Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Getting along with other kids

DD10 has always had friends, but she's also always had problems getting along with other kids--lots of tears when kids "don't want to do what I want to do." In third grade (the year before last) teacher had to contact me, because she was losing her temper during group work when the kids wouldn't do what she wanted. She talks a lot about being an outsider, yet she has playdates and gets invited to birthday parties. (Although, some playdates end in tears as described above.)

I'm just wondering if this is:
--a specific temperament thing
--a gifted kid thing
--a spectrum thing (she's not diagnosed)

And, if your kid had this problem, did anything help?

This is pretty normal kid stuff, in my experience. After all, who wouldn't want to have everyone do what they want to do, all the time?

My DD10 has been on both sides of this, so that has been useful. Having been bossed helps her understand the effects of being bossy. It also helps that DW and I play with her A TON, and we have modeled the kind of behavior we're looking for by negotiating to do activities we can agree on... partly to work on this issue, and partly because a child doesn't benefit much from playing with a parent if the parent doesn't like the activity.

She still has her moments, of course, but she's doing pretty good on this nowadays. Ages 4-7 or so were kinda brutal in this area.

Other than that, you're dealing with an issue of managing emotions, which is always an adventure with gifted kids.

Do you have any other reason to suspect it's a spectrum thing? (Since you bring it up.)

Yes, our DS struggled mightily with this. Most kids do to some extent; kids on the spectrum do extra because their idea of how things ought to go is much more rigid and they lack the perspective-taking to really understand that other people like their idea "just as much as your like your own."

Things we did:
--getting DS to like and tolerate more different kinds of play. This meant getting him experience with more kinds of play, and in some cases rewarding him for tolerating them until they became something he could do with others. He really did learn to like some surprising things (e.g. football).

--teaching flexibility in general. This meant working on it every day in every context we could think of. Running out of his favorite brand of peanut butter and having him cope with having a different one; driving an unexpected way; having an errand crop up when he was hoping to go home. One learns to cope by coping.

--putting him into situations where the skill of going along with others was explicitly taught. I coached DS's Destination Imagination team for years; I taught cooperation, then consensus skills. Scouts can also be good for this, depending on the leadership, as can things like Lego League.

Although I agree that most of us would enjoy a world in which everyone else did what we wanted to do... I don't agree that melting down in tears over this as the OP described is "normal kid stuff". AlthoughI don't mean that a child who has this happening isn't "normal" - I'd phrase it as this isn't "typical" behavior. By the time they are in third grade, most children have learned to interact with give-and-take re not getting overly frustrated when another child wants to do something their way, and also have learned to hold their frustration in check when they are frustrated over a situation like this.

To the OP, re your dd having playdates and invitations to birthday parties - I'd look more closely at - does she seem to have friendships with other children? Are their children she seems to be close to and care about? Birthday party invitations in early elementary are often offered up to a full class or group to avoid children feeling left out (or just to make sure a good-sized group of kids attends the party), and playdate invitations often include a bit of planning/convenience/etc for the parent as much as for the students involved. As students move into upper elementary you'll see that they students themselves start being less compliant about parent-arranged playdates, and that's when kids who have difficulties with things like this might start seeing less playdate and birthday part invitations. I'm not suggesting that will happen with your dd, just thinking that I wouldn't necessarily use playdate and birthday party invitations as a gauge of whether or not an early elementary child is successful at forming and keeping friendships. I'd look instead at what she has to say about recess, and look at what actually happens at the birthday parties and playdates to gauge how she's doing with social interactions and understanding.

Best wishes,

polarbear

Her cousin (age 17) is diagnosed Aspie, and the big indicator was the temper tantrums he exhibited in early elementary. DD's temper tantrums were particularly violent and seemed to go on longer in age than many other kids I knew/read about. So, I guess I've always had it in the back of my mind that it was a possibility, even though my SIL tried to ease my concerns.



She does have friends, but complains that she has no "best friend." She feels like all of the kids are paired off, and she is not. She does have friends call occasionally for playdates (we're beyond mom-organized ones by a couple of years), and is invited to parties that other kids aren't invited to. She has a couple of friends that she's part of an ongoing text chat with. I think it's one of the benefits of being in a really small school-- ~40 kids per grade.

Spaghetti--the rigid thinking thing sounds spot on. Thanks for that phrase to go to Google with.

Recess is often the source of after-school tears, and we had to take her out of after-care for about 6 weeks last year to give her a break from after-school recess.

I highly suggest The Unwritten Rules of Friendship by Elman & Kennedy-Moore. It has a chapter called "The Born Leader" (which I just reread two days ago) that deals with subjects like - learning to negotiate & compromise, knowing when & how to back down, managing the urge to correct others, & relating to others as peers. I was reading it in order to help a gifted student who has issues with group work (basically she comes up with an idea she sees as superior & gets upset when others don't want to do things her way) and this chapter was very helpful!

Good luck!