need help with my preschool decision re:aggressiveness

I think it would be good to try preschool. At the 3 year age group most really just work on social interaction. My ds was very timid and didn't know how to interact with kids his age at all. He was a "doormat" type and would let kids push him and take stuff from him. But on the other hand he didn't know how to interact so he'd get in kids faces and push toys/sticks in their faces. Of course, sharing was a big issue too, pretty common. We live in a quiet neighborhood and he is an only child so he didn't get much interaction with other kids at all.
I think preschool has been beneficial for him, being around other kids is the best way to learn how to interact with them. Plus they are closely supervised, but not so much that they don't have opportunities to figure things out on their own a little bit. For instance, my ds pushes a child, and realizes not all children are going to just sit there, ie, he gets pushed right back! And seeing other children's varied behavior and how the teachers deal with them is a good example, in most cases. He definatley understands the give-and take of social interactions, sharing, and others kids personal space much better now. They work on getting the kids to verbalize to each other and to resolve conflicts. For instance, if a child hits another child, they will intervene immedietly, but they encourage the hit-ee to tell the hitter "no hitting, I don't like that". Same goes with taking toys, mean talk etc.
You could always try it for a month or so and see how he does. My ds loved to go and "play" and he liked the teacher, but it took him a few months to actually start talking to the other kids.

Quote:
A warning sign for what? And what kind of classes? Thanks for the response

Personally, I would wait another year. I don't think it is at all unusual for young kids to get along better with adults, and different age kids. Adults and older kids are much more reasonable and predictable. Younger kids don't have the same interests (don't always want the same toys, can be distracted). If your ds acts reasonably with adults and older kids, he will do fine once his peers are a little older. If your ds only gets along with older people because they always give him preferential treatment, I might worry, but you don't say that is the case.

I would be concerned that sending him to school next fall could be setting him up for failure. A bad first experience of school could effect his attitude about learning for the rest of his life. It would be sad if he were treated as a discipline problem and given frequent time-outs. I do think that it is likely that he would handle peer interactions a little better at school than on playdates because it is neutral territory and the teacher will presumably be impartial. Good luck with your decision, it's a tough one.

Quote:
Hi,

I think that preschool might well give him skills and practice dealing wiht other children, IF it's the right preschool.

-Play based, as he doesn't need any help with academics , and academically based preschools are not developmentally appropriate. That's a red flag for me, because it usually means that the TEACHERS don't understand what's developmentally appropriate for behavior either.

-A gentle disciipline policy and a 'constructivist' approach. They should, for example, be willing to have someone 'shadow' your son to prevent him from hitting, if that becomes a problem.

-Well supervised classrooms with experienced, TRAINED teachers (you don't want only 1st or second year teachers) - you want someone who's been around the block, and recognizes how to deal with a variety of children and their needs.

-Has small classes

-Has 2-3 day a week programs for either mornings or afternoons -- 2 hours in the AM or PM would be a perfect start.

I would ask around with friends/family that you trust. As someone else said, make sure you visit the program, watch a class and talk to the director about your concerns. (As I was typing this, I realized that I was describing our church program - so don't discount smaller programs, either.)

Our son has benefitted enormously from preschool - his problems were somewhat the opposite -- extreme reservation and inability to interact with other children because he was too reserved/anxious.

And there's no harm in trying and then saying "Let's try this again next year when you're older" if it really doesn't work out.

I'm not quite sure what the other poster meant when they said "red flags" but things that you might want to think about are sensory issues -- try the "Out of Sync Child" or "Raising a Sensory Smart Child" - some kids are just overwhelmed by other children because they are too unpredictable or because they don't have a great sense of themselves in space and so are always bumping, being too rough. (I"ve been doing a lot of reading on Sensory Integration lately.)

I'm not exactly sure what else the other poster could have had in mind.

Lynn