How to Neutralize a Bored (ADHD?) Boy? The Schoolteachers Dilemma and creative Solution

Jonathan is almost graduating his first year of school. I went better than we thought considering his ever present ADHD symptoms (although we do not have an official diagnosis). All in all he is up to his class level in his studies. He reads tolerably well in Hebrew, recognizes a few letters in the English alphabet and he can compute up to 100. We are still struggling with getting to school on time in the mornings (as both my husband and I are NOT morning people, the understatement of the century..., I sometimes wonder who's fault this really is) and when Jonathan is bored or unsatisfied he may break out into a mood and lash at his teacher. This effect can be enhanced if his routine is broken, which in the summer months of school it usually is.

The first graders are appointed to conduct the ceremony of Shavuoth - the celebration of summer, first ripening of fruit an crops and the traditional date that the Torah (or 10 commandments at least) were given to the people of Israel in mount Sinai at ancient times. The ceremony rehearsals composed of 3 weeks in May in which the children are expected to continue their studies independently with various assignments parallel to rehearsals in small groups. The frontal lesson routine is totally broken.

Jonathan was not finding himself in all this. He did not want to join the dancers and could not keep quiet while the other children rehearsed their lines. His teacher was finding it difficult to get him to cooperate at all. And then, on the second week of rehearsals (after suffering his nasty bouts of screaming and boredom for the first week)  she had a brilliant idea! She assigned him a task that is important on the one hand and affords no rehearsal with other on the other. Jonathan would easily recognize his place in the ceremony without disturbing the other children or the rehearsals and he would feel needed! His role was to declare the ceremony has reached its end (and to invite the audience to stand up for the national anthem). Jonathan had one lie to memorize and was the only child to speak solo. He was exited and felt himself important. We picked the importance message up at home, on cue from the teacher and he became manageable for the rest of the rehearsals.

The parents were invited to the ceremony and I was almost as excited as Jonathan could be. He behaved impeccably during 20 minutes of ceremony, sitting quietly on the side of the stage and singing along when required. Then he started to get smile and wave at me, and made thumbs up signs to me and wiggled about in his seat. Just as I was wondering why he was so exited, he got up, picked the microphone and spoke his line. The sound was bad and the speakers beeped. Jonathan undaunted, simply repeated the line again and everyone stood up for the anthem. Then my important boy put the microphone down on its designated cushion and stood proud and erect center stage for the duration of the anthem! I was busting with pride.

Turns out the school filed it all. I am embedding the video here. I hope Jonathan will enjoy the memory as I will. Unfortunately the anthem part is cut off in the school footage! Lucky I filmed and photographed it myself! Proud mama all the way!

https://youtu.be/eLtTPTUzPP0

Cute Speech Mistakes

Better Late than never! I started collecting this s year ago. Jonathan is by  now a strapping youth of 5 years!

Jonathan's special vocabulary

at almost four year of age, Jonathan is inventing new forms and you words, as is typical of children his age. Working with two languages is proving a challenge and his tendency to swallow words is not helping, the result, however, can be interesting. I tried to document the best.

pippopotam (instead of hippopotam) = hippopotamus

jrefy = tom and jerry

asati (instead of asiti) = I made/ I did

shatati (instead of shatiti) = I drank

[caused by the basic form of first past tense in Hebrew]

tiftoach (instead of tiftach/tiftechi)= (you) open (something) - [caused by the infinitive form of Liftoach]

ventich (instead of sandwitch)

Legamer (insteadof ligmor)=  finish

Ani Mizaher (instead of ani nizhar) = I am being careful

Ani micanes (instead of ani nichnas)=I am coming in/entering

hasfaka (instaed of hafsaka)=pause/break, masfik instead of maspik (enough) or mafsik (stop)

lehasfik m(instead of  lahfsik) =to stop

feifeifiya – instrad of yefeifiya (beautiful female)

podcorn – instead of popcorn

clay mobile – instead of Playmobile (Kelim means tools in Hebrew, I wonder if this is just a phonetic mistake or a logic mistake)

I have a sensible idea…”Yesh Li Raayon Hegyoni” – his opening sentence for special requests or a starting point for negotiating his wishes

Aval Ima! But mommy – his opening statement when explaining or negotiating (usually after I said no to somthing)

in German all gets the addition of “ein” - even though verbs are not supposed to  get it this prefix at all:

Ein-tanzen=to dance

Ein-trinken = to drink

Ein-knoepfen= to press (a button) – this one is an entirely new creation based on the noun Knopf (button in German) and refers to using a vending machine to buy a drink or a snack.

Ein kitzel = to tickle

kikminchen = kikaninchen (kika +kaninchen)

ich hab dich lieb- gam du – interesting sentence structure and mixing a bit of Hebrew in too (gam=also)

fe-fau-de: instead of de-fau-de – DVD in german

birthsteg – a mix between the English birthday and the german geburtstag…

When Jonathan is not able to use words, he still knows how to help himself to communication. In our recent summer holiday in Germany, visiting family and friends, when facing the need to request a pair of scissors in German and not knowing the word, after he expressed the wish in Hebrew once and saw no reaction from a German speaking friend, he pulled on the friend's sleeve and with his hand showed her the action of cutting (using two fingers in a V shape and opening and closing them, like scissors).

He likes to do pantomime on a daily basis even at home. Making sucking sounds and demonstrating drinking in order to ask that I assist him in making a drink (June 2012).

Cute things Jonathan did recently

We brought an electronic appliance and those come with cartons. This particular carton was just the right for Jonathan, so he adopted it. He was so happy with it, he wanted to have dinner in it, I refused to allow this. Jonathan must eat at the table. He still ha s a low table suited for his height to eat his dinner, even though he is slowly growing too big for it. At the end, he sat on the box, at the table and ate is dinner. For my birthday, Jonathan gave me a present, a horn – like the ones used in football fields. He loved the sound and thought I would be happy to receive the gift.

One other day Jonathan found a business card with a drawing of a pair of lips in the street…you can easily imagine what the card was advertizing, but the graphics was really nice and Jonathan liked it because the lips reminded him of a kiss. So he gave it to me as a gift informing me that “mommy, I brought you a kiss!”

Jonathan is a fan of the touch game “Angry birds”. The principle of the game is using a sling to shoot birds at various objects, depends on the version you have. Besides the application on the smart phone, Jonathan is also the proud owner of a fur Angry Bird puppet that makes laughing sounds, like in the game. One day when we were visiting friends, I found a ball shaped like an angry bird. I spend the next half hour throwing the ball at Jonathan imitating the concept of the electronic game, Jonathan had a ball trying to catch the ball bird and we had a lot of laughs. Compelled to create other versions of the game, a few days later Jonathan took a shoe lace and wrapped it around his waist, then propelled himself forward, the lace serving as a sling and Jonathan being the angry bird. The result was not anger, just a lot of laughter.

Jonathan is coping with a new baby sister (who is already six months old). He loves her and usually is very kind to her, getting the most laughs from her. He also has to try out all her things! He is once again showing an interest in various baby games, especially the beeping or music playing ones. He loves them as a toddler and now he plays with them for his own amusement and that of his little sister. Taking a bath in her little baby tub was also obligatory. One morning my husband was giving me the morning off. So he and Jonathan made breakfast by themselves. They made pancakes and then painted faces on them with chocolate syrup and candy. I was served a very cute breakfast.

Explanation and Problem Solving

Jonathan likes to tell himself what is going on, like commentary to watching children TV or a DVD. He also scolds me if he thinks I confused something (mommy, its a turtle, not a frog – you got it wrong/you have confused it- I admit I do not always see things the way he does). Original thinking and problem solving expresses itself repeatedly , like his coping with a renovation in our apartment.

Watching a DVD with Jonathan is always fun because he delights so much in it. He also gives live commentary. When he was little, this commentary showed itself in an imitation of the actions in the DVD (like falling on the ground when the coyote gets crushed in the road runner cartoons – Jonathan's favourite DVD for interactive television (Jane Fonda like) sport). He also sings along with the DVD's.

Recently his commentary has taken a more advanced form – he either asks questions related to the ongoing story (Why does the mouse get the cat wet? Typical Tom and Jerry question) or he explains the action (the magic egg will now fall on his foot! Boom! Bang! And he is magical... a short summary of en episode of the Smurfs). Sometimes he even answers his own questions after posing them (the mouse likes to bother the cat – Tom and Jerry again) having heard the same explanation from me to those questions a few times, he simply remembers the answers.

Jonathan also likes to explain his surroundings. Thus he announced one day that his daddy was just too big to sit on mommy's lap and he might fall and bang his head “Boom! Bang!” The sounds were made in extra enthusiasm to make sure daddy understood the danger.

Jonathan is a boy that likes his home and feels good and secure in it. After a long weekend at his grandparents, he will wish to go to “my house”, and then he shows great relief when we get home. This feeling of safety was taken away one day, when we started packing away a large book shelf that dominates our living room while preparing for a small renovation (we painted the walls after about 7 years of residence and installed a new laminated flooring).

In emptying the shelves, we changed the look and feel or the room considerably and Jonathan's reaction was to ask us where had his house gone. He was looking for it also during the days of the renovation. And even after the renovation was finished, as the house now looked different (because of the new floor, the books were back in the shelves) he still looked for it a while, and at the same time admitting the new “surprise” apartment was nice. Each time we tidied up a room after it was painted and floored, he declared that “the room is back” and enjoyed it immensely. He also enjoyed helping me pack, by bringing me books from a pile to put into the boxes.

In the stacked up living room, he solved the problem of not having his usual table accessible for his dinner, by improvising an eating space by using a chair and covering it with his place mats. Taking out all the cushions of our sofa and building a house by placing them on the side like a wall is another typical pass time, the extra bonus to this house construction is that jumping on the sofa platform is really a lot of fun... It was also fun to use one of the empty cartons as a house to hide in for a few days after the renovation. Hiding in containers is a favourite activity and Jonathan uses every opportunity. Thus when we returned from a trip abroad, he curled himself into the empty suitcase when I left the room to put the dirty laundry in the bathroom. The only way for me to know where he was, was because of the fact that the suitcase was giggling when I returned to the bedroom.