Unregistered 11:21 AM 12-04-2014
I am new to teaching and I am the afternoon teacher for the 2 year old classroom. There is one little boy who had graduated to the 3 year old classroom but is being sent back to the 2 year old room because of potty training issues. My main concern is not necessarily with potty training, but with some of his behaviors. It is not unusual for my 2 year olds to have meltdowns, get frustrated, not have skills in managing and understanding their feelings, but this particular child is not within the normal range with his anger and tantrums and doesn't respond to the positive discipline techniques I am used to using. I am not sure how to help him.
He gets so angry he shakes, he screams, he cries, and he is not easily distracted or comforted. If I try to talk to him about what is going on with him, even after he calms down it just sets him off again. The only thing I have been able to do is direct him to a quiet corner until he calms himself down, and get the other kids to leave him alone until he is calm again, and then reinforce the calm behavior by saying "I am glad to see you are ready to play again." I don't know what to do to help him with this anger he as that is set off so easily. Any suggestions??? This really disrupts the class. I spend so much time dealing with this, and nothing I know how to do seems to lesson these outbursts.
Michael 02:54 PM 12-04-2014
Thriftylady 05:48 PM 12-04-2014
Since you are in a center, and it is causing issues with the rest of the class I would ask the director to get involved. There could be so many reasons why this is happening. My daughter had these meltdowns and I have learned now that it could have been so many things from parenting (which was an issue but her anger was at home only), to childhood depression. It likely won't be easy to sort out. At that age, it also could be abuse of some sort that the child can't verbalize.
Unregistered 10:52 PM 12-04-2014
Thank you for your responses and the information I reviewed. This little boy is just so hard to figure out. He is smart, genuinely sweet, he does not hit or throw toys. Most of the kids in my class I can figure out pretty quickly what works best for them. Most of the have mini meltdowns regarding their egocentric ideas of fairness, I want this toy, so and so won't share, I asked so and so nicely to stop touching me and they didn't, I don't want to wait my turn-things of that nature. It gets worked out pretty quickly. This little boy it's pure frustration-thwarted desires. I want to play this certain activity, I want to go outside, I want the red play dough. I don't see anything obvious in the interactions with mom, or my conversations with her that easily explains this level of frustration. He has similar issues at home.
Today was his first day back in my classroom after being demoted from the 3's and I had no issues with him what-so-ever. I'll see if this continues-or if he's just a little shell shocked from the move.
earlystart 10:14 AM 12-05-2014
I had a 2-3 year old boy with terrible meltdowns and he would lose control of his emotions at the slightest thing. It turned out he wasn't getting enough sleep, and lacked a consistent nap/sleep/routine at home. I had a conference with the parents and told them he needs to be at school by 8:30am (and thus wake up earlier, and thus go to bed earlier). He also needed lots of rewards and praise for being good (stickers, pointing out to the other kids when he was doing good things). Eventually he turned around and was still a little neurotic, but well-behaved most of the time (he became obsessed with following rules, and making sure everyone followed rules, and telling me every time he did something good).