My Child Is Mean To Others

Annie The Nanny
Hi Annie,
I don’t know what to do because my child is mean to others. Today the teacher pulled me aside and told me that my three year old son was taking toys away from other kids and every time this one little girl would make something out of play dough, he would smash it. She said she didn’t think he was doing it maliciously and I don’t think so either, as it’s just not in his character, but I need to know what to do? I had a long talk with him about it, and he said he wouldn’t do it again. I grounded him from playing games on the computer. Do you know of anything else I should do because I don’t want my kid to be the “bad kid” in class? Thanks Crystal
Firstly, take a deep breath. An incident or two at the play school doesn’t mean your son is headed for trouble. You’ve let him know you’re not happy and given him a consequence and that’s all good stuff. At three, you want it to be a direct consequence, so I would only deny him his games for the day of the offence. If he behaves properly at play school for one day, I would give them back to him, but for a while tell him you will be talking to the teacher every day after class. Tell him you will be checking to make sure he has been well behaved and if he has played nicely with the other kids etc, he gets his computer games back and if he hasn’t, he doesn’t.
He may just have had a bad day, been frustrated or whatever. Kids also do things quite often just to test where the boundaries are. Yours are clearly defined and that’s great. I’m sure the play school has their own methods for dealing with the problem too. They probably put him in time out which would have sent it’s own clear message as well. Don’t worry, if he can’t get away with it on either front, it’ll soon stop. For more help with your parenting, please visit my parenting services page.
Annie