please help need advice

[debby]

My son Noah is 8 & is having behavior problems at school as well as at home. My concern is the behavior at school! When he doesnt want to do something he will start to act up by either trowing things climbing under chairs and desks kicking hitting spitting trying to climb out windows or just running from teachers & aides. For moderate behaviors they use time outs but when it gets really bad to where he might destroy stuff or cause harm to himself or others they are putting him in what they call the isolation room. My husband is against this & I question it especially when twice now while in that room he has undressed urinated on floor & pooped on floor & then proceeded to pick up the poop & throw it at the windows that the aides are monitoring him thru, at this point they will call us to pick him up. He now has a new teacher & she is wanting a medical release from Dr. to use a restraint chair for timeouts so he will stay in time out without someone having to physically restrain him. I dont know what to do!!!! If my husband or I were to lock our son in a room or tie him down we would be in jail. I do understand that when he is out of control they dont want him to hurt himself or others, so what if anything else can they do in these situations? Help I am so stressed out over allowing them to do the wrong things.

[Jodi]

Hi Debby,

Has Noah always had behavior issues? Or did they just begin?

I have an 11 year old boy that has had behaviors off and on for 5 years now. He has torn his socks, thrown his shoes, gone under the desk, done the drop of flop (refusing to get up), and urinated on himself. I do no know why Noah is having behaviors. All I can do is share what I have been through with my son.

When Ryan has had behaviors, sometimes it was because he was overwhelmed. The materials being covered were either over his head, or they were moving too fast for him to participate. Other times, Ryan was just bored and used bad behaviors to seek attention of adults. Ryan was heavily praised when he started school, and he became a bit of a performer. He could not do any work without an adult praising his every move. Obviously at some point this became too much for adults to do and Ryan needed to learn that the praise would be not so easy to get.

Regardless of the situation, whenever Ryan had severe or repetitive behaviors, we would meet as a team with a behaviors specialist to discuss. Before the meeting, the teacher would track the behaviors noting what happened just before, what the behavior was, and what the consequence was. Sometimes it was a matter of coaching Ryan to do a non-preferred task. For example, if we know that math is going to set him off, we talk before math begins to help transition him to the new activity and follow that up with a preferred activity if he does the math without behaviors.

I don't agree with the physical approach the school is suggesting. His behavior is a form of communication, whether it be he is overwhelmed or that he is just refusing to act appropriately. Regardless, the team needs to work WITH you son, not against him. Again, I do not know your exact situation, but perhaps calling an emergency team meeting to discuss what is happening and developing an emergency plan to track what is going on so that a behavior plan can be developed for your son. Your son urinating and defecating is just another behavior. Something is making your man very unhappy.

How is Noah's communication skills? Can he verbalize well? Is he able to tell you about his day? You sound stressed and your instincts are telling you there is something wrong... go with your instincts. You may have to lead the team to find the right solution... don't let them lead you!!

Jodi

[Jodi]

Me again... just wanted to add that one of the most challenging things when dealing with behavior is consistency. I know many of the right ways to handle certain behaviors, but to really change them is to understand that it takes patience and time. It is definitely a marathon!

Consistently responding to behaviors will give you son the guidelines he needs in order to better understand his environment. If you become lazy and do not stick with a program, that sends a mixed message and you may end up starting all over again.

[kellied]

Hi Dbby
I agree with everything Jodi just wrote. I am also having major behavior issues with my 7 year old at school.
One thing I'm wondering is how long are his timeouts. My behavior therapist says no more than 2 minutes. I can't believe that they are putting him in isolation and want to restrain him. They really need help and education on how to handle these kids. Like Jodi said there is some reason he is being set off. When he gets wild his system is disregulated and you need to find the cause. Does he have an aide? Maybe he doesn't like his aide?

These kids also need lots of movement breaks throughout the day. Are they making him stay in his desk too long? Finding ways to give him breaks is huge. For instance if he's working on math for 10 minutes, maybe he needs to do it on the floor or at the board or sitting on a beanbag. He may need to take a break and go for a walk down the hall for a drink, water plants in the office... find jobs that are fun for him and then he goes back to work. These kids have poor muscle tone so to sit for long periods of time is almost painful for them because they need to concentrate to stay sitting up. Also they don't have the same attention span as other kids do. If your staff is not trained in any of this they may have expectations that are unrealistic.

There's a lot of good books out there on how to teach children with Down Syndrome in an Inclusive setting. I bombard my aide and teacher at the beginning of the year with them.

I feel for you as my son is doing the drop and flop a lot and doesn't want to concentrate so I am going to every workshop and reading everything I can on behavior. I've also got posts on here looking for help.

The schedules really help and consistency. It will get worse before it gets better. Our principals have been picking Sean up off the playground every recess to get him inside. They used to smile and laugh with him but were told by the therapist to be serious and firm and it took him all week with a broken heart because he was used to special attention but yesterday it finally clicked and he actually walked into the school. He was rewarded with 10 minutes of play time with the principal.

One other thing I just learned at a workshop is if the child is in high alert (for example just coming in from recess or gym). You need to bring him down to quiet alert to be ready for work. This may mean again doing a fun task like bringing books to the library or some breathing excercises. Use your imagination. This will bring him down gradually instead of throwing him into the class and expecting him to work. Our kids don't have the same body regulation as typical kids.

Anyway, hope some of these ideas help. I'll keep adding as I think of things. Stick to your guns and absolutely do not let them restrain him. They need to get a behavior therapist that has dealt with these kids before. Good luck!

Kellie

[kellied]

So I just thought of something that my therapists use here at home to deal with control issues. He is given a schedule of activities. He works on one at a time. If he wants to quit before the therapist, he's told "one more time". He has to do it before he's allowed to have a break or move to the next activity. Sometimes we have to do hand over hand. What that does is show him that he's not in control but that they or we are. We worked for months on that and now when they say "one more time", he complies and there's no argument. Again, this took a lot of repetition and stubborness on our side. He also gets rewards for complying.

Also, there's safe ways to restrain without using restraints. One is to put the child's arms crossed over their chest with their back towards you. You do have to be careful about their heads though because you can get injured by their head. You just hold them there until they calm down. Sometimes it can take quite awhile. You might be able to Google ways to restrain safely. I know my therapists have a name for it and there's several different ways. I'll let you know when I find out.

To have him stay in time outs we just put him in a hallway or wherever there wasn't anything that he could grab or play with. He has to go to the same spot everytime and then you stand there with the timer. You basically ignore him unless he moves. If he moves you quietly put him back, say time out and restart the timer (tell him that you're doing that). My son caught on quite quickly that it was going to take longer if he didn't sit still. When he's done we move on without reward or making a big deal. He still needs to finish what he started though if it's an activity or picking up something he dropped.

You may already know all of this stuff but thought I'd say it anyway in case.

By the way, we've gone through stages where my son takes off his diaper and smears it all over the walls, carpets and toys. Love that one! I should buy shares in Spot Shot. He seems to have stopped that again thank God. Still trying to potty train. That's one of my biggest issues right now along with the school stuff. It never ends does it?

The stress on the family is really bad isn't it? I don't think anyone really realizes how hard it is until you go through this. I think we need to talk about that more often on this forum. I'm all about being positive but sometimes you need to vent. Last week my truck was somewhat on fire at the school and the fire dept. was there and the whole bit and people kept commenting on how calm I was. I just laughed and said "this is nothing, you should have my life for a day". I do keep laughing though. I think I'm going to write a book on all the things my son has done that is funny. I always say it's lucky he's so darn cute!

[Googsmom aka Jennifer]

Oh Goodness! I send {{{{{{HUGS}}}}} and Welcome to Uno

[kellied]

Thanks. We need it!

[CC]

HUGS to you and

WELCOME TO UNO ;D

Wondering what type of school does you son attend? Is it your home public school?

Have you had a behaviorist come in and observe and recommend a plan for the Teachers and aides? If not I would request this ASAP.

Have you yourself gone in to observe what exactly is going on in the classroom and what might be triggering the behavior?

Does your son have a one on one aide?

I can share that my son aka my little character aka Christopher had some Hmmm lets say very challenging behaviors when he was young

He is now 17 and we are all still alive ;D and doing well ;D

For my guy, what worked the best was time out, very few words. OMG I am a big wordy person LOL and one day a pal of mine said STOP Christie you need to just stop saying so much to Chris, he is tuning you out. OMG was so true. When the bus came I would say Chris the bus is here get your coat and hat, is you lunch box in your book bag, come on the bus is here ..... LOL He would just sit and continuing playing his Nintendo. I then changed it to the Chris the Bus counted five to seven seconds in my head before I said another word and he just got up and got his coat, go figure LOL

When he got a bit older we stopped the time out well actually for us just saying to Chris DO you WANT TIME OUT he would say NO and comply

Then we moved on to 1 2 3 and it worked like a charm with him.

I could go on and on, like I said I can be wordy, LOL

BUT I will leave you with consistency between school and home on behaviors and maturity were the key for us.

Hang in there, it does get better

CC ~ From New Jersey

[debby]

Thanks to all that responded, every little bit helps! Noah is in public school & we have had a behavior plan set up, probably without alot of my help because I dont feel like I know much & Im looking for answers. Ive been out of the loop for too long & feel like Im starting over in learning about kids with down syndrome. I do think that my biggest problem is that my husband & I are not as consistent as we need to be. My husband especially does not follow thru with things & Noah pretty much is in control of Daddy, but knows Mommy wont put up with it. I need to make daddy realize it only makes things harder on everyone else. Thanks again for everyones feedback