Advice for a child who just shuts down and refuses to listen?
Hey all, I've been in childcare a long time but am pretty new to classrooms, and I was thrown into a 4/5 year old room with a LOT of difficult behaviors (I was warned ahead of time lol). Most of these kids are going to kindergarten at the end of August, and most of them I've kind of figured out how to work with, but there's one boy I'll have through the next year that I'm really struggling with and want to get some advice for.
When he's asked to clean up, stop a dangerous behavior, join an activity, etc he just kinda shuts down. He'll say "no", stand in place, and get teary eyed, sometimes even actually cry. It doesn't matter how small or gentle the request, he will immediately shut down.
If it's cleaning up toys he'll stand to the side until another child cleans up his mess. If I ever ask him to give something to me (a dangerous object, something he took from my desk or a classmate's cubby, something he hurt someone with), he will run away from me. He'll go to the front of the line and basically be standing on top of another child who was there first and refuse to move. During quiet time he doesn't sleep (which is fine, we can give them quiet activities on their cots) and refuses to stay on his cot. He'll plant himself ~five feet away from his cot and refuse to move, and if we turn our back he'll immediately get up to get a toy.
He often doesn't want to participate in activities, and that's fine, he's allowed to do his own thing, but it often feels like he's just refusing to join just to refuse, and he's excluding himself from almost everything.
I just don't really know what to do. We've got a lot of kids who don't listen, and I've figured out tricks with all of them. We've got a lot of kids who have similar behaviors that I've kind of riddled out. But this kid just becomes a brick wall. He's not hyperactive, he's not running away and gleefully laughing, he always just seems really upset and about to cry.
One thing he doesn't have issues with is transitions to other areas (thank God!) Even if he doesn't stay in his place in line, I don't have issues with him refusing to transition and he doesn't try to run off.
His parents said he's having similar behaviors at home, and they're also struggling with it because none of their other children had these behaviors. His sister is also at our center and I can confirm those behaviors are not present with her.
Basically - help!