It began innocently enough, a phone call from Grant’s Kindergarten teacher asking if we could come to the school to talk about how he was doing in class. We found out later that several parents received the same phone call, each of us the proud parents of rather rambunctious 5-year-old boys.
Six years later we still know these boys and their parents, they are good kids and come from fine families…but I am getting ahead of myself.
At the teacher conference we were told that our son, along with the other boys, had trouble sitting still and was disruptive in class. We were asked to talk with Grant and work with him to “solve the problem.”
Unfortunately, this was not the last meeting with the teacher…the discussion always the same. He is doing very well academically but has trouble focusing throughout the day. It was recommended that we have him “tested.”
This was all very new and admittedly pretty scary. He seemed like a pretty smart, polite, charming, fun loving kid to me…but apparently he had a “problem.” He was Hyper!
Well, we went through that whole process and the diagnosis was that he potentially had ADHD and that we should consider Ritalin! Wow! It was being suggested to me that we start drugging our 5 year old to get him to sit still in class!!
Hey guys, couldn’t it just be that we are asking a 5 year old to sit still for several hours a day? Couldn’t it be that when you put a group of 5 year olds in the same room all day there is bound to be some fiddling around and some mischievous behavior? Isn’t it possible that there is nothing wrong with the kid, but everything wrong with the system that is subjecting him to this situation?
We received vague replies that confirmed that the answers to my questions could be yes…but that if we did not remedy the issue now it could have negative affects in the future. He would get behind other kids academically, he would be placed in the lower math and reading groups, and that he would be labeled as hyper as he entered the 1st grade.
It was a quick decision; there was no way that I was going to start drugging my 5 year old to get him to sit still in class!!
Recently I read that the number of kids diagnosed with ADHD and given Ritalin or some other type of psychotropic drug increased 700% during the 1990’s and an estimated
4.5 million children were on the drug. In 2003 the number had risen to between 5 million and 6 million school aged kids, 90% of them boys. There are heated debates on both sides of the argument…in my opinion this is a travesty.
Fast forward 5 years and these conversations are beginning all over again. My daughter’s teachers are now calling us to ask for meetings to discuss how she is doing in class. You can imagine our surprise when we were informed that she has trouble sitting still in class, focusing on her schoolwork, and tends to socialize instead of completing assignments.
Yep, sounds like our Gigi! Lets add strong willed, creative, an avid reader, and independent to this list…
We are obviously much wiser today than when our first child started school. We will not be spending the $500.00 to get this child “tested”…nor will there be any consideration for putting her on some type of psychotropic drugs.
I am not a doctor and don’t claim to know anything related to the medical relevance of such drugs. I am sure there are many examples of situations where these drugs have provided immeasurable relief to kids and parents alike.
I am simply a parent that knows and loves his kids.
Like many things in our society these days there is a “cure” for everything. Getting to the root cause of an issue is difficult, and instead we tend to look for solutions to mask the affects. The kids aren’t broke; the system that they are subject to is broken. I think we need to question a system that so easily places labels on young children and that offers drugs as a solution to “their problems.”
As parents it is our responsibility to educate our children, but with our busy lives it is easy to forget this and remove the burden from us and place it on our public school system. At a minimum we need to partner with our schoolteachers and school administrators to ensure the level of education meets the needs of our children.
For those of you wanting to know…Grant turned out just fine! He is a straight A student, assists his teachers whenever needed, and is a great person to be around. His early bouts with ADHD were short lived, and we have not had any additional discussion with teachers about him being “hyper and disruptive.”
Home schooling offers you the benefit of taking responsibility for your child’s education, in a manner that is consistent with your family’s values and your child’s individual learning method.
As Portable Parents we will take complete responsibility for their education. It is exciting to have this responsibility, and something that we do not take lightly. We look forward to developing relationships with our children that foster their natural curiosity, and help them follow a path to learning that will stay with them a lifetime.
by Sean
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