Lying | ADHD Information
It's me again....anyway, we are having trouble with our ds lying about his Behavior color from school - this year he is supposed to write it in himself but discovered that he had not told the truth on some days and told the teacher about it. Now she checks it everyday.Last week he did it twice and we had many talks with him about it. He told us he wanted the reward he was working towards but we told he didn't earn it b/c he lied. And when he lies we take away the points that he can earn for the day. It is harsh but lying to us is the worst thing in our eyes.
Right now he and his sister have to get so many points to earn a Wii. each day they can earn up to 6 points each. they average 4 most days but when the child that lied about something will loose the points for that whole day. We aren't talking white lies but lies to us like not writing in the correct color.
Anyway - after everything we went through with him last week about lying - he lied yesterday AGAIN!!!! This time his teacher caught him b/c when they get a certain color she has to write in the color and let us know why he got it and we in turn have to sign it.
My husband and I are at a loss - when we give him incentives he appears to lie more. BUT he is lying about something that everyday we find the truth about. Yesterday he told us he wanted to go to the drive-in - which was one of the things we told him we would do when they had a good week and no more lying.
He cares more about getting the reward than about earning it. Is this normal for kids his age? ADHD? Yes, I know he was adopted and there may be some residual effects from his earlier upbringing...ALso, we know kids lie but this appears to be so blatant
Any advice?
Actually he understands our reward system very well. In fact, he has improved so much on other behaviors with it while we started in 7 months ago we actually made it a "little" stricter to earn the point.
BTW: here is how it works
1 point for early morning routine done - eat breakfast, put dishes away, make bed, get dressed and brush teeth
1 point for getting a green which means great in school
1 point for getting a green - if he gets a blue or worse - no point
1 point for homework - finishing during alloted time
1 point for good behavior at night - taking a bath, getting in PJ, brushing teeth and reading
1 point for chore
total 6 points - end of the week (based on 6 days) total of 36 but they average 27
When we started it was really simple. It used to be:
1 point for brushing teeth
1 point for making bed
1 point for good color in school
1 point for putting dishes away at dinner
1 point for homework
1 point for chore
Over the course of the 7 months they have mastered certain things so we either combined them or added something new. Recently we changed the color points to give them more incentive to get a good color. That is when the lying started. I realize that may have been a mistake now.
We used to have weekly rewards with old point system - going to a movie, play date, sundae or toy, etc.... It got be they were getting too much stuff so we started combining weeks to get something bigger - one time it was a trip to Disney and they worked the butts off for a month and got it!
In response to give him something for his good behavior - he does get rewarded for that. ALL THE TIME! I read TRANSFORMING THE DIFFICULT CHILD and I don't give into the negative behavior. But I do think talking to them about what they did and why the received the consequence is good. On the flipside - I also talk with them about their good behavior as well - neither receives more attention than the other.
Thanks for your response - BTW: he didn't lie about his color today. It wasn't a great color and I didn't over react to that and told him thank you for telling me the truth and let's work on doing better tomorrow.
Wait and see is my approach now.
newmom39364.7263773148Okay, buckets o' stuff
Firstly, kids get a LOT of negative messages all day. You have to FIND A WAY to reward this kid for sure, if you don't want him to lie. The situation that has been set up sounds:
Too complicated. If I couldn't follow what he'd get rewarded for from your post--I doubt it's making much sense to him, either.Of course he cares more about the award than earning it. Straight behavioural modification concept.Lower your expectations. He must do something right. Find it. Reward it. Increase it.
The easiest way to get a kid, dog or adult to do what you want is to reward them first for what you like. If you get them hooked on the reward--[praise, attention] they will repeat it.
Punishing lying behaviors rarely works.
It seems to me that he's getting more attention about the lying than he is positive rewards for the things he's doing right.
Don't give attention [good or bad is irrelevant--your time is still your greatest reward] for behavior you don't want to encourage.
The most important words you can ever say to a child aren't "reward"--they're "THANK YOU." and "You have my complete attention."
Are the points to buy a wii? It sounds like even though they have behaved and done the points to get the big rewards it may be a longer wait for the wii and your son can't see maybe they long term goal. The longer the wait for my son for behavior goals the less he makes them. Maybe make a graph like they do for fundraisers so he can see the progress and instead of taking away from the goal when he doesn't do well just don't add any progress to chart.
Of course, we have a graph and every week we will fill it in to show how close they are to getting the Wii. Every Sunday it is our routine and they get so excited to see they are so close but when they don't have a good week they understand it will take longer.Currently yes, the point now are for getting the Wii. We also give smaller rewards for good behavior so it is not like the are only being reward during this time for the Wii.
Trust me we have had trouble with ds in the past with putting too high expectations on him so we adjusted our practices.
thanks
newmom39365.2172685185 I am so glad to see I am not the only one struggling here with this same issue. My DS has tried living with his dad for this school year, and he has been there around 4 weeks and has been grounded half that time. He seems to lie about some of the stupidest things. I don't know why he feels he has to lie about something that is so simple. He got caught with the lies a few times while living with me, but nothing like what he is going through now. I am not feeling good about the punishment he is getting there either. He doesnt have a ADHD review until the 29th. with his doctor so I can't ask until then about this. His dad grounds him to the room. He only is allowed to come out to eat and use the bathroom. He has to sit in his room and read. He is soon going to think reading is a form of punishment and not enjoy it while at school. He said if he is good for a few days in a row he gets to come out and watch tv for a little while. Am I wrong for feeling like this? I just don't think sending him to his room is working. I know his doctor has always said that leaving him in his room alone for long periods of time is not good. Is this correct? Someone please help me.
CANIACMOM39365.6365856482 [QUOTE=CANIACMOM] I am so glad to see I am not the only one struggling here with this same issue. My DS has tried living with his dad for this school year, and he has been there around 4 weeks and has been grounded half that time. He seems to lie about some of the stupidest things. I don't know why he feels he has to lie about something that is so simple. He got caught with the lies a few times while living with me, but nothing like what he is going through now. I am not feeling good about the punishment he is getting there either. He doesnt have a ADHD review until the 29th. with his doctor so I can't ask until then about this. His dad grounds him to the room. He only is allowed to come out to eat and use the bathroom. He has to sit in his room and read. He is soon going to think reading is a form of punishment and not enjoy it while at school. He said if he is good for a few days in a row he gets to come out and watch tv for a little while. Am I wrong for feeling like this? I just don't think sending him to his room is working. I know his doctor has always said that leaving him in his room alone for long periods of time is not good. Is this correct? Someone please help me.
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I think you're right--if the kid is spending more time 'being punished' than living his life--something definitely needs adjusting.
As newmom mentioned--some kids don't mind being alone. Grounding that kind of kid to their room is useless. You have to figure out what motivates that child and they aren't all the same. Had one foster kid who LOVED money. Being alone didn't bother her a bit. So we used a money token system. Another foster teen loved foozeball--so we used that.
How old is your son?
[QUOTE=newmom] Actually he understands our reward system very well. In fact, he has improved so much on other behaviors with it while we started in 7 months ago we actually made it a "little" stricter to earn the point.
BTW: here is how it works
1 point for early morning routine done - eat breakfast, put dishes away, make bed, get dressed and brush teeth
1 point for getting a green which means great in school
1 point for getting a green - if he gets a blue or worse - no point
1 point for homework - finishing during alloted time
1 point for good behavior at night - taking a bath, getting in PJ, brushing teeth and reading
1 point for chore
total 6 points - end of the week (based on 6 days) total of 36 but they average 27
When we started it was really simple. It used to be:
1 point for brushing teeth
1 point for making bed
1 point for good color in school
1 point for putting dishes away at dinner
1 point for homework
1 point for chore
Over the course of the 7 months they have mastered certain things so we either combined them or added something new. Recently we changed the color points to give them more incentive to get a good color. That is when the lying started. I realize that may have been a mistake now.
We used to have weekly rewards with old point system - going to a movie, play date, sundae or toy, etc.... It got be they were getting too much stuff so we started combining weeks to get something bigger - one time it was a trip to Disney and they worked the butts off for a month and got it!
In response to give him something for his good behavior - he does get rewarded for that. ALL THE TIME! I read TRANSFORMING THE DIFFICULT CHILD and I don't give into the negative behavior. But I do think talking to them about what they did and why the received the consequence is good. On the flipside - I also talk with them about their good behavior as well - neither receives more attention than the other.
Thanks for your response - BTW: he didn't lie about his color today. It wasn't a great color and I didn't over react to that and told him thank you for telling me the truth and let's work on doing better tomorrow.
Wait and see is my approach now.
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I was thinking what someone else posted--maybe the change was a bit too abrupt for him [the other child seems to have adjusted] or he just isn't that good at waiting for the reward yet.
Or he could be just checking to see where it all goes from here and testing a bit. Hard to tell. Since he told the truth today--maybe he was just checking out the emotional weather? ['will she keep/love me, even if I mess up?'--that's a big foster/adoptee thang]
I don't know if this helps or not but as a foster mom--I never trusted when a kid was 'too good' because to me--they didn't feel safe, yet. When we hit the 'I'm gonna drive you nuts and see if you hit me or throw me out' part of the relationship I knew I was on solid ground because we'd come through that.
Hope it's some consolation
yeah - we had problems in the past with the lying and then it stopped and then it started again. Don't know why really.
I agree, telling us the truth, being respectful and not giving up on things easily are what we are trying to teach our kids now. As I have said in the past we are making up for a lot since our kids were recently adopted so we are going slowly at things and when they conquer one thing then we move onto something new. However, it irks me that the lying started again.
I like the dictionary method - he does writing a sentence over and over and he really does remember the sentence -but I might try that the next time (hopefully there won't be one)
My stepdaughter, age 10, also lies about the most ridiculous stuff sometimes. She'll lie sometimes to stay out of trouble, even if she wouldn't get in trouble in the first place. It's infuriating.
CANIACMOM -I don't know about staying in room for a long time is bad or not. I got sent to my room a lot when I was young but I figured out how to entertain myself - over the years I would rearrange my bedroom...today I am an interior designer with my own business. Maybe your son will get a chance to use the time wisely.
My husband and I were very upset at first at the lies and the bad behavior colors but we decided that we will take a different approach and remain as calm as possible no matter what the color was. It seems to be working b/c the last 2 days he told us the truth - one day was a bad color and the next was a good color.
I know men (i.e. my husband) over react and get really upset at bad behavior and I don't think that does doing any good. However, what wife can tell her husband not to get mad and remain calm over things that really upset them. I had to come up with certain tactics to convince him he was doing more damage than good. Well, I did it and he has remained calm especially when ds came home with a bad color - but since he told the truth my husband was happy. YIPPY.
Not only are we trying to teach our kids good behavior - we have to teach our spouses the same thing. Not easy when you are married to an Italian. They love to express their emotions outwardly...no offense to any other Italians
Good luck!
newmom39366.4502777778ok what we did with our ds for lying was pretty simple. he gets to write down 100 words from the dictionary and define them. Also newmom i am married to an italian and i must say that morals and respect are two of the most important things in our household. i don't remain calm when my ds lies. why should i? he's knows better and guess what, he's not lied in 2 weeks now. as for rewards and your system new mom i think its great. if your kids understand it then it's fine. well, it has been 3 days in a row now of telling us the truth - also his behavior color has improved over those 3 days. I so think they are related. And I know days he will lie and some days he won't. He is a kid and I have to remember that.
Also, I suppose I might not be the most proficient writer but I guess I have to explain that we didn't abruptly change the point system. It was a gradual change. I know many of you keep seeming confused about our point system probably b/c I didn't explain it in extreme detail -if I did this would be the longest thread ever.
Thanks for your thoughts.
BTW: Must tell you that my son has the best memory. One night I asked him the next time he takes a bath to do something specific. The next night he did it without a reminder nor had he done this in over 6 months so it wasn't a routine. In fact, I even forgot that I had asked him. WOW!!!! I am so impressed.
Such a good kid and I am so lucky to have him!
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