Anxiety can spark aggression, too. If you are afraid, it seems better to strike first. If anxiety seems key, the parents and school will need to soften their handling of the child and help him or her put feelings into words to assist the child in not acting out.
Since some children will misbehave to get a teacher’s attention, recommend that the parents drop in unannounced. Often the way a classroom appears (or is staffed) at 8 a.m. drop-off time is not the same way it operates at 10:30 a.m. Suggest a parent watch the part of the day their child complains about the most, which is frequently recess.
Even though there are bad situations and bad schools, most schools have great teachers and other professionals from whom parents can gain valuable information and advice. Generally teachers can explain the timing of a child’s troubles, for example, during circle time he cannot sit still or during craft time because his fine motor skills are not well developed. Having parents seek out these examples is the most efficient way to identify deficits in need of help.
Suggest parents speak to their child empathically instead of giving instructions. In this culture, boys especially are told to "keep a stiff upper lip" or "be a big soldier." A better approach is to say, "Yes, it’s tough when kids talk to you like that" or "I understand this really makes you sad and you feel like crying." It also helps when parents share a similar experience from their own childhood. For example, parents can say, "You know, when I was your age, I had an experience like this – I had a kid who was always on my case."
Parents can promote social development as well. For example, role playing can clearly help a child develop appropriate socioemotional skills. Parents can use this strategy either before an incident – for example, to rehearse how a child might react to a bully in class – or afterward, to help the child determine what he or she might have said or done differently and prepare for the next time. Use of social stories can foster these skills (see SocialStories.com or anything by Carol Gray).
Parents who experienced a bad peer interaction as a preschooler or kindergartener may project their concerns on their child who may be doing just fine. The parents might be supersensitive to teasing, for example, and bring an otherwise minor incident to your attention and/or become overintrusive at school. Asking, "How was it for you when you were little? Did you ever run into anything like this?" may bring out past experiences as an important factor predisposing to overreaction. If they wet their pants in kindergarten and never got over it, realizing this connection makes it possible for them to back off and let the school and child handle the current problem.
Watch for red flags or warning signs that problematic behaviors are not within the range of normal stress. The child initially doing well at school who suddenly does not want to return is one example. Sadly, you need to always consider whether there is abuse going on at school, including sexual abuse. Sudden adjustment problems at home, such as trouble sleeping, nightmares, or bed-wetting, also should raise your level of concern.
Also ask parents if their preschooler suddenly became more difficult to manage at home. Some children who experience negative peer interactions will cling to parents, but oppositional or defiant behavior is more common. Of course, 4-year-old children are notoriously brassy, so you cannot consider back talk a warning sign unless it is part of a sudden change in the normal flow of the child’s behavior. A child this stressed over school may need to be cared for at home or moved to a family day care situation
Unfortunately, the modern practice of grouping of kids of the same age together in a classroom increases the likelihood of interactions going badly. Ten 2-year-old children are not necessarily capable of peacefully spending hours together at a time. When a serious behavioral problem arises in this kind of setting, I frequently recommend family-based day care instead of center-based day care because children will be with others of different ages and different skill levels, and hopefully some of them will be more mature.
Support parents in deciding to pull the child out of a school if the situation is bad. If, for example, the school administration is unresponsive to or dismissive of a parent, removal of the child may be the best option. A new parent recently came to the parent group at our clinic. She reported that a teacher responded to her child’s behavior problem by putting him in a closet, which would have been egregious enough, but the teacher also said that there were spiders and bugs in the closet that were going to get him before closing the door. I was flabbergasted. The school tried to defend the teacher for doing this, and my final advice was to "pull the kid." Any school that ignorant of normal child development cannot be fixed.