/dysregulation at home/outside of school, although home is obviously a very different environment with nowhere near as many demands as the classroom. It does seem to be the school setting where she struggles most.
School are monitoring her and have put support in place, which has helped to some extent, but they're unsure what to do next as most of their usual strategies/interventions don't seem to have been as effective or fit what she needs (as she has a good understanding and awareness but can't control it). She understands that her behaviour isn't acceptable and can usually explain afterwards exactly what upset her and what she should have done differently and is remorseful, but she can't apply that in the moment when she gets dysregulated. Even her teachers have said they're not sure what more can be done.
My concern is that we're using strategies that aren't effective because we're possibly asking her to do something she may not be able to do, and in the process we're making her feel bad about behaviours she genuinely doesn't seem able to control and knows are wrong. She's previously said things like"my brain is bad" after a particularly bad day, which was really upsetting.
The main issues highlighted are:
-Very quick to become frustrated or upset. Especially if there's any perceived rejection from her friends it's a huge deal for her. She can apparently get easily frustrated and upset over 'silly' comments which others easily brush off.
-Can lash out physically at other children when frustrated (this has improved/reduced significantly over the year but still happens occasionally). This doesn't tend to happen with the children she's good friends with.
-Impulsive at times, particularly with peers(e.g. poking the child next to her) - don't think it's done maliciously but more so without thinking
-Needs support sometimes to stay on task (which I think is age-appropriate on its own, but maybe less so alongside the other difficulties??).
-Finds any perceived criticism or needing help very difficult. For example, if she's gently corrected during an activity, she will usually say she's "no good at it" and refuse to continue or will get really frustrated with herself if she can't do something straight away and then starts with the negative comments about herself.
-Listening and following instructions can be a bit iffy at times but again I think that's normal for this age.
School remain unsure and sometimes seem not too concerned and say it's still within the realms or normal at this stage and they hope it's developmental and will just stop with support. Other times they seem more concerned and say they are continuing to monitor her and log behaviours (which obviously suggests it's less normal?). She has periods where things improve, but it tends to fluctuate. The fact we don't see all these behaviours to the same extent outside of school makes it harder to know whether this is within the range of typical development or whether there's something else going on.
On the flip side she's very confident, very sociable, loves to learn and seems to have a good circle of friends despite some of her challenges socially in school. At home we've never really had to worry about her when she's been playing with our friends kids, out at soft plays or parks etc she's always desperate to seek out a new friend and we've never seen her hit out in frustration in these situations. Emotionally she can be a bit wobbly at times and we can see some big emotions occasionally but we've never felt it's anything extreme or beyond what you'd expect from a 4/5yr old and what we see from her peers/friends kids and we can always quickly calm and regulate her.
School haven't made any referrals yet as they don't think it's at that stage but we're worried that we're kind of in the same position as we were 12 months ago and we're all hoping that it is developmental and something will just click for her soon. My concern is whether we're missing something bigger in the meantime and not supporting her in the best way but maybe it's too soon to know?
Any thoughts? Should we just keep on waiting and seeing what happens and hope it becomes clearer either way as time goes on? Or should we be pushing for something else?? School seem at a loss to know what else to do/suggest (which worries me a bit when she's only 5) but don't feel she needs a referral yet.