It appears our oldest son has a Jeckyll and Hyde thing going on. Perhaps this is an affliction that affects many nearly-five-year-olds, but A seems to have an especially acute case.

In the morning, A attends Junior Kindergarten. Donna, his teacher, has nothing but great things to say about him. At our last parent / teacher meeting, she was literally beaming as she told us what a pleasure he is – smart, polite, inquisitive. She mentioned that she’d heard from other students that A has timeouts in the afternoon, but she found that hard to believe because he’s such an angel.

In the afternoon, A goes to a daycare program at the Fieldhouse, which is on the school grounds. In recent months, Jillian, his other teacher, has been greeting us with tales of A’s poor behaviour. He doesn’t listen, acts silly, splashes water on kids, even uses a plastic shovel as a weapon from time to time.

This week we started an afternoon sticker chart to track his progress. A sticker means he did well during an activity, a frown face means a timeout. The early results aren’t promising. On Monday, he had four timeouts, Tuesday he had three, and yesterday he had a remarkable five timeouts. If the trend continues, he’ll be dragged off in handcuffs by the end of the week.

A just seems very headstrong these days. He knows what he wants to do, and doesn’t much care what other people say about it. Everything is a negotiation, whether it be what’s for breakfast, what clothes he’s going to wear, or when bedtime starts. Failure to comply with his demands results in a grating whine that quickly raises the tension level in the house.

At this rate, A appears destined for a future as a lawyer, singer, or conductor. I can only hope that our early interventions will steer him away from the dark side.