Your description reminds me of our nephew. He was diagnosed with high-functioning autism - PDD-NOS (pervasive developmental disorder - not otherwise specified). It might be wise to seek consult from your family doctor. The earlier the diagnosis; the better the prognosis for this disorder (if in fact, this is the issue with your son). Just wondering ....
I'm glad you got the glue ear sorted as that would've been a major contributing factor to your sons behaviour. My advice would be to talk to your son's teacher/s and remind them of the outcome from the glue ear and tell them he needs simple verbal instructions, and getting him to repeat the instructions back to them. Kids sometimes don't understand the instructions we give them, even though we think we've put them in a simple way.
For example, just the other day while working in after school care, we had a room full of children making huge amounts of noise, to the point where i told them all they had to sit in silence and if anyone spoke, they'd have to stand up. This went on for about 10mins when a 8/9yo came up to me and asked 'is this a game?'
some children around this age are just in 'a world of their own' so if the teachers can reinforce this, hopefully he will take note and if not, i'd get it seen to again to make sure their is no inner ear/ear drum damage. All the best :)
I agree with what the others have said, and something in your post reminded me of a child I know with Aspergers, and he's very high functioning and is in fact now at Berkeley doing great.
He can't tune in and tune out different sounds, or even different stimulus. For example, when he was 4, he was trying to watch a TV show and another child was bouncing up and down vigorously (but virtually silently) on a baby trampoline, and he couldn't hear the TV. The visual stimulus of that child jumping in his peripheral vision made him unable to process the tv program. In other instances, continuous humming noises that others could block out would drive him to the point of screaming that it had to stop, he couldn't stand it anymore.
I suspect your son might also be touched with a little bit of ADD, which isn't an all bad thing. The most imaginative people in history have ADD.
Really, on balance, it sounds like your son is doing okay and every child has their strengths and weaknesses - his is focusing in a group situation.
Best wishes.
To throw something else into the mix, auditory processing problems have much to do with this and it is part of the sensory system. Actually occupational therapy can help this. Good luck
Thanks everyone, the health visitor is coming on thurs so I mention all this to her. X