First thing that came to my mind is what does the child eat and drink?
Would need to know everything over the course of the week, including what he may eat or drink in school.
The second thing that crossed my mind was a possible mineral deficiency of some kind. Mineral deficiencies in animals have been known to cause them to chew on many different things in an attempt to correct the deficiency.
For example, I think it was Dr. Jarvis who equated horses chewing on wood with a potassium deficiency.