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conuly
One of her friends, he's 2 and a half, and he's at that stage where he hits and pushes.
Well, lots of kids do that, nobody's blaming anybody. But since Ana's been tagging along after him, she's been getting pushed around a lot. Physically - with some guidance, she can stand up for herself. I hated to do it, but I taught her the magic phrase "If you don't stop, I won't play with you anymore", and it works. To an extent.
So today, she and Joshua (the aforementioned kid) and another boy, Frankie, are all playing together at the SICM. And Frankie just went through the pushing phase, made worse by the fact that he's a big kid. If I didn't know he's only almost-three, I would think he was four or older. (He's still inclined to get overexcited and accidentally knock kids over, but that's another matter altogether.)
And Joshua is, of course, every time he gets upset - wham. Well, he's young. His mom got fed up, though, strapped him in his brother's stroller, and left. Big Time Out.
And you know it's bad when you're having a time-out, and first your friend Frankie (barely older than you) goes up and says "Bye Joshua. But, why are you pushing? You shouldn't be pushing. I'll see you later, but don't push!" and then your friend Ana (still not very much older than you) repeats this, going "Bye Joshua. But you have to be nice. That wasn't very nice, you can't push people" at you.
Let's just hope the peer pressure and mom pressure starts working, because, much though I like Joshua and love talking to his mom, I'm at the point where I want to tell Ana that she can't go chasing after a kid who's in that stage - she's a very well-behaved kid in this respect, and apparently it doesn't occur to her that she can hit him back. (Not that I *want* her to hit him back, god forbid, but that would probably teach him a lot faster than anything else, and when she's old enough to understand when it's appropriate, it's an important part of standing up for yourself.) Her method of dealing with him is either to tattle to the adults (which is fair when somebody has physically harmed you, though I'm still working on her own standing up for herself with her) or to skip straight ahead to telling him off verbally. Which is good, but isn't working.
Well, lots of kids do that, nobody's blaming anybody. But since Ana's been tagging along after him, she's been getting pushed around a lot. Physically - with some guidance, she can stand up for herself. I hated to do it, but I taught her the magic phrase "If you don't stop, I won't play with you anymore", and it works. To an extent.
So today, she and Joshua (the aforementioned kid) and another boy, Frankie, are all playing together at the SICM. And Frankie just went through the pushing phase, made worse by the fact that he's a big kid. If I didn't know he's only almost-three, I would think he was four or older. (He's still inclined to get overexcited and accidentally knock kids over, but that's another matter altogether.)
And Joshua is, of course, every time he gets upset - wham. Well, he's young. His mom got fed up, though, strapped him in his brother's stroller, and left. Big Time Out.
And you know it's bad when you're having a time-out, and first your friend Frankie (barely older than you) goes up and says "Bye Joshua. But, why are you pushing? You shouldn't be pushing. I'll see you later, but don't push!" and then your friend Ana (still not very much older than you) repeats this, going "Bye Joshua. But you have to be nice. That wasn't very nice, you can't push people" at you.
Let's just hope the peer pressure and mom pressure starts working, because, much though I like Joshua and love talking to his mom, I'm at the point where I want to tell Ana that she can't go chasing after a kid who's in that stage - she's a very well-behaved kid in this respect, and apparently it doesn't occur to her that she can hit him back. (Not that I *want* her to hit him back, god forbid, but that would probably teach him a lot faster than anything else, and when she's old enough to understand when it's appropriate, it's an important part of standing up for yourself.) Her method of dealing with him is either to tattle to the adults (which is fair when somebody has physically harmed you, though I'm still working on her own standing up for herself with her) or to skip straight ahead to telling him off verbally. Which is good, but isn't working.
