Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy What do you make of this?

My 5 year old displays behavior almost identical to his older brothers. He has been labelled a "sponge". He picks up on, copies and mimicks EVERYTHING they do (good and bad unfortunately). If they wanted to teach him to build a bomb - he'd learn.

He has to be watched constantly. He gets into everything and is into sneaking and getting his brothers toys and hiding them. He has even increased the difficulty of finding his latest "hiding spots". He has no interest in toys except trains - my oldest was like this. He would rather use real tools than play tools, real phones than play phones, real computers than play computers - etc. Leapster has been a lifesaver although he is quickly learning his brother's Nintendo DS'.

He can tell you the sounds of all the alphabet but only the names of half. He can't count very high but can identify most number up to 20. His teacher said he doesn't know his shapes, yet today his brother points at the bottom of a pilon and says "what shape is that vince?" and he says "hexigon" and Julian goes "OMG mom - he's right I thought it was an octigon". While his alphabet is behind, I think he's a child with both ADHD and giftedness. His teacher agrees that we cannot look at his scores to tell his "smarts" - when I told her his brother is in the 140 range she says "no doubt he's at least that high".

He is horribly disruptive at school, home, etc. He does well at daycare but not sure why. He's about to get kicked out of kindergarten so in a last ditch effort to save my job - I'm getting him tested for ADHD to see if I can get him services.

Does this sound like a gifted child or a child who just has serious behavioral problems. His behavior problems are unbelievably high. He recites the inappropriate songs that come home from Jr. High - at school. He can sing any song we hear on the radio more than twice. He unfortunately picks up on and copies everything. He does not speak like a 5 year old, he speaks like a 12 year old. This is like my 10 year old who speaks like an adult.

What do I tell the teachers, principal and school counselor? How do I help him - the other kids can't learn and neither can he. While he doesn't do well with ABC/123 - he's got patterns (even complicated ones) down pat.

In FACT, he did a sheet wrong - was to color in 5 of 12 apples. he colored all - teacher crossed out 7 of them to show him the right way. He gets a practice sheet, comes home, colors all 12 and then crosses out the RIGHT NUMBER of apples to "make it right".

To me - that is not something 5 year olds do on a regular basis. But they are seriously ready to start suspending him and I've had to pick him up several times from school. How do I help my son? I'm having enough trouble getting my 10 year old to stay on track, I'm wearing out. I'm also a single mom who is in school so this has been tough. Thankfully I graduate in 5 weeks.

congradulations on being so close to graduation!
If they suspend your son, will they provide a tutor?
Did the school test him? Seems like they should before they suspend him....

sounds like your son is a real handful - what else he is will take a very experienced thoughtful tester to figure out. And I'm hoping the school might pay for it - if they are at the point of sacking him...

It's really difficult for a 5 year old to know what is and isn't ok to do. A bored 5 year old may have less than average motivation to restrain himself.

Remember that you can only do the best you can, and you will always have to balance the needs of all your family members - including yourself...

I'm praying for you -
Grinity

What specifically does he do that's disruptive? And does he do it only when he's bored, or all the time?

He sounds GT, but it is possible to be both GT and have behavioral problems, so details might help. I think Grinity is right on the mark about testing, too. Assuming he's not endangering people with his behavioral issues (at which point, they may not have a lot of choice in the matter), then it seems to me that the school has a duty to try to change the behavior before they boot him out!

He is dancing around the back of the class singing, not staying in his seat at all and being loud, center of attention, etc. He's not harming anyone, he's generally not a violent kid.

It is problematic that he's teaching other 5 year olds words he hears from his brothers (who know they shouldn't, but what 12 year old doesn't say "stupid" or "hate this/that"?). We won't get into the words he hears from dad (only 1/10th of the reason I'm a single mom).

The teacher has done all she can without completely being unable to teach. So basically I'm going down the ADHD diagnosis road and getting him an aide.

He *can* listen, but he is distracted by his own breath most moments. His behavior is better at my house and dad's house - even better for daycare, but these are more controlled environments with less freedom.

School is supportive but frustrated with him. No behavior plan of any kind yet, but they are beginning the process of doing that now. We have two family psychiatrists for our kids. The older two brothers both have moderate ADHD, one has bipolar and aspergers, the other has anxiety with ADHD (yes, thorough evals to dissemenate the two. I guarantee Vince has ADHD - I wish we could just go "ok, he can't function in the classroom and needs help" but we have to tack a label on him.

I have a call into the one psychiatrist that sees my older son, to see if he'll see the younger one. He only takes insurance on a request basis. He's seen my older son for 5 years now.

Pediatricians here won't dx ADHD - at least my son's won't - I thought they did so I asked.

LD is possible. They are going to check for that. Last night at gymnastics he was just everywhere. Cannot follow the group, getting all over everything, the owner of the place had to intervien (they asked me not to) and really get stern with my son and the instructor had to hold his hand to keep him from being a danger to himself and all the other kids there. He isn't trying to hurt anyone he's just out of control. He does fine in a small setting but can't handle big groups. His older brother had the same problem until he was in 2nd grade.

I appreciate all the advice. I'm just going to keep trying to figure this out. This morning - he was telling me the sounds of all the letters on the fridge, I think he'll be reading before he knows his ABC's. Is that possible? Oye.

You might ask the teacher to keep track of when during the day the behavioral problems occur. Do they happen randomly throughout the day? Do they happen right after a very energetic activity, such as recess? Some kids have a very hard time transitioning to a quiet activity, like circle time, after a very loud activity. (sensitivity issues). Do they happen within half an hour after eating a snack everyday? That was how we finally figured out our DS had food allergies. Imagine our amazement when we finally correlated his behavior to the fact that he wigged out every day after being fed brightly colored sugar bombs for a snack. (also known as healthy, vitamin C-enriched gummy bears made from corn syrup!!). Ask the teacher to keep a running log of problems with detailed descriptions of the time and behavior. It will help you also to see the frequency and the type of activity that is leading the school to consider such drastic consequences.

I have to tell you a funny story, just to make you smile and feel better. I remember one day, when DS was in kindergarten, receiving a phone call to come and get DS right that moment from the principle's office. He was being "asked to leave" in the middle of the day. I was in a panic about what in the world it could be from. I grabbed my purse and dashed out the door, breaking all speed limits to get to the school. I turned the corner into the school parking lot and saw all of the kids and all of the teachers outside of the building. I wanted to crawl under my car and hide, I was so embarrassed. I kept thinking absurd thoughts, such as, "DS, did you take your nuclear warhead to school today?" But I put on my best face and marched past all of the hundreds of kids until I found a teacher outside. She said that DS was in the principle's office and that they were having a fire drill. I waited with baited breath for the accusation that my DS was somehow responsible for the mayhem, but it didn't occur. So I went in and found my very upset little five year old sitting in the principle's office. The principle explained that he had been sent to the office twice for bad behavior and was being sent home. When I asked what he did, the principle explained that there was a substitute teacher that day (clue number one) and that she would go and find out. (wouldn't you think she would do that before she called me?!!!) The principle came back, rather red in the face, and explained that the offending behavior was that: he had not come in at the end of recess (the substitute had lost hear voice and he had not heard her), he had spilled his glue and had tried to mop it up with a paint brush, and he had called a girl in his class a name while waiting in line. The principle then decided to leave and ask the substitute teacher if it was a bad name that he had used. I leaned over and asked DS what he had called the little girl. He looked up at me with the most confused look and explained that he had been playing with vowel sounds and had switched the vowels around in her name. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper! DS's teacher called me the next day to apologize, but I was so mad!

Lesson to be learned: Find out everything you can about your child's behavior. Make the school documents the behavior. Make sure that if they try to put a label like ADHD on your child that you know whether it is warranted or not. (It may be, but let them jump through a few hoops to show it!). Make sure that they give you and your son all of the evaluations and testing that you and he need to understand this. I personally believe that if the school has to go through so much red tape and testing in order to carefully document advancing a child, then they should have to go through the same degree of careful documentation for proving that there is a problem.

Just my own perspective from having my son in hot water for misuse of vowels.

Note: I just saw your last post about your son's behavior. It sounds a lot like my son before we diagnosed the food allergies. You might want to try reading about it, to see if anythings clicks. This article details a fairly extreme example of the behavioral problems that can arise from food allergies. But wheat, dairy, and corn can sometimes lead to behavioral issues like you describe. We had no idea until we took these items out of DS's diet. His teacher called within a week to say that he was a completely different boy. Just thought I would pass that along in case it helps you or someone out there in the future.
http://www.livingwithout.com/features/vault_corncrazy.html

Since you mentioned asperpers in your last posting, boysclubx3, I thought I would add this reference to autism. You have probably come across the information about gluten-free/dairy-free diets and autism by now, since it has been widely reported. But just in case, I will pass along a link and a quote:

http://www.livingwithout.com/features/vault_gfcfdiet.html


My son reacts just like how you described your son whenever he eats gluten, dairy, and eventually we discovered corn as well. I would describe it, with my son at least, as an impulse control problem when he eats these food. And remember that many of the non-food items in schools contain wheat and corn: paints, glues, play dough or clay. My son always reacted to touching these items, and the reaction would last between 2-3 days. So if he paints or glues every day at school, it can seem like a constant behavior. It may be just a similarity, boysclubx3, so take it with a grain of salt. It is hard to try to eat without any of these foods, and I know that it would be impossible for me if I were a single mom. But we spent three very long years finally deciphering this. If my long and arduous journey can help anyone in the future, then I will be happy to tell my tale to anyone who is interested.

Ohh boy yeah. This will sound awful but I can't be a stay at home mom, and I did the gluten free diet with my oldest son for almost 3 years. The "results" were so minimal and the effort was so severe - I resorted to medications. There was hardly any difference on or off.

We have also done casien and corn free. I've BTDT with diets and the changes in behaviors for my kids at least have never been worth the effort put in. I know that sounds awful but that gluten free diet was a nightmare. I did it but working full time - I couldn't possible keep all the treats available to bring along and take to school.

I know Barbara's is easier to find now - but the majority of everything still has to be made. I'm not discounting the diet. I am going to go back to color free foods (I'd say I'm 80% there anyway) and I'm going to cut out the soda treats totally again (oh the moaning from my other kids LOL!). I make them drink diet but even diet has the corn syrup which is evil all by itself.

I'll cut some things out to see how it goes. He had not even had a snack at school yet, I pack things like pretzels or fruit. I am wondering if the Capri Sun's might be a culprit. I'll go ahead and replace those with something else for snacks/lunches.

Thank you again for the help!! I appreciate it.

I'm there with you boysclubx3. I know how hard it can be. And I would not suggest it at all if you don't see a tremendous effect. I hesitated to even mention it because most people have already heard of or tried the diet for themselves. If the diet doesn't have a noticeable effect, then don't go there. We found out that I had severe food allergies and needed to remove gluten, dairy, soy, eggs, and corn from my diet. We discover that DS's food allergies were related to behavior almost by accident (particularly the corn), when he started to eat the same foods that I was cooking for myself. We then took DS to my allergy doctor to get sub-dermal testing to confirm the allergy.

So don't feel bad for not doing the diet if you don't see any effect. The only thing that I will add, if it is at all helpful, is that corn is nearly impossible to avoid completely, much, much worse than gluten. Toothpaste has corn in it (sorbitol), toilet paper is dusted with it, fresh fruit and veggies are covered in vegetable wax containing corn to preserve them (apples, cucumbers, etc). And most medicines in a pill form have cornstarch as a binding agent. Even such innocent things as salt (Morton's Iodized salt has malodexitrin in it as an anti-caking agent which is made from corn) and baking powder have corn in them. Unless you are willing to call every company that has salt in the package and ask, then you can't be sure that you are going completely corn-free. So I would only advise this diet if you are 1) absolutely sure of a sensitivity or allergy from an allergy doctor, 2) willing to forgo all proceeded food and 3) you see a huge difference fairly quickly. Otherwise, don't go there. It is just too hard to eliminate it completely.

So now after going down that faulty path, does anyone else have any ideas for boysclubx3?

No - I do thank you. It did remind me to be more mindful of what I'm giving the kids. It certainly is worth at the least going back to limiting sugar, eliminating sodas and food coloring and eating more healthy.

I talked to my own counselor and she gave me great advice. She said to go back to a visual sticker chart, but to break down the goals by task. Right now with older brothers, the chart is done by chunks of time - ie: before school, after school, after dinner and before bed. So for him it will be to break the day into smaller "tasks", give him stickers for those tasks and then when he accumulates a certain number, he gets extra time with me or a fun activity etc.

I'm going to prepare that this weekend while the kids are at dad's house. I know making the goals shorter spaced will help. I'm also searching for activities that will challenge him.