The February SENG webinar about anxiety and 2E discussed perfectionism and one thing the presenter talked about was "assigning" a perfectionist a list of things they were required to fail at. It sounded more for older kids, like one thing on the list was to go to the mall and be rejected by x amount of potential employers... That's one idea, to allow them to be "perfect" with failure! To see how failure feels, how it fits. But you can also adjust it for the child's age, personality and interests.
We do alot of "how bad is this really?" like a reality check. It's very important to the little ones at the momemnt...that that color be just right, etc...that magic marker story could have happened to my DD, and she had some issues around stapling last year. These kids are so into their ideas, it's bigger than life almost.
I can't do too much about it at school and there are so many other factors at play there, but at home if this happens with homework or something we try to use humor. Since she loves science and loves extreme silly humor we usually do things like "will you not doing this your exact way cause the extinction of the human race?" or something to do with the universe, something really huge. If it's ridiculous enough scientifically, in her mind, she'll stop and reluctantly start giggling. We've been doing this for about a year now and she's really gotten to stop and think. You could try sharing the ideas with the teacher also.
Also now sometimes forcing her to "fail" on purpose, and then ask her if she's actually okay and she survived (check her pulse etc. just to have that dramatic silly humor that brings her around). As far as I know she has not had a meltdown this year in 3rd grade, her teacher reports a demonstration of tremendous self-control. Of course, she's exhausted after school but...one thing at a time.
LNEsMOM, in the past I'd be tempted to communicate with the teacher, but more recently (this year) I just coach DD at home and send her back in. I make her write her own reminder notes to, I started doing that during the last few months of last school year. I think this practice is really the best thing for her right now, though she's a grade ahead of your DS. That's what happens to kids that coast along without trying. I would hope the G/T teacher can recognize this. My DD's school think we're crazy for being concerned that she get 100s all the time. They don't understand what kind of parent would not be satisfied with that, but we say, "but she doesn't DOOO anything to earn those 100s...she's not learning good work habits."
