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Hello All,
Edited...
If you are still reading this, thank you.

Any ideas?

The first thing which comes to mind is related to your move across town. You may wish to think about differences which this has created for him. For example, some say the direction one lays their head while sleeping may have a profound effect.

May also want to touch base with the OT, to get the thoughts of someone who knows him well and his seen his ups and downs?

Wishing you the best with this.

Maybe his style is suited to deep diving one or two things at a time? Or perhaps he is feeling over-scheduled, but can't accept owning that as a problem since he asked for more classroom stuff?

Or could he have seasonal affective disorder? (harder to hold things together in the winter time)

But those are more random thoughts than something coming through heavily. Don't have much else, but hope it is just a blip and it comes back together for him and you.

p.s. Does he currently have any peers he relates to?

I wonder if it's some combination of items on your list:


That is, (on point 9) that he's seeing that this is getting YOU to engage and interact intensively-- maybe you'd been retreating from such intense interaction?

Has moving changed his social life a lot?

It's also possible that he simply doesn't think that you SHOULD be telling him what to do. I'm familiar with the autonomous beast within my own dear child-- just thought I'd mention it because this is about the age at which she became SO ungovernable that we had only three choices: a) unschool completely (which my DH and I find incompatible with our parenting philosophy and think is a bad idea given her natural disposition), b) return her to some other kind of schooling, or c) increase voltage. Okay, two options. {sigh} It was VERY bad, sometimes. More on that momentarily.

I should mention that your list of things, and your description about his obstinent refusal to do even appropriate work? Yeah-- WOW does that sound familiar-- we went through this every time DD jumped out of curriculum while we homeschooled-- she'd refuse, I'd beat my head against that wall for a week or two (or longer ) and then I'd think-- oh yeah? If you're so smart can you do THIS end-of-unit-assessment? And, um-- she could... start new curriculum all smiles for two to six weeks,

rinse, repeat. (Horror should be the clear reaction here, by the way-- I'm convinced this took years off of my life and DH's both).

We decided that she HAD to be educated by someone besides me holding the 'whip-hand' as it were. Enter virtual school. Ultimately, this forced her to work on areas of relative weakness, where she would MUCH MUCH have preferred not to 'work' on things she didn't like (because they felt difficult).

That one didn't make your list-- but I think it's something to consider. If school is finally appropriate, and especially if it's in areas of (relative) weakness, then push-back is something I might expect from a relatively strong-willed gifted child.

The more gifted and the more strong-willed, the more push-back.

My DD was Ghandi-- I could not break her. Seriously-- I tried. I tried persuasion, reasoning, reward charts, unpleasant alternative tasks, the naughty seat, giving her the silent treatment, I tried EVERYTHING I could think of that wasn't overtly abusive, and she just waited me out.

So either you'll have to get cooperation somehow, or you'll have to remove yourself as "the boss" for schoolwork, at least if that is the case.

Oh HK, I have a 7yr old whose got a page or two from your DDs book....

Search on OT sites about weighted blankets, balance balls instead of a chair, or a squishy seat to sit on (gel)... He may need some sensory feedback.

I've been homeschooling our Kindergartner for little over 2 months now and have been having similar problems. He's also 2E ... BAD SPD and like you said "questionable" in our case PDD-NOS. Plus because his cold allergy also seems to affect his behavior. We've had days when we couldn't get anything accomplished at all and then we tried doing some stuff while he was in a trampoline (it's one of those 5 foot wide with enclosure that can be indoors up to 100lbs) and it's amazing! He can't tell me what 2 + 2 is when he's sitting at a desk but he'll easily tell me what's 22 + 6 while he's jumping in the trampoline. When he's not jumping, he's just sitting in there enclosed from the outside work listening to ebooks on the iPad or doing all kinds of other activities on iPad as well or watching nature and technical shows on my computer screen. It's amazing what having him sit in that bouncy enclosed space does for him! The only thing he has to do outside is little bit of writing but I'm not pushing him too hard because he's just not ready for much more and arts but he loves doing all kinds of little artsy projects. I'm happier when he spends 30 minutes cutting with scissors than if he spent 5 minutes suffering through writing practice at this point.

So,enclosed indoor trampoline did the trick for us

We are sort of going through this ourselves right now, so I have not BTDT, but more "there-and-doing-it". DS has always been resistant to being told what to study. He had an Aha! moment with Scratch programming during winter break, and it became his passion. And he no longer wanted to do most of the stuff we had been working on previously.

My reluctant solution is to let him spend a lot more time on the computer, using Scratch. We've completely dropped much of our "formal" curriculum, although I do try to get a few things in (art, math, science) throughout the week.

I would not say DS loves challenges, but he is much more likely to work hard on a project if it is his own, and not handed to him.

Is there something (even loosely) academic that your DS is passionate about? Maybe allow him more time to explore a subject of his own choosing, in a way that is less structured than a class.

Also, I would not underestimate the impact of your move. Even if you're within the same town, you're in a new place. Things smell different, sound different, and feel different. He may not be sleeping as well as a result, which can have a huge impact on behavior. Or he may just be spending more of his mental energy on adjusting to the new location; things that used to be automatic, like going from his bedroom to the kitchen, need to be relearned.

I will be watching this thread with great interest! It is hard to know when, and how hard, to push these kids sometimes.

Yeah-- the one thing that I could ALWAYS count on from DD was reading. At least half of our "homeschooling" activities were "read ______."

I also gave her daily LISTS for school-- that way it wasn't ME verbally TELLING her what to do. A sample list from age 6:



I have to be honest here and tell you that this was not ideal in terms of developing written expression (which she resisted), but it saved my sanity somewhat.

I recorded what she read. When she was six, she read thousands of pages a month. Many thousands, actually-- like 4-8K. I just tried to sprinkle reasonably good historical fiction, classics, and non-fiction her direction, and that DID more or less work. Her attention span wasn't the problem.

She was different from your guy in that she could be still for HOURS.

As the mom to newly 7 year old boys - I almost started laughing when I saw the disco dancing description…You are NOT alone in having a son like this... I am surprised at some of the "moves" I am now seeing on a daily basis. LOL.

I can't speak to the rest, as we don't homeschool. We get push back on all sorts of things, however, so some of it may be the age.