KiasuParents - Parenting in Singapore

Hi parents, want to share an incident that I witness recently.. and want to hear your thoughts.

I brought my girl to a trial class at one of the enrichment class recently, and there was another boy who was in the trial too.. After the trial class.. the boy does not want to go back.. even after much coaxing from the parent and the teachers.. he still refused to go back! He was throwing tantrums.. rolling on the floor.. running about the place!

After about 30 mins.. with things smashed onto the floor.. and even queue stands falling all over the place.. he finally managed to calm himself down.. and left the place.

The boy appears to be hyperactive.. and cannot control himself.. and when he throws tantrums.. he creates a situation where he could possibly hurt himself.. and others!

In such situations, what do you think we should do? Should bystanders help? Should the school teachers help? What if we hold onto the boy to prevent him from hurting himself.. instead we hurt him? Who is liable? What would you do if you saw this happening?

Wish to hear your thoughts..

Hi,

You are observant. It's very real that nowadays the number of children with learning disorder are on a rise...you will probably see more of such children that behaves differently from your own. They are borned with natural handicaps that are invisible from naked eyes - part of the brain just lack that substance that conform most of us in carrying our daily life. I have a special child too.

A reply very much depends on the objective of the question......were you concerned over the safety of the other children in the class? If so, you can rise the concern to the personnel in charge running the class. You can also gather the feedback from other parents. The concern can be strongly voiced and the child will be ask to leave. Afterall, we all know that children with learning disorder are minority ones, and they are usually accepted into normal enrichment classes with much kindness yet with reservation. Their parents will understand and the child will face this with disappointment and learn to take it. It's not the child's first time, but it will also not be the last encounter knowing that he/she is not accepted. It's a lifetime thing.

It will also not be advisable to bottom up your emotions about the safety aspect as you will not like to hurt the parent and/or the child. That right is totally yours. It becomes a burden. The child needs not a charity act, but more of understanding, some degree of tolerance, and more flexibility.

If the concern rise from the urge to help all the children to benefit from the enrichment class, and teaching all to accept diversity, the best person for more information will be the parents. They should know or can guess what is the "melting point" of the child, and how to better allow their child to recover from great excitement to normal level of emotions again. Generally, it requires careful planning and some leeway for the child. Break the child from a high emotion activity to do some relaxing the body activities , before going to the next high emotion again. It means the child could no longer react spontaneous to the ad hoc scenerio, and also might restrict the other children to some degree. It takes fine tuning. And then it depends how comfortable you are to take lead to voice your concern and try to step in to make the whole thing work.

Generally, people will choose the first scenerio. Hope this helps to address some of your concern.

Hi Parents,
i believe my child is hyperactive, and many a times disturbs the class. The teacher is not happy too. she likes to control by shouting, which i explained to her that it will not help for more than few minutes.
I would like to change the school and try with some other teachers which are patient and innovative and new environment.
Do any of you have good experience in any kindergarten at West Coast or Jurong East with Hyperactive kids?
please help?
thanks.