WWYD: Mean Kid

Hi! This is actually my first post I think, though I'm a long-time lurker. We've been dealing with "meanness" issues with my 5yo DS and some of the boys in his preschool class this year. I've been unpleasantly surprised at some of the things they say to him (and each other). DS is pretty sensitive to it also so we've had many discussions about it.

One thing that helped me help him was learning about why this kind of thing goes on, esp. at this age. I found this article pretty useful:

http://www.becomingtheparent.com/sub...uestion13.html

It discusses exclusionary play in 4-5 yo's and how many children don't have the social language skills to express what they're feeling appropriately. For example, "You're not my friend" " You can't play with us" or the ever-popular "I'm not inviting you to my birthday party!" may all just mean they don't want to play what you're playing right now. My DS takes it all pretty literally, so we've had to help him work through the mean words many times.

That being said, I agree w/ Suzetta that some kids are just mean and this boy may be one of them. We've dealt with that too. It's unfortunate that his mom did nothing, but perhaps she discusses these things after the fact in private. You can hope, right?

Hope this helps!

If it happens again just step in and explain to dd that he would like to play by himself (or they would like to play by themselves) and help her find another activity.

As you're helping her find something else to do you can talk to her about how she feels, that he didn't express himself in a nice manner, see if she can think of a better way to say it, etc.

Focus on her. If he decides he does want to play with her (because now all of a sudden the focus is on her, that seems to attract other kids) then, if he's not been too ugly, then let them play but keep a close eye. If he was really ugly to her then explain to him that he is the one that didn't want to play with her and you think it would be a good idea if they played apart for a while.

I bet the other mom will just watch it all happen. If she doesn't like the way you handled it and she tells you so then talk to her about why she didn't step in to help her son express himself in a friendly manner.

UGH. I remember being mean and kids being mean to me when I was really little. I think sometimes it's harder watching it happen to my own.

Gosh mamas, when you witness this stuff, please stand up for your child and for every child that you see being bullied. When kids engage in this kind of behavior and it goes unchallenged by adults, it reinforces that it is acceptable to mistreat people.

If the child's parent is watching and not intervening, I step in and tell the child directly in a gentle, parental way 'William, we don't talk to each other that way. You don't have to play together if you don't want to, but please do not speak to Baby in that tone of voice." I then take Baby away from the immediate situation and redirect her play elsewhere.

I've had this come up a couple of times. My baby was born in China, so she has a different look than the typical sandy blond haired kid that is indigenous to this midsized midwestern town. Rarely, we've come across a child with a pretty limited set of life experiences, and he may not have ever actually met kids who were of a different ethnic heritage. Like a typical three or four year old, he says what he thinks without filtering: "get away, I don't want to play with you."

If the witnessing adults don't tell him that this behavior is not acceptable, then he doesn't know that. Just like I would never stand by while Baby (or any child) was hit or physically abused, I feel just as strongly about stopping kids from emotionally abusing each other.

Furthermore, it's critical that Baby knows I've got her back. Any kid who messes with Baby is messing with mom !

Having just read "Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline", I would work on teaching my child assertive communication skills to help her stand up for herself. If my child came to me crying about a situation like this, I would go with him/her and coach her to tell the other child firmly, "I don't like it when you say that to me." If I thought I could discern what the other child was really trying to communicate (because I agree that "you're not my friend" is just 4-year-old code for something more complex that they can't articulate), then I would coach that child as to what to say to express what he wanted to get across in an appropriate manner. If the child still was being mean, then I would encourage my child to go and play somewhere else, and to assertively tell the child, "If you are going to talk that way to me, I will go and play somewhere else."

I've gone through this a little bit the past few days on both sides of the "meanness" fence. Yesterday, my almost-4-year-old ds was frustrated because he wanted to go play with a certain neighbor boy, and I told him he had to stay home because we were having some other friends come over, one of whom was his age. He immediately started saying, "I hate Jeffrey! I wanna play with Noah!" Well, because of the circumstances, it just wasn't an option at that time. I thought he'd end up being excited to see his friend Jeff, but in reality he spent the entire time stewing because he couldn't play with Noah, and he did take it out on poor Jeff. It was just a challenging situation all around, and at times I handled it well, and at other times I didn't. Maybe the boy's mom at the park you mentioned just didn't know what else to say, since sometimes the more you say, "Don't say that! That's not nice!", the more your child will do it. Anyway, I tried to help my ds express what he was really feeling. I knew that he didn't really "hate" Jeff, he just really wanted to play with Noah at that point in time, and no other friend would do. But even with intervention, Jeff still did get some of the brunt of ds's frustration, and at the end he left exclaiming, "D______ is the meanest kid I know!"

Well, today, ds and I were at a playground, and ds got to be on the receiving end of some kids being mean to him and calling him a baby. I told him to go to the kids and say, "I am not a baby. Do not call me that." When they continued, then I intervened and helped him find someplace else to play. When we were in the car, we did have quite a long chat about what had happened and how he felt ("angry and sad") when the kids were mean to him. Then I was able to tie into the playdate with his friend Jeff the day before, and we were able to talk about how Jeff must have felt. (This was after ds told me that he was "never, ever mean to kids". I just had to chuckle to myself, knowing that only the day before he had been proclaimed "the meanest kid".)