Patience.....Running.....Low...
That's how I felt during the last hour of work today. The kids were absolutely hyper, just bouncing off the walls. We had the kids dance for a good hour to wear them out, it worked. But one kid in particular just kept pushing the teacher's buttons & nothing we tried worked. Time outs didn't work-(he'd throw the chair), redirection didn't work-(he'd hit you), speaking to him didn't work-(he'd spit at you), absolutely nothing. Then he chilled out a little bit when we all did art before the parents got there--that is until he decided to suck on the markers-(he's 5). So his mom called and asked us to get him ready to go because she was on her way. The job fell to me today, so off we went to the cubbies to get him ready. After throwing a tantrum about getting ready to go home, I got him to put his legs in his snowpants. Then he decided that he didn't want his feet to be out of his snowpants. That was another tantrum. Then he didn't want his snowpants zipped up. Yet another tantrum. I was beyond my limit at this point so I took his hand off the zipper and went to zip it up myself. While zipping his snowpants up I managed to catch part of his finger in the zipper. So then off we go to the office, him screaming bloody murder the whole time, to get a bandaid. Then there was another tantrum in the office because he didn't want a plain band-aid-(it's all we had). Then the boots went on-another tantrum, coat went on-another tantrum, hat went on-guess what happened--yes, yet another tantrum from a 5 year old. FIVE!
In short, my patience was shot by the time I left work tonight. I seriously just wanted to scream and I don't often get to that point-(in fact this is only the second time in 2 years that I've ever felt like that). For those teacher's out there, how do you handle this??? I'm really at a loss, I just get so frustrated because we go through this about everything, all day. By the end of the day I just want him gone. I know that sounds horrible, but it's the truth. I just don't want to deal with it after a certain point. Maybe tomorrow will be better.
posted by Jen @ 6:32 PM
2 Comments:
You know, at that age if they are throwing a tantrum, it is because it works at getting his way somewhere, and my guess is home. When I taught kids that would act this way, I'd keep doing what I was supposed to do (dress him, clean up, whatever) but DO NOT SAY ONE WORD TO HIM other than instructions. Do not give him the verbal attention that he wants. If you have the time, ignore him altogether, and when he starts to wander off and do what he wants to do, redirect him back to the task at hand. Another tantrum? More ignoring. I'd also tell his mother because this kind of behavior is NOT NORMAL IN A FIVE YEAR OLD. Not at all.
whenever my kids threw a tantrum, i would throw myself on the floor and have a bigger one. It usually scared the hell out of them and they never did it again. I don't suppose you could do that at work though, although I've probably done that as well.
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