Okay, somewhere in my little guy who seems unfazed by anything, consequences or rewards, I know he must have something that motivates him. Had teacher conferences a couple weeks ago and his teacher said she hasn't been able to find anything that motivates him. Most kids are motivated if the teacher rewards with stickers and privileges in class and sometimes it's just enough to please your teacher, etc. Not my boy.
It's the same at home. He really doesn't seem to care if you take privileges from him or reward him. He could not care less.
He also is often lost in his own world, it seems. Most kids, if you tell them to do something and they disobey, you know they are disobeying on purpose. With him, even if you get him to make eye contact, it almost is as if he forgets as soon as he walks away. If you tell him to brush, you have to tell him multiple times because he'll go into the bathroom and get distracted by something...the toothpaste, a toy, wetting a towel, etc. Very rarely can we tell him to do something once. And, while we do lay out consequences it's difficult because we see no desire to do better next time and it's also hard to get mad at a kid who really doesn't seem to do it out of ill will.
He can absolutely focus when he's really into something. Hand him a dinosaur book and he'll spend an hour studying every page and soaking it up. He may not be into school, but he's really knowledgeable about things he cares about and can carry a conversation like nobody's business. :)
We just can't get him to focus in school (he usually says he's tired or the material is boring or he wants to do something else). Flipping through a book he brought home from school, we saw that he colored on every page...he just colored about an inch long line on each. Meanwhile, I imagine the intent was for the kids to color all of the page. I can already pictured what he was thinking...I don't want to do this. This is boring. So I'm going to just do enough to get by.
Anyway, I just found it interesting that his teacher said she can't find anything that motivates him and we feel the same at home. Any ideas?
PLEASE look into Auditory Processing Disorder. You have described my nephew exactly and I wish someone would have told us about APD sooner.
You may want to read a bit about Aspergers also.
This is a good book
http://www.amazon.com/When-Brain-Cant-Hear-Unraveling/dp/...
OR
http://www.amazon.com/Sound-Hope-Recognizing-Treating-Pro...
If you want you can email me anytime.
L.
Alfie Kohn's book, "Unconditional Parenting" talks about the pitfalls of using rewards and punishments to motivate a child. (He sites research which shows that kids might change a behavior for a while, with one or the other, but empirical evidence states that these changes are rarely long-lasting positives.)
All that to say, your son may be ahead of the pack in that particular regard. Now, the key is to find out what helps him self-motivate.
If it were me, I'd spend time in observation, and then ask gentle, open-ended questions. He's written one line on each page. "Tell me about those lines that you drew. (Pause--) I noticed that you put one on each page. Tell me about that."
"I saw you really liked playing (cars, dinosaurs, blocks). What was happening when you were playing ________."
"If you could do anything you like tomorrow, what would you choose?"
Keep the questions conversational and simple. One strict warning here: Do not ask "WHY", because this will shut children up like a clam. They cannot answer that sort of "why" question. (Bruno Bettleheim has much to say on this in "A Good Enough Parent".)
Parents have to be detectives, and detectives start first by observing. That's where I'd start. See if you can enter his world a bit and find out what excites him.
Another thing that comes to mind: Do you think he wants company for some of what he's doing? I've found that when I send my four year old in to get dressed, he often finds something else he wants to be doing. If I go in with him, spend some time talking with him and keeping him on task, things go more smoothly. It's my company he's responding to, taking my lead. My guess is that when we give them opportunities to be self-directed (esp. after a day at preschool, when so much is organized for them), they take us up on it by not attending to the tasks we've assigned. So being available for some of those tasks--not to do them for him, but just to be company-- might be worth a shot, too.
time to meet with the school counselor. Ask the teacher for a referral.
Three thoughts: at age 5....how much does he know? Is the curriculum something he has already achieved? If so....maybe he is bored. It's up to the teacher to find something to challenge him.
2nd thought: is he immature for his age? Many, many boys wait until age 6 to start KG due to social issues. Both of my sons started KG at age 6. It really paid off in the long run. Many educators swear that they can walk into a classroom & pick out the "young" ones!
3rd thought: the fact that you mentioned eye contact/the lack of...or really the lack of connection. When you combine it with lack of focus & the ability to highly focused on something of interest.....these are all indicators that he needs to be tested.
As a head's up, our son also posesses a lot of these traits. He is 15 & is currently considered "untreated ADD". We chose not to treat him...simply because he's almost always happy. For the most part his grades run all across the board...& somehow he manages to pull off Honor Roll. We know that with meds he'd be achieving consistently, but have no desire to go that route. We were able to enhance the classroom experience simply thru behavior modification instruction thru the school counselor.
Hope some of this helps!
Children are not supposed to be motivated by consequences, punishments and rewards. They are supposed to be self motivated by their curiosity about the world. Try reading about the Montessori method - it assumes that children are already motivated to learn about the world and provides some methods of guidance.
Well if it helps, our son was extremely easily distracted at that age. You would have to tell him 10 x it seemed to go do something and what really worked was to go with him and be there to keep him on track. It was VERY frustrating. One thing that helped was to praise him like crazy and tell him what a great job he did when he actually did something. But I do remember a lot of the time feeling like I was going to go crazy bc he would go into his room to get dressed and then 15m later I would find him playing with some toy and not dressed. We made him a chart with the 5 or so things he had to do in the morning before school (on poster board with big pictures of each thing). We talked to him a lot about it and he tried but it was hard. I will tell you that now at 7.5 yrs he is soo much better at this and is less distracted. PS - Our son is in the gifted and talented program now at school. Perhaps your son is simply too bored by the subject matter. You can do a parent referral to get him tested.
Well, the brushing teeth, bathroom, etc. - that is just being 5 - LOL!
But the school behavior and way you explained him, in my opinion, points to a Gifted/Talented.
My son was tested at the request of his teacher after K for this. It was a list of questions about how they handle conversations, do they like to converse and interact with older people as well as attention span and a number of other things that sound like your son.
I would speak to his teacher, see if she has any advice and even set up time with the GT teacher at your son's school.
Also, there is the option to - at home- use the t hings he likes to build on for other subjects. If he likes dinosaurs - use names of dinos to learn letters, add and subtract and even find "site words" in the dino books, etc.
good luck!!
I'm so glad you asked this question, my now 11 year old is the same way and has been this way since Kinder. I'm still struggling with it and I don't know what to do, but I can say you are not alone! you have some interesting answers here, I'm going to have to look into them.
You just described life with my 22 year old, he hasn't changed.......... I am going to check out that Auditory Processing Disorder.
He is 5. Five year olds get distracted. Often easily, especially boys. I wouldn't be too concerned unless this carries on for multiple years. You stated he gets excited about dinosours. You stated that verbally he is an excellent converationalist. I would encourage him to talk. About anything he is interested in. Teach him social skills by having him ask you things, and then have him repeat back what you have said. Just don't make it overlong or too complicated. Who knows? Maybe he will become a public speaker. Or the president. Or Peace ambassodor. Just remember he is five. He has lots of time yet.
