I have to say that my 5 year old is getting to big for her boots at home too, but she is apparently a little angel at school.  There is a theory that a good child at home will be a terror at school, and the perfect child at school will be worse behaved at home. 

This does sound like there is more going on though, as her behaviour isn't just pushing boundaries, it is down right violent.  I think you need to look at the family situation and school situation and see if there is something between the two that could be triggering this.  Talk with her teachers about it and see if there are kids she is friends with who are a little more on the aggressive side and getting away with this sort of behaviour all the time.  She might just be copying them.

Excuse me, cause I like Dr phil.  But he says find your childs currency.  If time out is not working, remove everything from their world, toys or privledges (going on an outing (you can even make up an outing)). 

Hope this helps.

Jodi

hey, im not sure if my advice will be helpfull but i think anything is better than nothing...i did family day care for 9yrs and  at the time, the best way to control bad behaviour was to use "time out" better said," the time to think corner ". I used a corner in full view(for full supervision) with a special pillow,no toys or books,and placed them there on the pillow and explained what was the reason for them to be sitting in the "time to think corner" and asked them to sit there for a little while to think how they feel and why they did the things that were upseting to the other children,ect.... . For your 5 yr old i would put her there for 5 mins and no longer without talking to her till her 5 mins were up.Then go back to her and ask her if she can go and play without the bad behaviour. This worked so well with the children in care and my own daughter at the time.Its so important to tell the child thats its the behaviour that was bad ,not them...i hope this helps u!!! cheers and good luck

First, look for reasons for this behaviour. Is something happening to her at school? Is she being bullied? Does she like her teacher? Sit her down for a good talk about these issues. Ask her why she is behaving like this.

Assure her she will not get into trouble, no matter what she tells you. Explain that you love her, but you do not like her when she behaves this way so you want to do whatever you can to help her.

Talk to her teacher & find out how she is behaving at school. What is her work like? Does she concentrate? Does she get along with other children? Ask her teacher to keep an extra eye on her to help you figure out what is going on.

If her work isn't up to where it should be, if she's not concentrating, you may need to have her assessed for ADHD. Even if she doesn't have ADHD, there may be another medical cause for this. Take her to a paediatrician for assessment. Sometimes schools can have an assessment done there to take to the paediatrician.

My son has had problems with his behaviour (though not as excessive as your little girl) & I found the best way to encourage good behaviour is to use what he loves the most, which is PS2. When he shows good behaviour he gets to play it, but if he does something wrong, his punishment is no PS2. Whatever your daughter loves the most, use that as reward & punishment.

Star charts are always good ways of encouraging children in anything. Use stars for whatever you think appropriate, eg if she cleans her room, if she's good at school, if she does as she's asked without a tantrum, if she's nice to her sister, etc. When she gets to a certain number of stars (whatever you decide, whether it's 10 stars, 20, etc) she gets a reward. The reward can be a treat such as chocolate, go to the park, go to movies, pick a DVD to watch, take-away for dinner, anything you think she might like.

Good luck!