When I hear a three year old is perhaps having "issues" I wanna slap someone. Sorry, I'm going OT. Three years old!

Yeah, I know. But I guess the Spielgruppe teacher feels that if something is picked up early then it's better for the child.

We're not making a big deal of it, just want to talk to our very lovely Dr who I trust, to see what her thoughts are!

Issues was probably the wrong word!!

Sometimes I think our society has to have a name or disorder for everyone and everything. I think children develop at their own pace & style, and quite frankly, have never seen anyone under the age of 12 with a concentration span of more than 2 minutes unless something containing sugar or chocolate was involved. As a parent, though, you panic so easily, I can feel with the OP, I would have reacted the same.
If I may share a story: when my son was 6 months old, I took him for the first time to our local mutter/vater beratung, just for fun & to have the experience, as I always went to the pedeatrician before. I went in thinking I had the happiest, cheerful, social little chap and left 2 hours later with a checklist of things "he doesnt do", the number of a pysiotherapist AND an osteopath and the serious recommendation to talk to my ped because my son wasnt making eye contact (it was almost 7PM, we'd been there for hours, she was in his face the whole time - me too, I would avert my eyes...). Anyway, the ped took one look, laughed, told me to laugh as well and made a note to have a serious chat with this woman for scaring me with all her stories of lacking motor skills, autism & some scary syndrome because he had a small dent in in his chest.....

Months later I still feel like the biggest fool for not trusting my own mother instinct.

My sister spent a year thinking and acting like a dog. She was 6; everyone was freaked out by it, we had to have psychologists come round, my mother ignored everyone and said she would grow out of it & it just showed she had lots of creativity and imagination. Its true, she did and "turned out fine"...

Sorry, hijacking and getting off topic!

For the sake of the teacher, I would take your daughter to the therapy, so you have peace of mind.

Good luck! P.

Hi

I totally agree with you and we have decided to take her to the therapy for the sake of the teacher.

BTW, today when my wife told the teacher that we agree for the therapy her feedback on my daughter suddenly changed very positive.

Cheers

Agree with your approach..

Dear Dietiker,


I am sorry for the inaccuracy of my words, as many members expressed before, hyperactivity is a disorder. I was worried about you knowing more details about it before taking any decision.The opinion of a specialist is vital concerning that the information given by the teachers is not enough or precise to let you know if there is a problem or not.

I am happy that things are getting better and that you will not give up on your professional lives here in Switzerland .

Wishing all the best for you and your child,

Ana

dont tkae things to heart your child will grow out of it sooner or later

Reviving this old thread in the hope that the OP might be able to provide some feedback on how this turned out and that other members might have had similar, more recent experiences.

Our 5 year old son started local KG last year (when he was four years old). Like all children he has different strengths and weaknesses, but we would not regard him as being developmentally slower than others. He is an only child so he can struggle with sharing, etc. which we are working on.

We had a meeting with his teachers last night and whilst they have noted improvements overall since starting KG (which we also have seen and concur with), they think some of his motor skills may require some work (holding a pencil, using scissors, etc.) and are recommending that we schedule an appointment with his pediatrician to discuss potential therapies, such as ergo therapy.

We are not opposed to doing this but do find it quite an extreme course of action, specifically because this is the first year of KG. I don't think that it would be something that would normally be done in our home country for (what I would consider are) basic skills that with normal practice will get better.

Has anyone else had a similar experience and how did this turn out for you? Has anyone experienced any social stigmas by teachers, other kids/parents, etc. after letting their children attend these types of therapies?

one of our daughters did some sessions of this (pyschomotortherapy I think its called here) following what was a very pleasant conversation - the school didnt insist from what i remember I think it was a regular checkup with the doc and she said that she might benefit from it. In my view it was a complete waste of time, there was (is) nothing wrong with my daughter, she now excels in classes at school and there was absolutely no difference from the 10 sessions of this she went to, apart from the fact she enjoyed playing with all the toys in the room and we discovered health insurance didnt cover it.

Of course other experiences may be different but this is our perspective.

Thank you very much for the reply.

Yes, I should add that our discussion was very cordial and I did not feel as though the teachers were forcing us into anything but were rather trying to provide helpful feedback and opportunities for improvement.

Like everything in life we try to be open-minded and open to feedback, but are also careful about creating a beast where he is pigeon-holed for the rest of his schooling career because we take up the offer when that drastic action may not even be necessary.

we were concerned about this too, but I think this stuff is fine, it didnt lead to any subsequent follow or activity from the school. I think its just a side effect of the health service (and country in general) being so rich here, in that anything that could possibly be something to look at, they do. In the UK you wouldnt have had this sort of stuff, you would have to have something properly worth looking at before this kind of advice was recommended.

There are swings and roundabouts in the Swiss education system, whilst the normal band is quite narrow the services available are quite wide and good. Our son has ADHA and problems with fine motor skills and had ergotherapy for a number of years, it is not uncommon here so don't worry. The % of boys in therapy here is high (bandwidth issue?) and it won't be viewed badly by anyone. There are still a couple of things to consider, bullying/teasing is an (often unaddressed) issue here so he could be a target if his skills are less than his peers, therapy will help him. Work closely with his teacher even if you disagree a bit with their analysis, they will help but don't want/have time to carry the whole (supposed) burden. Thirdly, look at the match between the therapist and your child, this is critical to maintain motivation and there are alternatives if the school one doesn't work out. Ask questions as (a lot) services available are not offered or easily found as it would be considered rude to suggest to you how you should raise your child!

First point is don't be too concerned, it's not an extreme course of action. Your child is only 5, recommendations for things like ergo therapy or speech therapy shouldn't be worry you and are perfectly normal.

Children develop at different rates, if the kindergarten you see a doctor then why not, there's little harm that can come at this stage. Certainly no decent pediatrician is going to diagnose ADHD at such a young age. We also had a similar experience with one of ours and ended up going for ergo therapy, which was very much enjoyed as was the one on one contact. Health insurance will even cover the costs.

Your child shouldn't get pigeon-holed if you take this course of action. One thing I would would recommend is putting some pressure back onto the kindergarten to also do their job. Ask them to prepare an action plan on their side to help in your child's development and also for bi-weekly reports on how the progress is going. Some kindergarten teachers think their job is done once they've recommended the intervention which really isn't the case!

We had a similar situation with our son, who was put in "motor skills therapy" classes (one per week, during regular school hours) when he began the 1st class / primary school. It was just him and the teacher in the class, which was nice so that she could focus only on him for that one hour per week. They realized he needed the classes when he wasn't able to do things as easily as some of the other kids, especially with his hands, such as zipping zippers, etc. He was also very timid compared to other kids (e.g. didn't want to climb high, etc.). And being that he is our only child, I think they noticed things that we didn't because we didn't have as good of an understanding about what is "normal" for that age since he has no brothers or sisters for us to compare it to.

We have not noticed anything in terms of social stigmas. And I think it's actually not all that uncommon for kids to be put into these classes. For us, I'm glad they were able to "catch it" and do something to address the issue. It's better to try to fix any issues like that now rather than wait until the kids are older, I think. And my son actually really enjoyed the classes. He thought they were a lot of fun (lots of climbing, jumping, drawing, etc). The classes went on for two years, but they're done now.

That’s interesting. Ours was fully covered by the health insurance as long as it was prescribed by the paediatrician.

Our son did ergotherapy to help with his concentration issues and possibly improve his handwriting (although that was pretty much a lost cause). He really enjoyed and really benefited from it.
There was no pressure from anyone to do it but we thought it was worth a try even though we were a bit sceptical at the time. Quite a lot of kids do it and there is definitely no stigma attached, it’s best to catch things earlier when they are easier to fix in my opinion.

Do you really think it is better to err on the side of denying a child the support they need at this early stage? And how do you think having to deal with that on their own will impact their development...

The vast majority of teachers are dedicated professionals with far more experience than any of us in child development issues. A teacher spends several hours a day working with a child and when they flagged up an issue with our son we took it very seriously.

Our son has Asperger-Syndrom and we’ve been through the whole cycle - repeat years, special classes, support teachers in class with him etc... information sessions for the kids and parents of children that were in class with him etc...

He is now finishing his final year in college and I’m absolutely certain he’d never have gotten this far if it was not for all the support along the way. Particularly from his classmates and their parents once they understood the situation. Simple things like making sure he took his meds, did not wandering of, to encouraging him to attend his graduation ceremony, something he really did not want to do. He had the night of his life btw, still talks about it today.

There really is no issues about getting support in the Swiss system, so make sure your child gets all the support available to them.

__________________
"There is no passion to be found playing small - in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living." - Nelson Mandela

Not saying that we are planning to deny any support, are questioning the teacher's experience or are not taking this seriously (rather to the contrary on all fronts).

However, we are interested in understanding the further implications for him within the general Swiss and schooling context which from a majority of the replies appear to be limited.

With my daughter, we had something similar, in that they decided she needed speech therapy. In our case, the KG paid for it. She didn't need it (confirmed by the therapist after a few sessions), but she benefited overall as it exposed her to more German language.

Our thoughts were "why not"? There were no further implications. I can't see why there should be any for your son.

I have the feeling we foreigners, alien to the Swiss system, tend to see any suggestion of early therapy as a negative branding of our kids.

Don't.

Early age therapy carries no stigma in this country. It will not reflect negatively in a later age at school. It might help pin point the reason of a problem and help sort it out.

Most times it is covered by the canton/school system. And perhaps it might not help, but maybe it will help. There are no negative sides, but the potential to a positive outcome.

My kid has been in Logopädie since he was 2. He has improved greatly - might be due to Logopädie, might be that his brain finally clicked. But I can rest assured that I took advantage of any opportunity to help him out.

Most kids that have been sent to one of the available therapies in our school are actually quite happy to go. It's one on one attention, and the therapists are usually lovely people who really want to help.

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Fighting for Pluto's liberation from the Dwarf League since 2006 @(°.°)=@)x.X)' ' '

This is very helpful feedback, and precisely what we are looking to understand.

Any parent wants only the best for the children, and ones mind can easily run-away with you as you start thinking about all the possible considerations.

Thank you so much for your (and everyone else that took the time) reply!