Hi,

Wondered if any of you out there could offer advice.

I am writing as a parent of a bright 4 year old who has a birthday early in the academic year, which means he missed the year R intake in September. He was so ready to leave pre-school before he was 4 and was left behind by almost all his friends. It wasn't a disaster, he made more.

At home, he has been taught to read and enjoys all things medieval and superheroes. He is a child who can occupy himself and is very sociable at pre-school,enjoying nothing better than to run around like a headless chicken with his friends in the manner of many 4 year-old boys.

He has recently become quite difficult for pre-school staff to deal with, throwing things over the outside fence and trying to escape himself and I have been a regular signatry in the incident book which details when children's behaviour becomes unacceptable.  We have another term of this to go and I am quite worried that despite our approaches to him about this behaviour, which he is able to understand and feel genuine regret for, he is so over-ready for school, that he just can't help it - he's actually not trying to be naughty but is naturally pushing the boudaries suitable for his stage of development, but not for the pre-school setting! and of course, I agree that throwing things over the fence is naughty. 

Like all 4 year-olds, he is not perfect at home, but I do not have these problems with him. He can be a delightful, thoughtful child and a pleasure to have around on his own and with his sibling.

Any of you early years experts have any ideas about what is going on here and how we can proceed ?

hi Michelle,

I have just read your statement about your son and it nearly bought me to tears.  This is beacause I am going through exactly the same thing with my son.  In fact I could have written it myself it is so acurate to my situation.

 I feel that they don't understand him at nursery and have no idea of what he is about.  He has just earned himself a naughtly label that we just cannot get rid of.  They don't get the fact that he is simply bored.  I now have his placement sorted for reception in september and hope that things work out better for him there.

 I would love to hear from you, if you have found a solution.

Liz Fortt

I opened this thread because I suspect I had a narrow escape from a similar situation. Daughter is very bright, but fortunately being six weeks prem meant that she started school this year as an August birthday - and she was so ready.

I do sometimes wonder what I would have done this year - the pre-school is lovely, and I suspect she would have been okay there (probably because she's a girl) - but I'm pretty certain that we'd have been facing very challenging behaviour at home, without the stimulation she's getting from school.

I think I would have been going for a halfway house with what aagm620 suggests: although she would probably have still gone to the pre-school (but not necessarily the full number of hours), I would have been looking for activities to do with her that would be more challenging - learning an instrument, going to a foreign language group, just going on trips to explore (just the one-to-one talk whilst doing so would probably be constructive), quite possibly hooking up with the local home ed group. I wouldn't have been looking to home educate long term, but I think it would have made a lot of sense to see pre-school as a secondary resource rather than rely on them to provide much stimulation. 

I hope you both find some solutions, and that things simmer down at nursery. Hopefully things will be better come September, but I guess something needs to happen now to make sure they haven't got into behaviour patterns that will be difficult to break.

Another thought: can you suggest any activities to the nursery that you know might engage your child? I told my daughter's key worker about things she was doing at home, and they then tried some of those at pre-school. Obviously you hope they'll be doing some different things at nursery to home, but if they can distract them onto something they find interesting, it might avoid the poor behaviour. It might also give the staff ideas for other things that might engage your boys.

Good luck.

michelleharri6:

As regards home tutoring, yes, nothing I haven't thought of. However, we both need a break from one another and he desperately needs the companionship of other headless chickens! 

i quite understand this bit - i could have home-edded my daughter, tho she wouldn't have been too pleased as she loves a crowd - but the very thought with my son - augh!

but we had access to a lovely school which was happy to let children fly, so i stuck with the extra-curricular stuff already mentioned

letrus know how it goes when he gets to reception

As Gifted and Talented co-ordinator in a large primary and the proud parent of 2 G+T children, I see your problem from different angles.  I genuinely don't think home schooling is a valid option, particularly as your son has settled so well socially. 

My advice would be to talk to the school about moving him up a year.  This is perfectly possible, but does depend on the discretion of the school.  The child's obvious boredom and frustration is something that any school would want to ease if possible and I suspect that the head would not want to lose any child who will clearly provide those all important levels later on in school life. 

Make an appointment with the G+T co-ordinator or head (or both), outline your concerns and if his results and teacher assessments back up what you say, i think you have a strong case to have him admitted early (or at least do part of the day in an older class).  Be firm but reasonable and I would be surprised if some compromise could not be reached.

Good luck.