Dude and HK, we are seeing both the positive and the negative aspects of blending in. He is able to quickly adapt and transition to a new environment and also able to put people at ease, take newcomers under his wing and be the class clown and provide a few laughs every day. He was privately tested and the school acted on those results and provides acceleration, but that is contributing to him feeling "left out of the cool crowd" because he is in a pull out. He does have a few friends in the pullout class, but not "cool" kids - those that watch the cool cartoon shows, play the cool iphone games etc (which DS is not!).
And then comes the bad part - him trying to pretend to be someone that he is not in order to impress and gain friends. And doing things that he should never be doing because some of his peers encouraged him to do so - that pliability to peer pressure that Dude talks about. Granted, these kids are only 6 and cannot do much mischief with a strict teacher watching them, but I am worried about the teen years and beyond.
He went through a phase of saying that "studying is boring, school is for nerds, math sucks" etc. Which was what confused the teacher. Later it came out that he was mocked by some kids for saying he loved school and wanted to go to school even on weekends. That problem has been set straight now - he has understood that different kids have different attitudes to school and that it is OK to love school.
We have talked about bullying, being an upstander, not giving in to peer pressure, we have gone to his classroom and had him apologize that one time he did something wrong due to peer pressure, talked to the teacher about how he is gullible and easily influenced by peers and asked the teacher to talk to him about being true to himself etc. etc.
We are constantly asserting and educating him on how to use his own judgement and discretion when faced with peer pressure. For us, it is a long and ongoing process.
