There have been many school gate conversations where the comment has been pass that children can be very cruel/mean to each other. I have seen some parents get very worked up because their “little angel” has been treated badly by another child. I have equally witnessed parents say -“isn’t that the way it is, they will grow out of it”
The reality is that children are learning how to behave from their parents, their siblings, their classmates, teachers, sports coaches etc. The additional reality is that there is a large variation in the emotional and intellectual development of each child and this further compounds the challenges that some children may face.
As my own children have gone through primary school I have developed a number of responses to situations that have developed with other children that have served me well. I hope that you find them useful.
Are you OK? How do you Feel?
My priority as a parent is where my child is at when she tells me, followed by what they are learning.
There have been plenty of times when they had processed an incident for themselves and were telling me only because I had asked what had happened during the day. I would not have served them well to pull them back into the emotion of the event (as much as I really wanted to get mad on their behalf).
So instead I learned to focus on how they had learned, how they could handle a similar situation if it came up again.
Retaliation may lead my child into trouble
Although my child’s own immediate reaction might have been to physically rail back, or insult or be very cruel verbally, these responses were never going to serve my child well. Both my children received a constant message to never respond physically. My son in particular who was doing Tae-Kwan-Do was warned you can block a hit but you must never attack and if you do there will be no more Tae-Kwan-Do. Their verbal responses were to be of the variety of smart, diffusing or confusing but never insulting or hurtful. They learned to respond with phrases like “So!”; “Your point is” “that’s just what I was hoping for” “Thank you” these latter too need a little extra explaining. My daughter had a couple of months where another child called her “weird” “Strange” etc. My daughter’s confident response of “Brilliant” “Thank you” etc diffused the situation, and the other child quickly learned that her mean words didn’t hurt my daughter. It also avoided those I said you said escalations.
Public Face – Private Face
At one level we all want our children to recognise and express their emotions and understand what it is they are feeling both positive and negative. When they encounter other children acting in a bullying manner however they are best served if they do not disclose their true feelings to the bully. If they are able to hold a mask of not being affected by the bad behaviour the bully learns that they have no power and this can actually diffuse the situation in some cases. In these circumstances however it becomes very important that the child has the opportunity to express their emotions in a safe environment so that they learn to let go of all the anger and hurt. As the parent we can make a calm call when we need to go for re-inforcements to support our child and when our childs own public face protects them sufficiently.
What does the Child Want?
As my children have got older I have found it hugely beneficial to them and the development of their sense of self esteem to ask if they want me to let the teacher know what is going on, before I rush in in self righteous indignation. My son in particular, really wanted to handle situations with other pupils for himself. He know that I was there in the background, he knew he could tell me what he was planning without judgement but rather i would make sure that the possible consequences were thought through.
in this way he learned great life lessons of what he needs to do to handle difficult people and how to protect the messages in his own head and his own feelings.
Get over it and Move On
When my daughter was about 4-6 she came home with various stories from school and it turned out that they could be a week old, a month old and in fact the longest gap was something that had happened the previous year. It started a process of constantly messaging that I could help her deal with things that were current and that she just had to let them go. At the same time she was constantly told that each day was a new day and yesterdays hurts are gone and that she needed to be respectful and kind with each new day. Yesterdays hurts were yesterdays.
Overall, I believe that most people are fundamentally good and if we treat people well we will receive the same in return. However my children’s experience of “meanness” “jealousies” “bad moods” and “pettiness” during their school days have taught them the core skills of how to handle these situations effectively so that they protect themselves and their self-esteem and general sense of well being.
Mary Corbett is a founder member of Parenting Club, author, life and business coach and mother of 2 busy children aged 12 and 17.
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