My son spit on teacher...how to talk about behavior?

Post Reply New Topic

I really hope this isn't a new behavior for my son, 4.5...He's having a very stressful year. He has a new baby sister, new teachers...a great thing is he is more verbal, is using some great words to communicate. But now he's doing new things like spitting. Could this be a sign of stress? How can I talk to him about the behavior without reinforcing it?

I can relate. My son has serious attitude with this teachers and sometimes hits other kids when he gets frustrated. Did you hear what happened from your child? I know with AS kids, nd kids this age, it's not enough to say "that was wrong." You will have to reinforce with consequences -- whatever will get his attention. When my son was sent home for hitting I made him sit in "jail" (his room) then made him do chores the rest of the afternoon. The main thing is consistency and making sure you don't accidentally reward the behavior. As you know AS kids are really, really smart and can get their way without us knowing .

With a 4.5 year old I think its good to ask questions. You want to figure out what he was thinking, so that you can offer the appropriate re-direction. If he really, sincerely wasn't thinking (and that could tell a while to get to, since "I don't know" is always the first answer), it may indicate that he was feeling overwhelmed or nearing a meltdown, in which case avoiding the trigger situation will be more effective than consequences.

Wow! You can make them do chores? Hats off!

Ann

Yes, he's very high functioning but still on the spectrum. Also I started early teaching him how

I agree about the consequences.

And I'd try and get at why he was motivated to spit on her. My son smacked his teacher on the first day of school. I pretty much wanted to die.

It helped to have her tell me it was "not hard" and "more of a flail" ...

And when I pressed him to tell me why ... he was scared that I had left, and wanted to get to me. He thought I was on the other side of the classroom door and she was in essence the gate keeper that was not cooperating.

It was the first time I had ever left him -- and he was just freaked out. Not an excuse, but once he understood (1) I can back two hours later and (2) if her ever did that again we were retiring him Thomas videos ... the behavior went away.

My guy has a baby sister coming too -- and I am pretty worried about how that will impact the dynamic of everyday life. Right now he kisses my belly and talks about playing with her ... but the poor boy has no idea how much it will change his universe.