My grown up daughter has a 6 year old boy. He is a lovely lad, but his Mum and Dad are not together, and he only stays with his Dad at weekends.
Mum is only 22 and Dad is 27, my little grandson behaves appallingly no matter what the situation, despite this he is very rarely told off, so when he comes to stay with us and is told off, he will scream for ,(literally), two hours for the slightest thing.
My wife and I have a 6 yr old daughter and a two yr old son who are fascinated by his behaviour, but have both been hurt by him and no longer want him to come and stay with us.

We are at our wits end with our daughter, as she will not discipline him, and has been told that it will curtail his development.
She is currently in a program with the school where she receives a chocolate every time he behaves well at home,!!!!.

He is a nice little boy, but has no language skills and is very aggressive.

How do we help them both?.

Binky wrote:My grown up daughter has a 6 year old boy. He is a lovely lad, but his Mum and Dad are not together, and he only stays with his Dad at weekends.
Mum is only 22 and Dad is 27, my little grandson behaves appallingly no matter what the situation, despite this he is very rarely told off, so when he comes to stay with us and is told off, he will scream for ,(literally), two hours for the slightest thing.

What do you do while he does that?
My nephew does the same, and he expect someone to respond to him (his parents that is) I suggest perhaps ignoring him while he screams. May seem hard at first, but you'll get used to it real quick.
My nephew learned real quick that screaming will only cause me to ignore him completely.

My wife and I have a 6 yr old daughter and a two yr old son who are fascinated by his behaviour, but have both been hurt by him and no longer want him to come and stay with us.

Well in that case maybe it's best that he not be allowed to stay with you guys until his own parents learn how to discipline their own damn child.

We are at our wits end with our daughter, as she will not discipline him,

Tell her he's no longer allowed at your house until she does and his behavior becomes better.

and has been told that it will curtail his development.

She sounds like my brother and his wife. They were told the same thing just the other week.
Have they changed their discipline since then?
Of course not.

She is currently in a program with the school where she receives a chocolate every time he behaves well at home,!!!!.

He is a nice little boy, but has no language skills and is very aggressive.

Maybe one of the reasons why he's aggressive, is because of his lack of language skills. Young children sometimes act out in a violent manner because they can't communicate their thoughts/feelings, so they get frustrated and lash out. How about suggusting to your daughter that he see a speech therapist?

Thanks Valden, you are right about the language skills, maybe he is frustrated, while he is screaming though we talk to him and tell him how irrational his actions are. This prompts him to scream harder. He has hit my daughter with a glass and a knife and has tried to stab my two year old son 'because he is little'.

Sounds like a job for SuperNanny

http://www.supernanny.com/

Maybe they should put him into some sort of sport... so he can let out all that aggression.... hopefully not on the other children though.

Well Supernanny does seem to know what she's talking about, only watched an episode or two ages ago and never paid much attention but we love 'The Step' Ours are 2 and 4 and get warnings for being naughty ('Do not hit/push/bite your sister, it hurts her. I do not want to see you do that again, now go and say sorry/give her a hug' etc). Depending on the severity of the naughtiness we'll either say 'Do it again and you'll have to sit on the step for 2/4 minutes' (one for each year) at the first warning or the second, so hitting etc would be on the step if they do it again, general silliness or something like banging the door for the fun of it they'll get two chances before they go on the step. Always always give them a warning, explaining to them why they shouldn't do it and that they will be going on the step. When they do get ordered to the step they always complain, whether its whingeing, crying or screaming, so we say the time will not start until they sit quietly. If they get off the step and won't sit back down when reminded their time starts again then we physically firmly sit them down and say we'll come back in 2/4 minutes to take them off. When their time is up we remind them why they were there and talk about it, they then go and apologise if need be.

Sounds like this kid needs something similar, though maybe given his age a 'quiet space' might be better and more emphasis put on thinking about what he did wrong and why, which would hopefully help both you and him work out why he does it and how to fix it. Of course it would only work if both your daughter and the father agreed to do it and stick to it, which I imagine would be a problem if she doesn't seem to understand he needs discipline to start with and they're not together.
Have you got anywhere quiet he can sit while staying with you? Using his bedroom isn't a great idea (don't want to associate his personal space with punishment plus will probably have toys available) an alcove in a hallway is good, don't want it to be the dining/eating area in case its a mealtime kickoff, likewise if he kicks off while watching tv theres no point in sitting him in the corner near the tv. He needs to be removed from the situation really. Even if he screams for two hours you leave him there, when he's quietened down and been quiet for two minutes you can come away from the 'thinking/naughty' area and calmly (hopefully!) have a chat with him down on your knees at his level about what happened and why it was unreasonable.

I was reportdly a really difficult child but I matured into a pesudo productive member of society and I dont scream that much anymore. I don't know if there is anything you can actually do about it binky if your daughter refuses to discipline him.

We aren't 'allowed' to put him on the naughty step, as we do with our own children. He has been diagnosed with 'ADHD' or some such, and is taking tablets to treat it. My missus and I really do love this frustrating little boy, but we are at the point of not allowing him to be with our own kids.
Social services are involved with his mum and , (very), absent father, and despite much messing about and various recommendations on the part of the powers that be, nothing useful seems to be happening.

'millefleur', thank you for such beautifully considered reply regarding the 'naughty step', we did try him with this when he first stayed overnight with us, but after he had screamed for literally 2 hours our own children were very distressed to the point of crying because he would not stop. We allowed him back in and he was as good as gold, but the next day he broke my son's finger by stamping on it, I was furious and I must admit I would have smacked him.

Binky wrote:How do we help them both?.

Encourage your daughter to put him up for adoption? Clearly she's not doing a very good job of bringing him up herself.

Seriously, if he's stabbing other kids with knives and his mother won't discipline him, there is not a lot you can do. I know he's your grandson, but I still wouldn't allow him in the house when he's a threat to your other kids.

Tell your 6 year old this is why she shouldn't have a kid at 16.

I have been tempted to do exactly as you say. He is our grandson though, and we do love him.
We feel that all his behavioural problems are down to his mum and dad, to add a bit of personal perspective - Both of my older daughters, (22, and 19), aren't my children by blood, but they are very much loved by me and I won't distinguish between my own children and them. My eldest girls father was a very abusive and angry man and this has given her a fear of disciplining her son which is almost pathological.

Binky wrote:Thanks Valden, you are right about the language skills, maybe he is frustrated, while he is screaming though we talk to him and tell him how irrational his actions are. This prompts him to scream harder.

Trying to talk to him while he's screaming is not a good idea.
As Mill has suggest, give him a place where he can just let it all out. But keep your own kids away from him while he does it as well. (Stay near him so he doesn't do anything stupid like hurt himself of course!)

He has hit my daughter with a glass and a knife and has tried to stab my two year old son 'because he is little'.

O_O You still allow him over? I understand that you love him, but you've got to draw the line somewhere. I agree with Warren, perhaps it would be best if he were put up for adoption. He's clearly not getting the attention he deserves from his own parents, and has speech issues that are possibly making him aggressive.
And you, the grandparent, shouldn't be the one raising him either.

he seems to be very naughty but if you have the patience than i think it's better you look after him than some strangers.
if you want to sit him outside as a punishment make sure you let him know for how long,maybe hang up a clock to see the progress in time,he'll understand if you mark the spot.10 minutes is already a long time for a little thing like that.after the time is up let him come in and say something like"i hope your feeling better now".if he refuses to come in just ignore him(try)until hes willing to be nice again.it's very important to be consistent doing this a couple of times wont help at all.when you tell him that he has to sit outside if he does this or that,Do IT.
try to find different strategies,there are lots of ideas on youtube too,just look up "naughty child"

My 7 year old can get aggressive and can be difficult to handle - he is very different to our 2 and 1 year old girls.
He is extrememly bright tho and we realised that a lot of his anger and aggression comes from frustration.

When he has an interesting and contructive task to do he calms down, although when he starts to struggle or feels he is losing in a game he becomes aggressive again. It's very challenging.

Being positive and talking to him a lot really helps, although this is time consuming. When he is punished we have to explain in great detail about why his behaviour is bad and how it affects other people. His behaviour is actually perfect in school and his teachers describe him as a model pupil.

There isn't a magic cure for difficult behaviour, but your grandson probably feels angry and frustrated so a lot of talking and interacting will deveop his language skills and hopefully calm him a bit.

Good luck!
Amy.

Hire an Applied Behavior Analyst in your area, and they'll help you sort out the kid's difficulties. Although the behaviors you've described are very severe, from a glance the causes of them seem fairly obvious and they shouldn't be a big issue for a behavior analyst.

As already mentioned, a big issue here would be the lack of language skills. If you hire an analyst, then this will be the first thing they teach him - basic functional language skills (how to ask for something he wants etc.). Once this is done you'll notice a huge drop in his problem behaviors, but probably not all of them. The naughty step is a fairly decent catch-all behavioral intervention, but it's not perfect because the punishment depends on the function of the behavior. Unfortunately there is a bit of a myth about behavioral problems that "they're just acting out to get attention", and this simply isn't always the case. So if it turns out that the boy is acting out because he's overwhelmed by all the people around, or he just wants to be by himself or somewhere quiet etc, then putting him on the "naughty step" away from everyone else is just going to increase his problem behaviors because he's basically getting rewarded for doing bad things.

I noted that you tried ignoring him when he starts screaming, and a couple of people have suggested this too. It can be a valid behavioral technique, if you know what to expect. This is an "extinction" procedure, so called because the behavior is 'extinguished' when it no longer leads to rewards. The problem, however, is that consistently across all people, animals, situations and so on, you'll run into what is called an "extinction burst". After a slight drop in the problem behavior following the commencement of "ignoring", you'll find that the problem behavior increases dramatically. This can be in volume, severity of behavior, duration etc. It is extremely important that you do not cave in once you've started an extinction procedure because all you end up doing is basically resetting the problem behavior to a higher level, so if you try to ignore him again, then the problem behavior will start at this higher level and then increase even more during the extinction burst. (If you do plan to ignore him completely, then it would be best if you could place him somewhere that is fairly secure with no sharp instruments or things he can break, as it sounds like if his extinction bursts get bad enough, he might stab someone or put a hole in a wall. So somewhere secure, away from other people and objects, and where you can keep an eye on him without having to get up and walk over to him so you can make sure he's safe but also then your attention doesn't fuel his behaviors).

You'll also find that even if the problem behavior has been absent for a while after using an extinction procedure, it may pop back up again (but at a lower level than previously). This is known as "spontaneous recovery", just use the extinction procedure again and you will completely eliminate the behavior.

I'm not sure if there's anything else I can add, just that I strongly recommend getting a behavior analyst in there and make sure they have their BACB certificate (you get a lot of people calling themselves "behavior analysts" because they feel qualified to work with problem children after training sheep dogs for 2 years or something ). It might be a little bit expensive, but it shouldn't take too many sessions before you see a vast improvement and they should give you practical information on how to continue the improvements yourself.

Binky wrote:Thanks Valden, you are right about the language skills, maybe he is frustrated, while he is screaming though we talk to him and tell him how irrational his actions are. This prompts him to scream harder. He has hit my daughter with a glass and a knife and has tried to stab my two year old son 'because he is little'.

Wow that's a bit extreme. I know kids that are hyper but usually don't do it by hurting other kids. I have a granddaughter and she's a hands full I'm not able to keep up with her.
I really don't know what you will do with your grandson but I know expressing frustration is when they act up the most.

I have tried asking my 3 yr old grandaughter and get out of her what was wrong, and once I hit the nail on the head she behaved better.

Good luck, it's heartbraking to deal with this.

Millefleur wrote:Well Supernanny does seem to know what she's talking about, only watched an episode or two ages ago and never paid much attention but we love 'The Step' Ours are 2 and 4 and get warnings for being naughty ('Do not hit/push/bite your sister, it hurts her. I do not want to see you do that again, now go and say sorry/give her a hug' etc). Depending on the severity of the naughtiness we'll either say 'Do it again and you'll have to sit on the step for 2/4 minutes' (one for each year) at the first warning or the second, so hitting etc would be on the step if they do it again, general silliness or something like banging the door for the fun of it they'll get two chances before they go on the step. Always always give them a warning, explaining to them why they shouldn't do it and that they will be going on the step. When they do get ordered to the step they always complain, whether its whingeing, crying or screaming, so we say the time will not start until they sit quietly. If they get off the step and won't sit back down when reminded their time starts again then we physically firmly sit them down and say we'll come back in 2/4 minutes to take them off. When their time is up we remind them why they were there and talk about it, they then go and apologise if need be.

Sounds like this kid needs something similar, though maybe given his age a 'quiet space' might be better and more emphasis put on thinking about what he did wrong and why, which would hopefully help both you and him work out why he does it and how to fix it. Of course it would only work if both your daughter and the father agreed to do it and stick to it, which I imagine would be a problem if she doesn't seem to understand he needs discipline to start with and they're not together.
Have you got anywhere quiet he can sit while staying with you? Using his bedroom isn't a great idea (don't want to associate his personal space with punishment plus will probably have toys available) an alcove in a hallway is good, don't want it to be the dining/eating area in case its a mealtime kickoff, likewise if he kicks off while watching tv theres no point in sitting him in the corner near the tv. He needs to be removed from the situation really. Even if he screams for two hours you leave him there, when he's quietened down and been quiet for two minutes you can come away from the 'thinking/naughty' area and calmly (hopefully!) have a chat with him down on your knees at his level about what happened and why it was unreasonable.

Millefleur we agree once again, we use the bottom step in our house. I always explain afterwards why she was put there, she almost always has calmed down and cuddles me

I do think tho that as grandparents you're in a difficult situation, you can't undo in a couple of days what mum does in a fortnight. But I also believe its your right to lay down ground rules that are expected to be adhered to in your home or as others have said he doesn't come for overnight visits. Your own childrens feelings need to be considered but maybe if you explain to them that the little boy doesn't have the same rules as them at home they'll understand. I used to have to do alot of explaining to my kids when they were small and saw their cousin getting away with murder while they were expected to behave. They actually ended up feeling a little sorry for her because they felt she wasn't getting the same care as them from her parents. There is violence involved here tho and your own childrens safety is paramount

We're in a similar situation when my husbands 6yr old from a previous relationship comes every second weekend. His mother is a very lazy parent, despite not working, she seems to go for the easy route every time. The result is a spoiled brat with no social skills or manners at all. He cannot use a knife and fork and makes more mess eating than my 3yr old, his speech is also very poor, possibly not helped by having most of his teeth removed due to poor dental care. But we have very clear expectations in our house and on the whole he has learned this and accepts that things are very different in our house. I think kids are more adaptable than we may think

Maybe having a long serious talk with your daughter, telling her from your own experience that you can see her ideas are not working. Explaining all children are different and that she needs to try a different tack with him. I think part of this talk may have to be quite direct, she needs to know that her son is a difficult child to be around. Surely no one wants that

Edit to add: It could also be worth trying to get in touch with his teacher, to have a one to one discussion about your worries. The teacher will probably have dealt with worse children than your grandson and may be able to offer advice or signpost you to outside agencies for help. I think he sounds as if he needs a child psychologist but his mum also needs help. I believe you should be able to get this help through the NHS

Addendum: He stayed with us today, and scratched my daughters face and became unmanageable without kicking very hard at my wife or myself, he broke my wifes finger, (an eight hour visit to hospital), and my legs are black and blue. My two year old son who is very robust, will not play with him any more and is scared of him.

Binky wrote:Addendum: He stayed with us today, and scratched my daughters face and became unmanageable without kicking very hard at my wife or myself, he broke my wifes finger, (an eight hour visit to hospital), and my legs are black and blue. My two year old son who is very robust, will not play with him any more and is scared of him.

I hope you and your wife are ok!

Keep us updated!

I was going to recommend...Telling your daughter to sit him down, turn off the TV and hit him! My bad!

Instead, upon further reflection, i think this young lad needs loads of time spent with him by someone, in a one on one situation. Very time consuming i know, but, surely someone in your family thinks hes worth it? No? He doesn't sound all bad.