5 year old taunting sister

[jewelsJZ]

Just had another dinnertime with my family wherein 5 y.o. ds repeatedly taunts 3 y.o. dd at the table. She of course, then does the same. Dh and I tried many tactics, including humor, kindly asking him to stop, asking him to ignore her (we figure that would be an easier concept for the 5 y.o. vs. 3 y.o.). Finally sent him away from the table, had discussion, "we are asking you to stop X and you keep doing it so we are sending you out of the dining room". He sits on the stairs and continues so he is sent upstairs to get his pj's on. Then he cries, is remorseful, promises not to do it any more, on and on.
So, in hindsight, I am guessing dh and I could just empathize and reflect back: "you don't like it when your brother teases you." "you don't like when your sister yells back at you." Although I think we'd barely get one of these sentences out before having to utter another one.
The other problem is they've been together 24/7 all summer and really need time apart. We did lots of that over the weekend, where they got special time with mom and dad, several hours each day. Tomorrow dd has a drop off play date at a friend's for the entire morning. I can schedule one of these for ds as well this week. But I just don't know that it will be enough.
They fought horribly, mostly ds taunting dd and then her retaliating, for most of the day except when one of them was sleeping. I handled it fairly well all day but when dinnertime came, I had had enough.
What should I do tomorrow when this will surely start all over again?

[LaLaLaLa]

I have a zero tolerance policy for taunting, as I was a younger sibling who had to deal with near-constant verbal assault from my older brother.

In our household, DD is 5 and has great skill at taunting. DS is 3.5 and has great skill at punching in retaliation. It's not a great mix.

So, the second I hear a nasty tone of voice, or DD starting a competition with DS or picking a fight, I step in to remind them that if they can't be nice to each other, they will have to be separate, in their own bedrooms with their doors shut.

My kids do like to play together most of the time, so just a little reminder to DD that I won't let her play with DS if she is being unkind works for us. At the dinner table, anyone who is being unpleasant is asked to leave the table until he or she is capable of being nice.

The constant policing is a huge bummer, but I wish someone had stopped my brother from using words to make my life miserable.