4 year old bully!?!

tinkerbell1978

Not sure what to do to help my sister but her daughter is being bullied at school she is only 4 years old and its been since she has started school.

We never realised that this was happening but we noticed her behaviour had got out of control, we thought she was just really really naughty turns out she cries every break time and then lets it all out when she gets home.

The little girl bullying her pushes and nips and tells her i dont love you and i hate you so when emily gets home she says the same and pushes her cousin who is 21months.
I said to my sister it is prob likely the childs mother was either a bully at school herself or that she was bullied turns out the mother was bullied and has done what i would have prob done and taught the child to stick up for herself and be assertive prob is she has done it too much and turned her child into a bully.
my sister has mentioned it to the school and apparently the little girl has already been excluded from a playschool so you would have thought they would have kept an eye on her. anyway nothing seems to have changed my niece is naughty i know its prob not all down to the bullying as all children are naturally a little naughty!
its not just her she is bullying though its another little girl who's behaviour is the mirror of my niece is it a bit drastic to pull her out of school as she doesnt really need to be there until she is five but then she would lose out wouldnt she?!

misty

Even if you take her out of school now - she will have to go back - unless she changes school.

I would try and nop it in the bud as soon as - I would go back to the school and ask them what they are going to do - they must have some strategies in place - whether it is to encourage them to play together or to keep them apart. I gues the majority of it - goes on at play time or lunchtime rather than when they are in class. If that is the case they need to talk to the dinner ladies/playground assistants and make sure that the children are kept n extra close eye on.

You could (I wouldn't personally) invite the child who is bullying to tea and try to get them playing together. You could speak to child's mother but again I would be bothered I would end up rowing with them.

It's not acceptable and as it is happening at school - the school need to be proactive rather than reactive to it(pardon the pretensiousness!)

tinkerbell1978

the strange thing is my niece actually loves the little girl who is bullying her strange no?! and when my sister told my niece i know its not the best advice though! that when she pushes her push her back this happend the other day in front of my sister and the the little girl went round the playground saying my niece had pushed her and they all went against her and ignored her it brings me to tears it really does its amazing what effect being bullied has and it amazes me tat it can happen at this age! we have told her to tell someone if she pushes her again etc and she said when she did the teacher just nodded thats it nothing was done my sister i think will be having another word with the school! before it gets out of control! thanks for the advice! you see i worry because the bullying has effected her behaviour and because she is close to her cousin the behaviour is already starting to show in him the screaming etc!

Dead_Eye_Jones

yeah I think close contact with the school is the way forward, find out how she gets on each day and keep the pressure on. Provide a loving and stable home environment and ensure that she at least knows what behaviour is and isnt acceptable, dont let her pick up the bad behaviour. Continue to enforce your boundries and stick to a consistant regime.

Never quite sure what to think about the 'if he hits you then hit back argument' - obvioulsy this isnt a great rule to live by in life but I think in the playground it actually seems like a reasonable suggestion, I can only say it worked for me at primary school - I just thought it was a rule, if someone hit you, you hit them back, and I always did it. I worked out for myself that sometimes this resulted in you hitting each other harder and harder until it got quite painful and didnt achieve anything, a lesson well learnt because Ive never hit anyone since then! At the least make sure its 'self defence'.

Hmm I dunno part of me also thinks that its unacceptable but the reality is in the playground the weaker kids can really suffer. Kids know how to hide this stuff from the school, telling teach is easier said than done...

culpepper

If mum were to ask the picked on little girl how being bullied made her feel and then pointed out that,that is how she makes her own cousin feel when she does it to him, she might stop doing the same to him.
Then she can be told when the other little girl bullies her she must say ,If you push me ,it makes me feel sad ,I wont love you.If you are friendly,I will.
The trouble really with small children is that they can't always put themselves in anothers position and need it pointed out.
The other little girl really sounds like she needs help to express her feelings in another way . Maybe school could help there.

inkie

Number one - do not encourage your child to retalliate - from what you have said in your previous posts it appears that this is what the bully's mother has done - hence we the situation that you are in. It is not a sign of weakness not to retalliate. If we all took the approach an eye for an eye - then the world would soon be blind!

Rather than speaking to the school - put your concerns in writing in a (calm) letter, clearly stating that you find this other girls behaviour unacceptable, and ask how they intend to manage this in line with the school anti-bullying policy.

I know that it is easier to speak to school - but there is no record of yuor concerns, and therefore less of an incentive for them to sort it out.

My daughter came home from school last term with what appeared to be like stangulation marks on her neck (found out later that a boy had grapped her around the neck) - felt like going and throttling the little so and so, but didn't. I wrote a letter, as above (in this case provided photographic evidence of my daughters injuries) and the prob. was soon sorted.

HTH

tinkerbell1978

culpepper wrote:

If mum were to ask the picked on little girl how being bullied made her feel and then pointed out that,that is how she makes her own cousin feel when she does it to him, she might stop doing the same to him.
Then she can be told when the other little girl bullies her she must say ,If you push me ,it makes me feel sad ,I wont love you.If you are friendly,I will.
The trouble really with small children is that they can't always put themselves in anothers position and need it pointed out.
The other little girl really sounds like she needs help to express her feelings in another way . Maybe school could help there.

have tried to explain to her this before a few times that how she feels when the girl is being nasty to her is how her cousin feels when she does it to him problem is my sister has no set routine and where i have a naughty chair and naughty toy box etc she has none of these and when she says she will do it never seems to stick to it and gives in it doesnt help when my sisters laughs at me when i put my son in the naughty chair!

my niece is very spoilt first grandchild and was a prem baby 1lb 6oz so has alway recieved all the attention put the fact that she now has to share Grandpa which is a challenge and a half together with the bullying its stressfull to be around esp when my sister appears to let her get away with most things! she then has grandpa and nanny trying to discipline her too soo three people three different ways this kid is confused! her daddy lives in london and his visits appear to be irregular too! i have suggested maybe she needs to talk to someone but she looked at me as if i was mad i have tried to help her what more can i do if my sister wont listen but then she keeps asking me what to do and i keep telling her its driving me mad!

missk_ensington

You need to do something, I went to Lytham St Annes High School, which you may know has had two kids hang themself in under 12 months due to bullying. At school I had many girls try and bully me, mainly verbally and being nasty, especially when I got a small modelling job. My Mum taught me never to start a fight, and never bully someone, but if soemone is trying to hurt you, hit them now ask questions later! I'm not suggesting you should encourage violence, I'm talking as a last resort.

Normally, bullies are great at a) mouthing off and never actually doing anything or b) doing things to those they know will never dare speak up or hit back. I punched this girl right between the eye balls when I was about 13 and I never had one nasty word again until I left school!

misty

Going off topic - re Lytham High - the police have repeatedly said regarding the second death - there is nothing to suggest bullying - taking into account diaries/talking to pupils and examing comp. Only the newspapers have suggested bullying as a possible reason for the suicide.

aeuerby

inkie wrote:

Number one - do not encourage your child to retalliate

I have to say I don't agree with that. We always told my daughter don't retaliate tell a teacher. Nothing ever got done. The teachers would just tell her to keep away from the bullies - who generally followed her anyway.

She now retaliates and the incidences over this year have become less and less. She is however also told don't start anything but finish it.

I do however agree with the theory of a "paper trail". Put everything in writing then the school can't deny things that have been said and keep copies. Also all schools should have an "anti bullying" policy that should be made available to all parents upon request.

If this child is bullying now it will continue. Taking a child out of school is not going to help either the child or the school deal with the problem as the bully will move onto someone else. This has happend at my daughters school. Children have been taken out of school because of bullying and the bully moves onto someone else. Incidentally our head teacher claims that no bullying goes on in his school

There are websites that do help parents and children cope with bullying and how to sort it out with schools but I can't for the life of me remember them. They have been mentioned on these boards about a year or so ago though. If I can find them I'll post the links.

culpepper

aeuerby wrote:

All schools should have an "anti bullying" policy that should be made available to all parents upon request.

If this child is bullying now it will continue. Taking a child out of school is not going to help either the child or the school deal with the problem as the bully will move onto someone else.

All schools probably do have an anti bullying 'policy' .It doesn't mean they actually use it. (Ours didn't) .They are supposed to record incidence of bullying when reported to them but ours did not according to the educational welfare officer we spoke with.
As for not taking the bullied child out because the bully will turn to another child, that would not be the bullied childs problem. It would remain the school's problem to deal with as before .
A little girl or boy who has a strop and slaps someone is sweet and amusing to a 30 YOLD but terrifying to another 4 YOLD.