Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school Boredom = class clown --- solution???

DS started preschool this fall. He is very social and loves going to school to play with his friends, but he is having some behavior issues. For context, we did have a new baby 2 months ago, and we moved from Ohio to Houston over the summer (a big move!), and Hurricane Harvey dramatically impacted the start of the school year, and these things did have an impact on his behavior. That's a lot of things going on for a preschooler! He has had a greater tendency to act out, but this has improved dramatically in the past month (at least at home). And the behaviors that he is now struggling with at school are the same ones that he had for a long time and that are often associated with boredom. I asked his teacher about if he was possibly seeming bored in class at parent-teacher conferences, as I wondered if this is the root of the issue, but she didn't think that he appeared bored. However, as more and more stories trickle home, I think that is what is going on. He has been purposely answering questions wrong during "circle time" which has been confusing the other kids. They are going over material that he mastered years ago, so he finds it entertaining to give the wrong answer. He often does this at home. He is also often very loud and disruptive -running around the room, yelling, waking up other children at nap time, etc... I've had to pick him up early 3 times for being disruptive. At home, we've observed that when he's bored he tries to entertain himself by being overly silly and trying to make other people laugh, often getting quite loud. Any advice on how to channel all of this energy in a positive direction? Or how to work with the teacher to help DS feel more challenged and perhaps then less disruptive? She seems to misread his boredom behaviors as simply acting out for no reason.

Can the teacher have a talk with him and say, “We need to be quiet during nap time. If you aren’t asleep, you can choose from these quiet activities.” And then come up with a plan for what he can do during that time that is acceptable.

I am concerned that they have you pick him up early for this type of disruption. If he is seeking attention (which I feel has to be considered), your coming to pick him up may be his goal. Is there more to the story than this?

The game he plays during circle time may be the result of boredom. Is this a play-based preschool?

Hi, attention seeking is part of it. The problem is that they don't give them the option to do a quiet activity. They are expected to lay quietly, even if the kids don't really nap anymore. DS stopped napping at 2.5. It's a parochial school, and it's pretty structured for a preschool. We are Catholic and thought a catholic preschool would be nice. And we do like the school and the teachers in general. Everyone is quite nice, but conformity is expected. I'm starting to wonder if maybe the Montessori school I looked at may have been a better fit, but the price break we got for being parishioners was very attractive. We also don't expect him to get much curiculum out of preschool, we mostly like the social aspect. I also thought that as rigorous as kindergarten programs seem these days, maybe a more structured preschool is not a bad idea.

It seems that his regular teacher has picked up on the attention seeking, but when she's out sick things tend to not go very well.

Yeah, I'd tend to go for "this school is not for DS" the moment they make it clear that conformity is the expectation, because that's usually all wrong for any gifted kid. And he has to just lay there like a lump when he's not tired? My DD didn't encounter naps until K, was also not a napper, and she reports she was allowed to color quietly.

Perhaps the school day is too long. Is it a half day or a full day? My DD attended a public pre-K in the Houston area, and it was just a half day... no naps.

I agree that half day could be better. Usually no naps, and you get the socialization in without as much opportunity to get bored. (I also think half day for Kindergarten might be better for a lot of gifted kids.)

It sounds like this school is rigid. Most pre-schools are not very rigid and are very willing to work with children with different personalities, etc. I wonder if the teacher can get input from an experienced school director? I think you could hold a meeting and see if they are willing to work with your child for the issues at naptime, and be understanding about his behavior at circle time. If not, maybe this isn’t the right school for your child.

One approach that sometimes help is to flip the situation in the teacher's head. Instead of *you* trying to make her do extra work, work on re-framing it as *her* making her own life easier. If she gives him different material that engages him, *she* doesn't have to deal with disruption and problem behaviours.

Sometimes it helps to propose it as an experiment: "let's try this for a week and see if we get different behaviours". It may also be helpful for you to send in your own materials during that trial, to make sure he is getting the best opportunity to be engaged. If she sees with her own eyes that it helps and makes her job easier, she's more likely to take the idea on as her own.

The said, it sounds like your DS is being pretty seriously disruptive, in ways that cause problems for the other kids too. This is not a positive for anybody, especially him. It's also pretty common for a really bored gifted kid, though. So you don't want to be too hard on him - but you also need to be pretty clear that these behaviours aren't ok. So show him you understand and you don't blame. prove it by explaining how you are going to try to fix the problem. Ask him for his ideas on what he could do differently to handle the most problematic times (circle and nap). Let him see what you are going to do for him, and what you expect from him in return.

But bottom line, I'm with Dude. What these kids need most is flexibility. If there is an absolute unwillingness to bend on anything, then the school is likely to spend all their energy trying to force your square peg into their round hole, bashing off his sticky-out bits rather than enjoying and nurturing them. And on a more practical note, I've learned with regret that forcing a non-napper to lie still and seething probably contributed far too much to souring my DD on school for years to follow.

eta - meant to mention: most teachers take "he's bored" as an insult to their teaching, not a description of the child. It's best to avoid that word, and just describe behaviours and what pre-empts them in other circumstances. "How to get him more engaged" seems to be a less fraught expression.

Platypus, thank you for mentioning that it better to reframe boredom in a more positive light. That's seems obvious now, but hadn't occurred to me. The teacher is very sweet and from what I can tell very good with the class, so I don't want her to fell that I think she specifically is doing something wrong.

The preschool is a full day and they don't have a half day option. Although, nap time is the last activity of the day, so I'm starting to consider picking him up early and having him do his quiet time at home. I'm currently staying at home with the new baby so this would be an option, at least for the time being.

I did talk with the teaching assistant today and she confirmed that his behavior has improved, but the disruptions are still a problem, particularly at nap time. They've ended up typically moving him to a different room. To be honest, part of the matter is he is a difficult kid. It takes a lot of energy to parent him and we have to set very firm boundaries. He's clever and figured out that the boundaries and school aren't as firm and he gets lots of second chances, so he feels he doesn't have to behave as well at school. We've found for ourselves that he's the kind of kid that if you give him an inch of rope he'll hang himself.

I do want to try and stick with the school. DS really likes it and is making friends. So maybe your advice can help me tailor his experience a bit.

Can you trial bringing him home early and skipping nap time? I spent DD's first year at infants school picking her up at lunch, taking her home for lunch and play, and then returning her to school for the afternoon session, just so she would avoid the strictly enforced nap time. It was only possible because I wasn't working, and it was a massive pain in the neck, but it was better than ruining her first experience of school, and ruining the quality of her overnight sleep.

Two of my boys had issues during nap time when they were in preschool. The school ended up removing DS9 from the classroom all together during nap time and that resolved the issue. When my DS6 was in preschool I was able to pick him up early when I was staying at home with a baby. This worked as well and his behaviors were reduced.

Lazymum, you are describing exactly what I'm feeling/thinking. I am leaning towards this as a solution. I'm frustrated that we will lose out on 10 hours per week of childcare, but worth it if it can improve DS's experience of school. There is a family history (both his father and grandfather) of being gifted and also being labeled a trouble maker by the school system. I want to avoid this for DS if possible.

Hi SarahMarie,

I'm in Houston, originally from Indiana, so I can relate to your move.

We had the same problem with DS12 when he was in preschool. I tried to get them to do something else with him during the naptime, but they refused. We're Catholic too and wanted him in nice, sweet Catholic preschool where we were parishioners. We ended up moving him to another preschool (Methodist) that was more structured and looked the other way on state mandated nap time. It was a huge improvement and relief.

There's probably little you can do during this school year to change, because I know all of the preschools are usually waitlisted by the beginning of summer, but do start asking around as we are blessed to have a huge variety of programs in this city.

Please feel free to PM me. I don't know what area you're in, but I know people across the city and might be able to help you find a place that's a better fit.

Also, don't discount the impact of the move, the new baby and Harvey. I have one kid in private and one in public and we are still feeling the shock in both schools.

Never, ever use the word bored.

I don't get nap time. My kids both went to daycare and when the were obviously over napping they were put in the group that played outside at that time. To me it sounds like they are simply trying to avoid work for a while.

Hi Saritz,

It sounds like you went through pretty much the same thing. We are going to stick things out for the rest of the school year at least. We are currently living in Bellaire outside the loop and DS goes to school in Westbury. We will likely be moving to a new house in 2020 when our rental contracts expires and we go to buy a place. That's part of why I'm not keen on switching schools again this summer. I want to limit change as much as possible after the upheaval of this year, and knowing another move is in our future. I think we want to stay in Bellaire, but it will depend on what's available and what the market is doing at that time.

So glad you mentioned that, puffin. It's great if we can save another parent and/or child from going down that ill-fated path.

When advocating with the school, talking with a teacher, etc, avoid describing your kid as bored! Saying "bored" can backfire. This old thread has several posts about avoiding the word bored.

I think part of the problem is that we say bored we mean mentally bored = under challenged. Teachers and perhaps the rest of the world interpret bored to mean under occupied. This can result in more of the underchallenging work. They also more reasonably take it as an accusation that their class and by extension the teacher is boring. Read the linked thread above, it is a useful one.

I find "disengaged" to work better than "bored," personally.

The original post mentioned he acts up at home. What do you when he acts up at home? I have heard no mention of repercussions for his behavior at home? A timeout for example. It appears all the advice I read relates to the teacher. After the first time I had to pick him up my comment would of been if this happens again I'm taking away your.......

Hmmm... see that he "has had a greater tendency to act out, but this has improved dramatically in the past month (at least at home)."

While coaching a child to demonstrate good behavior, it can be effective to learn what the child is thinking when he makes his poor behavior choices, so that the root cause can be addressed/remedied (whether it is a specific trigger and/or immature/faulty thinking).

That said, kids may behave well at school and then decompress at home... acting out only at home. Kids need home to be a soft place to land, a safe place where they are understood. I'm not excusing poor behavior. Just encouraging understanding what the child is thinking (and therefore what the poor behavior is accomplishing) so that caring adults can help equip the child with better tools than acting out.

Based on the OP, I would tend to think that this child does not have appropriate challenge in school (curriculum level, placement, and pacing), therefore is not learning and growing... but rather is being taught to underachieve, in order to fit in.

Kids need appropriate challenge and academic/intellectual peers.

Just my opinion but when you are at home the parent has an easier time to focus on the child. At school a teacher cannot give that same attention.i have no doubt from all the posts that he does not have the appropriate challenge at school. That said it still doesn't excuse bad behavior at school.

I think we are all saying similar things.

If you are asking for how to advocate, here is a crowd-sourced list of tips and resources.

Begin by talking with your child and spouse so that you are all in agreement.

No one wants him to behave badly at school. But the OP thinks the behavoir is a symptom and treating the cause is more effective long term than treating the symptom. Also with a strong willed kids threats don't work, the just make things worse as they simply don't care at that point. A parent may know when it will work but a teacher won't.

So are you suggesting "a strong willed kid" gets to rule your life?

I think the sum total of posts indicate that negative behavior is not OK... and that treating the cause (lack of appropriate challenge) may prove more effective than treating a symptom (poor behavior).

It just seems to me it's never the kids fault. It's always the teacher. No one has addressed a change in the kids behavior

I reread the thread and I see the parent saying that they do address the behavior at home (no specifics) and I see suggestions on how the parent and teacher can work together to help the child make better choices, or at least intervene before the poor behavior happens.

The school has been called too rigid, but that isn’t necessarily a reflection on the teacher.

We've been working with him almost constantly on his behavior. That's part of why I posted this question. It seemed like his whole life was becoming about discipline/reinforcement of good behaviors and discussing what we can do to have a better day tomorrow. It is too much for a 3 year old, and I could tell it was wearing on him, as it was wearing on all of us. We do time-outs, quiet time, marble jars, and discuss his behavior with him thoroughly, always requiring a sincere apology and talking about alternatives to avoid repeating the behavior in the future. I'm fully aware that he's a tough kid, but certain situations seem to make it worse. I think possibly that his teacher isn't as firm with him as she needs to be (such as too many second chances...) He knows how to read people and can easily manipulate a situation. It can be maddening at times. Because of that he has always required very clear boundaries and a routine to help guide him. Any sense that the boundaries may be flexible or that the routine can be altered and he will do everything he can to see how far he can push it. We've been working with his teacher to reinforce his positive behavior through consistent messaging, and things have improved in the past couple of weeks overall, but naptime has continued to be a challenge, one that has remained unaffected by any amount of positive reinforcement or punishment on my part. So my remaining options are to try and suggest ways the school may be able to better manage him, or to just bring him home for nap, but I worry that he will view this as a victory and the behaviors will spill out at other times whenever he wants to go home because he isn't feeling engaged. So I'm still on the fence. There's no school this week, so I have some time to consider what to do.

Does he get plenty of time to run? Maybe more exercise would help?

Update: after a couple of months of sticking to our positive reinforcement and communicating with the teacher things are going much better now! We’ve had an entire week with no incidents and DS seems happier as well. It seems we have worked through whatever was troubling him. Thanks for your advice!

Nice to hear!