playgroup bullies

What do you do when some other kid is being really mean to yours at a playgroup? Do you stand up for your little one or leave them to it? Do you feel it's ok to tell off someone else's kid or would you ask the other mother to intervene?

At a coffee morning/playgroup this week, a 4 year old boy, who is always quit aggressive, was bullying my 2 year old, taking toys off him, shoving him off the ride-on bikes ... I saw him do it about 5 times. His mother wasn't taking any notice of him so several times I told him to cut it out and play nice, which made no difference. It made me so mad, partly because this is my son's first group experience and I want him to enjoy it, not to be scared of the bigger kids. I also don't want him to learn to behave like that. Does anyone have any strategies for dealing with mean kids?

I second lenzy. In all group experiences and at kindy in the future you won't always be there to help your child. Yes he is very young but i think i would remove my own child from the situation without making a big deal about it. Take him to play somewhere else and with nicer kids.
Kids will be kids and i don't think they are "bullies" at the age of four.

Linzy wrote: IMO if there is no hurting going on then you should let the kids sort out the situation themselves. Kids need to work out how to deal with conflict.

Not sure I'd agree with this tbh, I think it is really important that we teach kids how to deal with situations. Not sort it out for them, but for the first few years, kids are on constant " download" mode, so if you explain to your 2 yr old that 'if you don't want so and so to do xyz, then you need to say 'stop'. And say to the 4 yr old that it's not ok to be hitting/ pushing.

You can expect kids to sort things out themselves, if you are confident that you have given them the tools / skills to do that. How can you expect a two yr old to appropriately deal with a situation like that if all he sees is a four yr old getting his way by being rough?

I don't know many parents that wouldn't be ok with someone else gently reminding their child that violence is not ok.

Hth

I feel that pre-school kids aren't ready to sort it out for themselves and need some kind of guidance ... it's just awkward when it's someone else's kid. I certainly don't want to make the other mum feel bad, because all kids can be monsters at times. And I don't hold it against the little boy, because he is obviously too young to have learned the social skills yet. But he really needed some kind of intervention - I don't think you should ever let kids get away with being physically violent to each other. I felt like I should have said something to the mum, but how to say it gently?

I have struck this situation a few times and I have no problems saying something to the other child though I normally say something directed at the both of them like you need to take turns and be nice to each other and if you can't then (and state the consequence). My DD is really good at sharing and I think sometimes she can be taken advantage of a bit. She also only takes a certain amount of pushing around before she hits back.

I did some role playing at home with her before we went to the people's house that we normally have the problem at. I said to her if someone takes a toy off you what should you do, and then suggested ideas of what could be done. She is still a bit little to come up with ideas on her own so I suggested things she could do and we talked about those. Just things like telling the other person to stop and share nicely, use their gentle hands etc and then if that didn't work to move away and play with something else. Or come and tell me so I could help her. Stuff like that. I agree that kids should sort their problems themselves but at this age they need some guidance on what is an acceptable way to deal with the problem.

Tough ay!
I have a 3 year old who has only just started hitting, sigh. But randomly he is only hitting (very infrequently I should add) the kids that he actually really likes and they are always the ones that are smaller than him. It is hard to be the mum of a kid that is hitting. We deal with it by talking alot with sentences like "in our family we don't hit our friends, we use our kinds hands and give gentle hugs" etc And I make him repeat it back to me.
Usually I try and play beside or sit beside where my boys are playing so that all the kids around know an adult is watching. I have found that at every playgroup/music group etc I have every been too the great majority of mums get caught up in adult conversation and the kids just ran about doing their own thing - it can be lonely being the only mum who isn't in on the mum chat (I have no solution to this one though, just rambling I guess). In my coffee group we pretty much just take turns supervising the kids.

Thanks for all your comments and advice. It has made me think about how sensitive we mums are and that saying anything that could be taken as criticism of someone's child could be really upsetting. I guess I would want someone to tell me if my child was being violent, so I could help him learn better behaviour for his own sake, otherwise he'd have trouble making friends.

But I don't know the other mum that well so maybe it would be better just to avoid the situation. She seems like a good mum who just happens to have 2 extremely full-on kids, so she sends them outside to play while she stays inside to get a much-needed break from them... so it would be hard to tell her. I agree with what you said Weeheebaby, about the kids being left unsupervised at these groups. That was the case with my group, all the mums were inside having coffee while the little kids were outside alone... not an ideal situation!