School and Custody issues

[amh56]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Arizona

I have sole legal and physical custody of my son, age 5, and have since 3/08. It's actually temporary custody, but since his mother never did any of the stuff the court asked her to do, it's been in place for 18 months. She has supervised visits which are 4 hours long each Wednesday, supervised by her mother. We have modified the time of the visit from the court-ordered time to accommodate school.

The visitation has been an issue since my son started school. He gets out at 2:30, so I get him to his mother by 3pm, and she has the next four hours with him. His bedtime on regular school nights is 7pm. The last three weeks, she has sent him home with a Happy Meal that he has not started eating yet and a full cup of soda. I have asked that he be fed before his return, but she has not complied. I have also asked that he not be fed soda on school nights to no avail.

Our child has been having serious trouble adapting to school. Before he started kindergarten, he had never been in daycare, spending all his time with grandparents when he was not with my ex or me. I have tried to discuss this with his mother, but she shows no interest when I try to bring it up. She also told him (I know this because she told me) that it is funny to be mean to kids at school. He has been hitting and taking other kids' stuff since this conversation.

My wife and I are trying to counteract this attitude, with little effect. My question is, is there anything I can do (preferably short of going back to court) to change the visits? I don't want to keep my son from his mother, I just want her to have a minimal impact on his school life.

Perhaps a move to a Friday night visit? Do I have the right to do that, as the parent with sole custody?

Do you have any other ideas as to how I might handle this? Thanks for your help!

 

[Isis1]

let's play devil's advocate for a moment.

mom's parenting encourage bullying (supposedly) is a parenting choice. you have the right to parent the child as you see fit on your time. mom having wednesday moved to friday's will not impact that parenting choice. her time is already limited as it is.

look, i know your grief about the bedtime. this is one of those issues that are constantly a problem. so, i will tell you what i did with my kindergartner two years ago.

he stayed up till 10 or so on days he was with his father. so he would be tired and cranky at school the following day. wednesday was the visitation day. that meant, tuesday, child would take a nap after school. and thursday. child would take a nap after school.

his behavior improved so much, i insisted he take a nap everyday he was with me. i haven't received a note from school since!! as a second grader, he no longer takes naps, but he does have a 1 hour of quiet time on his bed just to "deflate".

 

[thieneyes]

A Suggestion...

Might also to be "prepared" for the impending junk food/soda issue. When the child comes home and sits down to eat, replace his soda with a capri sun or even sprite since it is caffeine free. The child might tell mom, which may lead to her either A. making the child eat prior to drop off to "make sure kiddo gets to eat what she buys him" or b. changing the drink on her own. My son is 5 also, and I'm lucky if I can get him into bed by 7!

I also play a game with my 5 and 6 year old in the car on the way to work (with the fiance driving). They take turns answering questions : How do we behave at school? How do we play with our friends? What do we do if the teacher asks for help? etc....It reiterates good behavior EACH DAY since we know their attention span is short.

 

[amh56]

Thank you all for your responses.

The sodas always go directly into the trash. My son doesn't even notice by the time we get home. He gets water when it's late, and juice if it's not too close to bedtime. Once in a GREAT while he'll get Sprite, but even that's rare with me.

I'd love to have him take a nap, but he absolutely refuses. I can make him lie down, but he won't sleep. The only time he does fall asleep (outside of bedtime) is once in a while on the ride home in the car. But that's not common.

I understand that moving her visits to Friday will not impact her choices, but it would give me a chance to de-program him over the weekend before he goes back to school.

His behavior has been so bad that the school I have him in is threatening to revoke his open-enrollment status. Our neighborhood school does not get good marks, and I don't want him going there if I can help it.

I'm just trying to get my son a good education and teach him to be a good kid. He is, when he's with me and my family, but it doesn't seem to carry over into his school life. I don't know what to do.

 

[Isis1]

Thank you all for your responses.

The sodas always go directly into the trash. My son doesn't even notice by the time we get home. He gets water when it's late, and juice if it's not too close to bedtime. Once in a GREAT while he'll get Sprite, but even that's rare with me.

I'd love to have him take a nap, but he absolutely refuses. I can make him lie down, but he won't sleep. The only time he does fall asleep (outside of bedtime) is once in a while on the ride home in the car. But that's not common.

I understand that moving her visits to Friday will not impact her choices, but it would give me a chance to de-program him over the weekend before he goes back to school.


His behavior has been so bad that the school I have him in is threatening to revoke his open-enrollment status. Our neighborhood school does not get good marks, and I don't want him going there if I can help it.

I'm just trying to get my son a good education and teach him to be a good kid. He is, when he's with me and my family, but it doesn't seem to carry over into his school life. I don't know what to do.

okay dad, on the nap issue, you HAVE to be consistent. and patient. this could take months for a new rule to kick in. it's not instantaneous. you just have to toss your schedule, and keep laying him down. he gets up, lay him down. it will be exhausting......you will get cranky....but it has to be done. eventually, your son WILL get the idea. daddy said take a nap.

as for the soda issue, i serve diet root beer in my home. no sugar, no caffine. i have a father in law that insist on giving my children soda and since i don't want to ruin the joys of grandparenting, i've compromised. and please tell me you don't throw it away in front of the child. that action say "daddy doesn't like mommy, daddy throws away things mommy gives me"

 

[ecmst12]

Is there someone else who can supervise the visits that will be more mindful of the dinner/soda issues, and maybe counteract the bad advice mom is giving about school?

It's possible that the routine disruption is more to blame for the behavior problems then what actually goes on at the visits, so maybe moving them to a weekend would help.

 

[stealth2]

I'm really not sure that Mom's the one solely to blame here. Both of you chose to keep your son cared for at home, rather than having him learn social skills via preschool.

When your son acts out at school by being a bully - what do you do? YOU are the one who the child lives with the majority of the time. So what do you do about it? Besides blame Mom?

Soda is the least of your issues, to be honest.

 

[Hisbabygirl77]

If hes acting out have you went and sat in his classroom? Have you tried different forms of dischipline/rewards? Last year was my sons first time in kinder having never been in daycare of preschool and he was misbehaving as well. Not only was he not use to the social interaction but he also was not used to classroom setting as at home didnt need to sit still for any length of time.
So I sat in his classroom, I started the "goodboy" box at home. If he got on green(good) that day he got to come home and pick out a cheap toy from the box. If he was on green all week he got to go to store and pick out a toy. If he got on yellow (warning) he of course did not get grab box and he lost video games for the day and if he got on red (bad) he got grounded to his room for day and I went with him to school next day. Within two weeks he was on green everyday.

Be proactive. Try different things dont just blame mom.

 

[amh56]

and please tell me you don't throw it away in front of the child. that action say "daddy doesn't like mommy, daddy throws away things mommy gives me"

He literally never notices that it's gone. He doesn't see me dumping it and has forgotten he ever had it by the time he's eating.



Is there someone else who can supervise the visits that will be more mindful of the dinner/soda issues, and maybe counteract the bad advice mom is giving about school?

It's possible that the routine disruption is more to blame for the behavior problems then what actually goes on at the visits, so maybe moving them to a weekend would help.

The grandmother is the court-ordered supervisor. I assume I'd have to go back to court to change that? She does seem to care slightly more than the mom about his schooling, though she's loving being the Disney-grandma.


I'm really not sure that Mom's the one solely to blame here. Both of you chose to keep your son cared for at home, rather than having him learn social skills via preschool.

When your son acts out at school by being a bully - what do you do? YOU are the one who the child lives with the majority of the time. So what do you do about it? Besides blame Mom?

Soda is the least of your issues, to be honest.

We did choose to have our son cared for at home, which was mostly chosen due to financial issues. I don't see anything wrong with this decision.

When he's misbehaving in school, he gets lectured, punished, grounded and everything else my wife and/or I can think of to modify his behavior. But he does not act this way at home. When he's told to do something with me, he does it, at home. I don't know how to make him listen to his teacher. I tell him to do it, and I punish him when he doesn't. I tell him he'll get a reward when he does. What else can I do?

 

[stealth2]

We did choose to have our son cared for at home, which was mostly chosen due to financial issues. I don't see anything wrong with this decision.

Nothing's wrong with the decision, per se. What's wrong is that no one thought it was a good idea to teach your son how to behave amongst a group of peers.

When he's misbehaving in school, he gets lectured, punished, grounded and everything else my wife and/or I can think of to modify his behavior. But he does not act this way at home. When he's told to do something with me, he does it, at home. I don't know how to make him listen to his teacher. I tell him to do it, and I punish him when he doesn't. I tell him he'll get a reward when he does. What else can I do?

Well... one poster made a suggestion. When he acts out - you go to school with him the next day and ensure he doesn't do it again. Be consistent. Every time he acts out, Daddy has to go to school with him to make sure he behaves. When he behaves, he gets to be a big boy and go on his own. He'll figure it out pretty quickly.

Seriously - it's EASY to blame Mom. Except... Mom only sees him a minimal amount of time. So her influence is minimal. YOU get him most of the time. And he acts out on YOUR time. So... YOU are the one who needs to solve the problem. Welcome to Parenting 101.

 

[ecmst12]

I think you need to supervise him interacting with other children in person, so you can intervene and instruct him RIGHT AWAY when he starts bullying/misbehaving. He is brand new to group socialization where most of the other children have been in this type of setting for years, so he's going to need a lot of guidance. If you can't go to school with him, arrange some type of play group or something on the weekend. Then you will be able to see where the problems are occurring, and you can talk to him as it's happening rather then hours later. Don't expect him to get it the first time, he's only 5 after all.

 

[txmom512]

okay dad, on the nap issue, you HAVE to be consistent. and patient. this could take months for a new rule to kick in. it's not instantaneous. you just have to toss your schedule, and keep laying him down. he gets up, lay him down. it will be exhausting......you will get cranky....but it has to be done. eventually, your son WILL get the idea. daddy said take a nap.

Oh that's just sad. There's a SO MUCH easier and more pleasant way to do the nap thing. Your way is just way way too much work and causes so much unnecessary frustration for both of you. Why do some parents think that this whole raising a kid has to be a constant fight full of control issues?

Instead of making nap time a horrid thing to be dreaded, take a little time out and lay down With your kid and read a book. DD and I LOVED 'quiet time' when she was little. 9 times out of 10 she'd fall asleep. After awhile, she'd fall asleep w/in just a few minutes. The times she didn't, she at least spent some time lying still and resting that little body, and that would do. There was no crankiness, no getting frustrated, no getting exhausted. Just a nice short break in the day enjoying a quiet moment with your child...

 

[stealth2]

I was thinking the same about the nap - have one together! No one has to force ME to have a nap!

 

[txmom512]

When he's misbehaving in school, he gets lectured, punished, grounded and everything else my wife and/or I can think of to modify his behavior. But he does not act this way at home. When he's told to do something with me, he does it, at home. I don't know how to make him listen to his teacher. I tell him to do it, and I punish him when he doesn't. I tell him he'll get a reward when he does. What else can I do?

Wow... Is there any Positive reinforcement in there anywhere?
Honestly, this sounds weird, but it always worked really well w/ me. Little kids are exactly like dogs when it comes to discipline. Exactly... I've trained a lot of dogs, and I 'trained' my dd the same way.

You have to remember that they have incredibly short memories - it's not that they are trying to be bad when they forget to be good - they literally really did forget. It takes patience, consistence, and lots and lots of repetition.

The other thing to remember is that positive reinforcement works about 100 times faster than negative. It's the positive reinforcement that they remember. Make it fun to be good. Make it rewarding - and I don't mean necessarily w/ material things (though the occasional material reward does help). When they do something bad, discuss it, give them their discipline (age appropriate) and let it go. When they do something good, omg make a HUGE deal about how awesome they are and how proud you are of them. THAT'S what they remember. That's what they crave, and that's what they will work towards getting every time...

 

[amh56]

Wow... Is there any Positive reinforcement in there anywhere?
Honestly, this sounds weird, but it always worked really well w/ me. Little kids are exactly like dogs when it comes to discipline. Exactly... I've trained a lot of dogs, and I 'trained' my dd the same way.

You have to remember that they have incredibly short memories - it's not that they are trying to be bad when they forget to be good - they literally really did forget. It takes patience, consistence, and lots and lots of repetition.

The other thing to remember is that positive reinforcement works about 100 times faster than negative. It's the positive reinforcement that they remember. Make it fun to be good. Make it rewarding - and I don't mean necessarily w/ material things (though the occasional material reward does help). When they do something bad, discuss it, give them their discipline (age appropriate) and let it go. When they do something good, omg make a HUGE deal about how awesome they are and how proud you are of them. THAT'S what they remember. That's what they crave, and that's what they will work towards getting every time...

I'm trying to do positive reinforcement. I have told him over and over that he gets X if he behaves. The problem is that I don't hear about the little things. I only hear about his issues. School is the problem area.

I will try to go to his school with him again. It's hard to juggle my schedule.