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Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

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Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby Ddeby » Wed Jan 28, 2015 4:16 pm

Just stumbled across the board during my search for ODD and was hoping somebody could offer some help/advice.

My son is 6 (will be 7 next month) and in first grade. His first grade teacher has been complaining since September that he is disruptive, makes noises with his mouth, taps his feet and pencil constantly which disrupts the other kids, talks when he should be quiet, tries to make the other kids laugh, crawls under the stalls in the bathroom to lock the doors, and has been involved in pushing in line (my son said someone cut him in line). We disciplined him at home for putting his hands on the other child which I won't tolerate.

But for the other issues, my thoughts so far have been that he is an overactive, very normal little boy who is perhaps immature, but I didn't see this as a major problem. Especially since his kindergarten teacher never relayed anything of the sort to me. First grade is 6 hours a day, whereas in kindergarten it was 2-1/2 hours, so naturally he's antsy. The teacher has tried moving his desk away from the other kids and putting a rubberband on the foot of his chair for him to bounce his feet on. She also gives him "brain breaks" where he can take a quick walk and come back. All to no avail.

Last week the teacher told me that he has been disobeying not only her, but the gym and music teacher as well. WHen he's asked to do something, he will just simply stare at them. Silient defiance I guess you could call it. He has been bursting out in tears if he cannot understand something, and he again "had his hands on someone" (although I didn't get the full story of that incident as the teacher didn't see it herself). She has used the words "impulsive" and "out of control" when talkign about him, to which I take a little bit of offense. I agre with impulsive, but to me "out of control" would be tipping over a desk or kicking another child. So I''m a bit on the defensive at this point - he's my baby after all.

The school wants to implement a Connors-3 and from my research I see that it looks for ADHD, oppositional-defiant disorder or conduct disorder. I know he doesn't have ADHD. His attention is good for tasks he likes, and academically his grades exceed where he needs to be. But reading through the ODD literature there are SOME signs of ODD, but some of them seem quite normal for a 6 year old boy.

Obviously I need to wait for the testing to see what the school determins, but I guess my question is how do you tell the difference between a strong-willed child and one with ODD? His behavior at school is clearly disruptive, but at home it's not. He's my most challenging child by far, but I don't see the level of problems at home that the school is seeing. He's quite obediant to me and my husband.

Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you! :)
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby seabreezeblue » Wed Jan 28, 2015 7:50 pm

I'd like to redefine ''out of control'' here a little bit.. out of control simply means that the person isn't able to stop their behavior at that point..

Not to say that you're not justified in having a problem with the phrase.. it's just that it doesn't mean the person is horrible or anything like that.. they simply have little control over their actions.

Okay; let's have a look at ADHD and why you don't think your child has it..

I can't say whether he does have ADHD or not but i can tell you that children with ADHD can focus on things that interest them.. in fact many of them have a fantastic hyperfocus ability.
Children with ADHD can also excel academically.. particular areas of giftedness in ADHD tend to be the arts or maths.

Link to an ADDitude piece about hyperfocus..
http://www.additudemag.com/adhd/article/612.html


I can't give you an answer - or even a guess at this point about ODD due to lack of info but i'm wondering if you've asked your son why he ignores his teachers.?

It could be something as simple as being distracted by noises and not hearing the teachers properly(or processing if he does hear)

Ps.. does he ever do the silent defiance thing at home.?
A silent child that just looks at you when he get told off is usually one that's struggling to hold back tears or anger.
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby Ddeby » Wed Jan 28, 2015 10:09 pm

Thank you for the reply and link.

To answer your question, when I ask him why he doesn't listen to the teacher, sometimes his answer is "I don't know" and sometimes it is "I just didn't want to do it." And no, he really doesn't exibit this silent defiance at home.
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby seabreezeblue » Wed Jan 28, 2015 11:07 pm

you're welcome xx

ADHD is something that's quite misunderstood due to all the articles out there that deal with the negative symptoms of it instead of exploring the positive as well..

I do need to say again though that I'm just explaining ADHD a little bit.. i'm definitely not thinking he has it. This is a case of ''see what the professionals have to say''

To answer your question, when I ask him why he doesn't listen to the teacher, sometimes his answer is "I don't know" and sometimes it is "I just didn't want to do it." And no, he really doesn't exibit this silent defiance at home


^^ hmn.. see from what you've said about your little boy, he's good natured and pretty willing to please..
you're not seeing the defiant behaviour and this usually means that something is going on for the child in the environment that they're playing up in.

It could well be that the environment is too noisy for him to concentrate properly.. it could be that the instructions are confusing him and he refuses because he can't make sense of them.


When you ask him to do something.. do you give simple and one at a time instructions.? In my experience, parents do this and teachers don't.. the teachers at your childs school probably don't and this is likely to make him anxious and fidgety if he doesn't understand.


One tiny question.. has he had a hearing check done and were there any issues at all .?
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby Ddeby » Wed Jan 28, 2015 11:49 pm

I completely understand what your saying. My knowledge of ADHD, oppositional-defiant disorder and conduct disorder is next to nothing, so I'm interested in any information I can get so that IF he ends up being diagnosed with one or the other, at least I'll have some basic understanding.

seabreezeblue wrote:It could well be that the environment is too noisy for him to concentrate properly.. it could be that the instructions are confusing him and he refuses because he can't make sense of them.


My gut tells me he's overstimulated with the other kids, noises and goings on in the class. His teacher said he does much better when the assistant teacher gives him one-on-one attention. I asked if a smaller class was available to him after learning this and I was told no.

seabreezeblue wrote:When you ask him to do something.. do you give simple and one at a time instructions.? In my experience, parents do this and teachers don't.. the teachers at your childs school probably don't and this is likely to make him anxious and fidgety if he doesn't understand.


I probably give a combination of single instructins as well as multistep at home. He can follow a two or three-step task if it's something already familiar to him without a problem. If it were something unfamiliar I would probably use one step at a time.

seabreezeblue wrote:One tiny question.. has he had a hearing check done and were there any issues at all .?


Hearing was checked a at his checkup almost one year ago. As I recall he missed a few tones, but the Dr. said at that age (5) sometimes it's difficult to tell if it's a true hearing loss or not. He will be having his checkup again in April and I will doublecheck on that. Thank you :)
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby EternalMystery » Mon May 18, 2015 4:15 pm

Strong willed children tend to want to do what interests them. It's not really disruptive, they just simply won't stop playing with the blocks because you ask them to - until they are ready. That sort of thing.

ODD will be consistent regardless of whatever environment they are in. He is fine at home, which would seem to rule that out.

ADD or ADHD sounds more on the mark. There is an awesome TED Talk video about Scott Sonnon's experience with school. He has a learn style the educational system can't deal with, so they labeled him slow. He wasn't slow, it was just the way the current system teaches wasn't ideal for him. This might be what is going on with your son. It might be that he needs a different educational system, like Montessori, home schooling or unschooling.

Here's a link to the TED Talk. It is really interesting viewing.
https://youtu.be/bxkBqFbbAP0
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Re: Rambunctions 6 year old. ODD or nothing to worry about?

Postby ADHD-HP » Fri Oct 07, 2016 9:38 pm

Ddeby wrote: I know he doesn't have ADHD. His attention is good for tasks he likes, and academically his grades exceed where he needs to be. But reading through the ODD literature there are SOME signs of ODD, but some of them seem quite normal for a 6 year old boy.



Hi there,

AD(H)D kids/people are totally able to focus. Actually because they are hyperactive, they can "hyper-focus", but as you put it right "for tasks he likes". After reading your description, I see more of ADHD symptoms than ODD / DC.

Usually children with ADHD don't know why they do things they do and that's why when asked "why do you do that they answer "I don't know", as opposed to ODD/DC kids, I guess who actually may do the things on purpose.

It is also good to know that ADHD kids in lots of cases show the symptoms of ODD because of their ADHD.
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