Overexcitabilities

[momto3boys]

I am about to begin officially homeschooling my children-my oldest is five and while I've not had him tested I am fairly positive he would be identified as gifted in ps. (I was as a child as well.).

 

I have recently read about overexcitabilities in gifted children and my son fits the bill exactly-both physical excitability and emotional. Does anyone has experience with this or suggestions for how to channel his energy bursts and/or extreme sensitivity in a homeschool setting?

 

Thank you in advance for any suggestions.

[GoVanGogh]

My DS is the poster child for over-excitability. :lol:

 

He is ten now and I do think age has helped some. He now has the maturity and experience to go further on his own, so it it isn't as exhausting on mom and dad. We still supervise some projects (like soldering :tongue_smilie:) but he can do his own experiments.

 

He has sleep issue, as he can't shut down. We make sure he gets exercise and fresh air almost every day. We do try to keep bedtimes quiet. He eats a good bedtime snack w/protein and carb. Still, he has nights that he can't turn off. He is now old enough that we say, "We are going to bed. You may continue to read. Only wake us if the house is on fire."

 

We do freely feed that excitability. We try to keep him well-supplied with educational things - kits, books, etc. We go on a lot of field trips to continue to expose him to new experiences. But we also have 'quiet time' built into each day, which allows DS time to decompress.

 

We do still have issues. DS does cry from time to time that he 'likes too many things, too much.' Then we snuggle on the couch and talk about what a blessing it is to so interested in things and how, as he continues to age and mature, he will be able to funnel his attention into a few passions.

 

At the same time... DH has a co-worker/friend who is a fellow poster-child for over-excitability. :lol: He is 34-years-old and still just a big kid with a lot of enthusiasm and energy. I do see that as a good thing, as my husband is a pretty typical engineer. (Quiet, reserved, focused.)

We have gone ahead and embraced this co-worker as a (supervised) mentor to our child. It has been a very positive experience so far.

I have always read about the importance of mentors and was worried about how that would 'look' or how it works. (DH and I neither one had mentors.) But DH is in a good profession and we have been able to find several positive roll models for our son - people our son can chat with about his ideas.

 

On the flip-side. College does concern me. DS has been asking for two college degrees since he was six-years-old. Financially, that doesn't concern me. But I do know that DS will probably have a hard time deciding what he wants to do in life.

(Though my brother has three degrees and is working on his fourth. :lol:)

[Maus]

Mine is nine now. We do the snacks w/ protein and carbs, too. At bedtime, and about halfway between lunch and dinner.

 

This sounds contradictory, but we are doing it somehow: for sensitivity, routine seems to help best. For the physical energy, a certain amount of flexibility works best. I'll try to explain.

 

Certain things, like bedtime and getting up in the morning, need routine. We also have routine dialogues for things he tends to be sensitive about.

 

For schooling, we tried out different times of the day, etc. For us, we find his "quietest" most focused time tends to be mid- to late morning, around 9:30 or 10:00, so we start the most focused subjects, like math and piano around then and then work until a late-ish lunch around 1:00. The only things that work well after that time are field trips, or hands-on type things like science experiments, or sometimes art.

 

After math and piano are taken care of, around 11:00, I let the kids choose the order of the rest of our subjects. (We use task cards in pockets.) This seems to help them feel like they are exploring their own interests. We do sometimes have science-heavy weeks (my DD's favorite), or grammar-heavy weeks (my DS's favorite -- yeah, I know, how can such an energetic kid like grammar so much!!!?:001_huh:), but it seems to even out when we look at the end results.

 

Reading is part of our fairly lengthy bedtime routine, so we sometime incorporate school reading there, too. It also has to incorporate some discussion time, because he worries about strange things. In the last hour, he has whimpered about being afraid of acids a half-dozen times, so apparently we will be having a discussion about which acids are actually dangerous, and which are not. :tongue_smilie:

 

I pre-screen everything, but especially movies. We are getting to have a pretty good sense of what will be an issue. (For our son, reality isn't much of an issue -- Roman gladiators get a "it was wrong, it was bad, we don't do that anymore"; fantasy is a big issue -- Cyclops gets a "Mommm... there aren't really giant creatures with only one eye that eat people...are there?")

[momto3boys]

Thank you so much for the ideas and sharing your experiences, I really appreciate it. I did a much longer bedtime routine last night and the difference in behavior was drastic from that alone. I'm looking forward to trying some of your other ideas/suggestions soon.

[SunnyDays]

I just wanted to say this post is helpful for me as well. My son fits this TO A TEE!! We're still experimenting, but some of the things mentioned help us as well. The routines are very important here too... if he goes to bed not tired, without a "wind down" or "talk about our day" time... it's not pretty. :)

[jenbrdsly]

I'm not sure if these ideas are helpful or not, but here are my notes from the SENG conference last year about trying to help kids focus and not have tantrums. The labyrinth idea DID NOT WORK for us, but it might work you.

 

Good luck! OE is something we struggle with in our household for sure.

[kristinannie]

I have this same experience. My son is 5 and almost definitely gifted (I haven't had him tested). He is also a very difficult child to parent, but I see a lot of myself in him (I was also gifted) so I have some understanding...maybe too much understanding. :tongue_smilie:

 

I just want to recommend this book. I am in the second chapter and it has already helped me. There are a couple of other moms on the accelerated board that are reading it. We were joking about having a book club, but maybe we should really just do it!!!