Can you give suggestions................(dealing with children taking turns)?

Question

Okay, friends. help me out.
I run a home daycare. I have several children in my care. I have one specific child who is a handful. Really, he is diagnosed as ADHD and if anyone doubts the true existence of ADHD, this child will make a believer out of you :-)
I love him to death. He is really the sweetest child, but alternately the meanest. My problem is this; He likes to be first at everything (don't we all?). He wants to be the one to hang up our daily weather sign, open the door, carry the clipboard, sit in the middle seat, be the line leader.....you name it, he wants it. Okay, they all do. But the thing is, the rest of them understand they have to wait their turn. the rest of them know that if it isn't their day, too bad. They know their turn will come. He, on the other hand will not cooperate all day long when it isn't his day to be line leader or whatever. He won't sing with us, he won't color with us, he won't listen to anything all day long unless he gets what he wants. He's not really an overly indulged child by his parents. He doesn't always get his way at home. His parents are a lot like me in their parenting style so they DO tell him no and they do discipline him to use self control. He also isn't an only child. He has a little brother (13 months) who is with us all day and his mom is pregnant now.
I have tried telling him that until he can accept the fact that sometimes it's not his turn, he doesn't get any more turns at all. For the past 3 weeks, he hasn't been line leader, sat in the middle seat, opened doors or anything else that gives us problems. But it isn't working to help him. He still fights with the other children everyday to be the first one out the door or in the van or whatever. I have to try a different approach since this one isn't working, but I am at a loss. Can you help? Do any of you have any suggestions? I am willing to hear from anyone who has a real suggestion.

Answer 1

what if instead of switching jobs/privilages around, you just asign each child a daily job or privilage they keep all the time. Maybe figure out which one he likes the most and say that is HIS thing all the time. Maybe having a job or privilage that is JUST his and he doesn't ever have to share it would help. (you could even use those words to make it all sound so great to him)



My son's teacher does this to avoid conflict with the kids wanting certain jobs each day. She just asigns each child a job and they keep it for the year. My youngest is class leader so all year he gets to lead the class in things such as when they sing the Star Spangled Banner, he gets to go up front and stand and lead everyone. he doesn't ever have to share that job and it makes him feel special because that is HIS "job".



It sounds to me like this boy's biggest issue is he doesn't want to share. Depending how many kids you have and how many privilages/jobs there are, maybe each child can get two that they have. This way there is no anticipationof when it will be his turn to do this or that. You can make up a chart that lists what each person has and leave it at that.



EDIT: how about a reward system for waiting patiently for turns? You could involve all the kids in the program. You could get a clear jar either one for each child or one they all share. Then get marbles (you can get them at wal-mart in the game section). Every day when a child does their assigned privilage or chore without any trouble and waits patiently if it's not their turn then they add a marble to their jar (or to the community jar). You draw a "goal" line on the jar and once the marbles reach the goal line (which should be set low to start), they all get a treat.



If somene doesn't do a good job for example if you are going somewhere and it is not his turn to be line leader, and he gets upset and gives a hard time, then he loses a marble or two.



This is a way to give him an incentive to do a good job. Also if you use a community jar then he feels the pressure from the other kids to do well so they won't lose out on reaching the goal. They all have to work together to try and get to the goal line.

Answer 2

I'm no expert and have zero experience with ADHD, but this is how my child's preschool class was structured.



You can assign each child a number. At the beginning of each day, the numbers are shuffled and assigned to a clas task. Then you announce to the class (and can even write the names next to tasks on the board) "today A is our weather sign hanger" "B is our clipboard holder" "C is our door opener " and "D is our line leader" this way he can see each child getting to be first for a particular task. Sounds like you are very fair and creative and have a lot of great tasks for the children. Not sure if this will minimize your issue or not.

Answer 3

Hi Carrie~~ I have never had to deal with a child with ADHD on a One on One Basis...BUT one of my good Girlfriends' Son has ADHD...she found that by giving him a GOAL to work toward improved his behavior tremendously. You could give him a SPECIFIC day to work toward. Tell him that SAY..Thursday is his day to be able to PICK a Privilege that he would like to have for that day (Line Leader for Instance) Go with the Reward System and if he collects let's say 4 Good Citations during the week then he gets the Privilege he has picked for the week on Thursdays. You could also encourage EXTRA Good Behavior by telling him that if he goes Over and Above his Required 4 Good Citations then EVERYONE in Class gets some sort of treat (your discretion)...Does this make sense? LOL..I hope So~~Aloha~~

Answer 4

Maybe instead of assigning the job for the day, assign one for the week, that way he gets to do something special and everyone else does too.

Answer 5

Hi!

Like you said you can't assign individual jobs!Well actually you can how about this you assign an individual job to a kid each day that is diffrent then the last day! i am kind of confused on what to write lo!