How Do You Tell Your 4 Year Old How to Deal with a Mean Pre-schooler?

I find at this age kids are still receptive. Most montissori's are good at teaching kids how to handle other kids. They usuall sit the kids down as a group and teach them bully's being bad etc. If they have not done ths yet., I would be wonering why? PTa kid? or big donator? They pull both kids aside and work on it? I agree with the so response also.

Ahh, the 4's - so happy that that is almost behind us. According to our preschool teacher what your son is experiencing is pretty normal.
My DD went through a phase where everyone that didn't want to play her way was mean. Sometimes it was the other kids teasing her, other times it was her being bossy and other kids rebuked her. It's an age where they really learn to interact socially and to negotiate the fine line between standing their ground and leading and making compromises and following a lead.
We did have some kids in class whose social skills lagged behind a little bit. We handled it from a couple of sides and told my DD that some kids simply needed to still learn how to be nice, to stand up for herself and tell kids that she didn't like being teased and to go and find someone else to play with.
At the end of her 4's year it really all settled down and everyone got along much better than in the beginning of the year.
The thing is that you can't protect your child from negative experiences forever. Rejection is an important part of life and dealing with rejection and how to handle "difficult" people is one of the most important social skills.
Encourage him, teach him coping skills (stand up for yourself, find another friend to play with, etc...) but let him figure it out.
Good luck.

My guy is 3.5 and started preschool about 4 weeks ago and has been aggressive. He has hit and likes to pat the other children on the back in a sort of "well done" way, and they don't like it. As they have seen, he's very touchy-feelie. The teachers and I are working with him, he knows the rules backwards, forwards and inside out...like his teacher says, he's a smart boy. But, we feel he is overwhelmed with all the children, like a child in a candy store, or as teacher put it, us adults when we go to the mall, "Which store should I go to first?" He acts and then thinks and is sorry. And, to his credit, all the kids and teachers love him, it's his lack of control that's annoying.

What they have taught the other children is to say "Stop" and hold their hand out palm facing him, when he gets ready to hit, pat or something they don't want him to do. He has a visual and audio reminder to stop, and it's working, he's mellowed a lot.

Since they want to play together and are like magnets maybe tell your son he can stick up for himself to this other boy by doing the same, and help the other boy learn to be nicer. I would tell him when he says mean things to say "That hurts my feelings", and if he pushes him to tell him he will not play with him if he keeps it up. There is so much both of them can learn from this, I hope they can both work this through and be friends.

You've gone to school 3 times on this issue. I agree with what Suz said. If he sees Mommy making this a big deal, it will become a big deal for him. I would try to be a little more nonchalant about it. You aren't going to be able to control or fix every negative peer interaction that goes on at school. They are all still really young. You can say, "gee, it sounds like Billy is still working on learning how to be a good friend, who else might you enjoy playing with at school?" or then ask a different kind of preschool question, "what did you paint today?" Try not to dwell on the the one "problem" kid. It's good your child knows how to stand for himself or walk away, but he shouldn't feel like HE is the one responsible for fixing the other kid's bad behavior choices, either. If it keeps coming up, after a brief acknowledgement, I would change the subject and talk about other kids and activities. Invite a few other boys for a playdate. Try to shift his focus.

well, your poor little sweetheart! an unpleasant situation, and it sounds as if he's handling it very well. don't worry about him turning into something he's not. clearly this little not-friend has undue influence right now, but your son's personality and your parenting carry much more weight.
it's also quite normal for these little conflicts to happen. on the one hand it's good that we as parents are so much more aware of them than we used to be, but it's a double-edged sword. none of us want to see our kids anxious or upset, but they also do need to learn how to handle negative people, and yes indeed, this does start in pre-school.
don't make a huge deal about it. it's validating for your little boy to be heard and understood (for years this sort of worry was just brushed off) but if mommy thinks it's a huge deal, so will he. i would listen carefully, mirror back to him so he knows you get it, and work with him on some role-playing. not billows of comfort and outrage, nor anxious questioning when he gets home. calm, quiet, matter of fact help. and let him bring the issue to you, don't probe.
it sounds as if the school is aware and watchful, and your son is very comfortable coming to you. he's going to handle this and future conflicts very well.
khairete
S.

My daughter was very small. The (Montessori) class bully was very large. My daughter had a very loud voice and was very confident. All the other children had a problem with the bully, who would trip the other kids and sometimes hit them. My daughter didn't have that problem. Why? Because she would YELL and YELL and YELL at him... screaming at him how bad that was and NO he was not allowed, and how dare he... and OMG... the boy HATED that, and it would draw teachers' attention!!! The situation with the boy and the other kids got so bad the teachers taught the other kids to use my little girl's technique. If he hurt them or threatened to hurt them, they were to get in his face and YELL YELL YELL stuff like "NO! YOU MAY *NOT*...." and that they themselves would not get into trouble for this reaction. They even had them practice yelling the "NO YOU MAY NOT" and whatever. That actually worked... but the bully and his mother were very upset and the parents removed him from the school.

You just need to keep encouraging him to play with other kids.
Remind him that HE has the power, and the choice, to play or not to play with anyone.
Ask him why he keeps seeking this boy out. Chances are he doesn't even really understand why he does it, but it will get you talking, and you can help him practice saying stop, no, I don't like that, and most importantly, how to walk away and find someone else or something else to do.
I'm also wondering if there's more than just this one boy, maybe he's just missing you and using that as an excuse not to want to go to school. Is school a new thing for him, or is it a longer day or something?

I would ask my child why he continues to play with a child that he says is not nice to him. If he's playing with the other boy, but then saying he doesn't want to go to school, are they related or not? Why does he want to be friends with a boy that hurts him? Is there something else bothering him about school?

There's a Little Bill episode where there is a mean boy. Bill's dad tells him to say "So?" As in "Your breath smells!" "So?" "You look like a frog!" "So?" If the other kid gets little reaction, he may simply move on.

My DD told me that P hurts her when he plays Batman. Sounds to me like normal boy stuff. I told her to tell him she doesn't want to play Batman and that hurts and if they can't work it out amongst themselves, she can talk to the teachers. My DD is a small child and some of her classmates just looooove her but don't realize they're bigger. I watched another girl give her a hug til they fell over. Maybe ask to help out during recess and see how your son behaves with this kid.

I would personally teach my child to be a little tougher on this mean boy. In the perfect world it would be fine to tell kids to politely ask a bully "not to be mean." In the REAL world this usually doesn't work. Therefore our kids need the tools to stick up for themselves.

Have you asked your son why he wants to continue playing with the "mean boy"? First he says he doesn't want to go to school because of this kid, but then the teachers say they are drawn together like magnets. It can't be both ways. Someone is not seeing what is really going on; either your son is just playing with this kid because he's bullied into it, or your son is using this kid as an excuse.

So, I would tell my son to simply not play with the "mean boy" and if the "mean boy" tries to force him to play with him, then your son needs to speak to the teacher.

If, however, your son does want to play with this boy, then he needs to quit complaining about how the boy treats him.

You can also explain to your son that this other kid apparently wants friends, he just doesn't know how to go about having friends or being friend so rather than be hurt or angry about his remarks, feel sorry for him.. See the remarks for what they are, a lame attempt at getting someone to talk to him.
Empathy is the name of the game.

at this age for us, it was neighbor kids. i had to keep an eagle eye on them and when they started bullying i pulled my son in from playing. i let him see that i was not happy with how they treated him - and i flat out told him, NO ONE is allowed to be mean to him - although not much i could do about other peoples' (unsupervised, undisciplined) kids - i told them all as a group that if they weren't playing nice my son would not be able to play. and i made sure they understood that i was watching. not by threatening them, just by being present. eventually they (as a group) got better. although i still dread when he wants to go outside, i just never can feel comfortable when he's out there. anyway, i feel for you because at least in my situation i had some control. thank goodness he had an amazing preschool and i didn't have to worry about him there.

at 4, i do feel we should be advocates for them. mine is 6 now and in kindergarten and UGH i hate knowing he really needs to deal with this stuff himself at this point. it has gotten better. he stands up for himself, and he walks away if people are being mean.

keep being an advocate for him. keep teaching him that HE is too valuable to be talked to that way, he doesn't deserve it. show him that it's not okay by A. modelling better ways of treating people and B. standing up for him when others don't treat him well. he will get the picture.

as far as the school...well yes, i do think you kind of have to keep going to them. sorry to say (sorry to them too, i know they would probably get sick of me). is there another class he can be put in? if i was the teacher witnessing this, i would feel tempted to separate them and inform them that "if they can't play nice" they need to not speak to each other. but i'm not at school, i'm not a teacher, so who knows, maybe that's not possible.

You want it to be a teachable moment. Instead of teaching him to work it out, teach him to stand up for himself. Obviously the other kid doesn't want to work it out, and at 4, they don't have the capacity to "work it out" the way adults do. The kid is mean, your kid tried to be nice, the kid is still mean. Sticking up for yourself, is not being mean. I tell my daughter to put her hand up about chest high and tell the kid to STOP IT. Don't hit me. Then she walks away. I also tell her it's okay to not like the kid. Last year at school she told me she didn't like Connor. I asked her why and she said that he hits her all the time. I said, you don't have to like him, but you can't be mean to him. Just leave him alone. I didn't try to make them be friends and neither did the teachers. They had plenty of other friends in the class to play with. I wouldn't encourage them to get together, even to work it out. If they have other friends, have them play with other friends. Now if they do keep playing together, you still need to encourage your son to tell him to stop it. Telling him to be nice doesn't work. He has to be stern and tell him to stop. I practiced with my daughter.

My son is 4.5, his older sister is 6. For both of them, while I gave them lots of talks about being nice, and how to spot mean bad behavior, and they are extremely nice and they're hurt when other kids aren't, blah blah, I also always made sure the most important thing was to blow this behavior off, tell the kid to quit being mean, move on, whatever. Unless there is very serious aggressive danger going on, I do not interfere. If one of them comes to me saying "That kid did_____" (and lots of kids around here are way bratty) I usually say, "Wow, that's not very nice, tell him/her to quit it and stop playing with them if you want" or "ignore them" etc. I've even been known to give it the "Handle it yourself, Sweetie, I don't need to hear it, tell them to quit it and just go play with someone else if they're being mean." It seems harsh, but after hundreds of times in parks etc, you just can't keep getting sucked in. My daughter had a bratty girl in her K4 class who I just told her to steer clear of. My daughter still played with her, but she didn't complain after a while because she knew I'd just tell her not to play with her. She would still tell me what the girl was doing, but more of a "can you believe it?" sharing way.

If the other kid is really being bad the school should be handling it much more effectively. If he's not being all that bad and they just keep trying to separate the "magnets" you should tell your son be less sensitive about it if he's going to keep playing with the kid. My son would grasp that at 4.5. He's had some trouble with kids in some classes and ends up playing with them just fine when reporting their behavior gets him nowhere.

Both my kids will also yell at kids to back off and have permission to fight back (which my son has only had to do once). Yelling nips the other kid's behavior most of the time. Brats like easy targets. I'd have your son yell at the kid and be tougher with him. Schools can't really be relied on to discipline kids these days.

Help him learn that it's ok to walk away and when to walk away. Teach him with his plushie friends at home what a "good" friend is and what a "bad" friend is. You have a good started telling your son to ask the other little boy to be nice, but when the other little boy said "no" your son should have replied. "Ok, I'm going to play with someone who is." and gotten up and left.

Good luck.

Well, I had a similar situation last year in my sons first year at a montessori. An older child in the class was bothering my son every day and my son would get "caught" standing up for himself (ie telling the boy to stop etc.). At the end of the day I asked him to be moved to the other class and it was a night and day experience at school.

In our situation the teacher in the original room didn't want to handle the relationship between the two and was letting the 3 and 4 year olds go at it on a daily basis with no intervention. Bottom line, your son is 3. He doesn't know and shouldn't know how to handle this type of situation on his own. Yes, he will have to learn but telling him at home and when he's not in the "moment" is not going to change things in the short term.....eventually but not at 3! Ask if you can come in to spend a day in the classroom and see whats going on. I got different stories from all of the teachers and assistants and 3/4 year olds have budding imaginations. My final conclusion was his original teacher had no intention of managing the relationship between my son and this other boy and if there is no adult helping to manage a negative relationship in the moment the negative interactions happen then nothing will be learned on either side. Keep talking about what to do but also get to the school and see for yourself what's going on and insist on something being done beyond what's been protocol to this point because it's not working! Good luck!