So I took the morning off of work and took my 18 month old son to a local play gym (a Gymboree to be precise). We go once a week and he loves it.
He was playing by himself as I watched when a larger child (more on this later) comes from behind him and pushes him against the wall. My son went down like a ton of bricks. They were not interacting, no toy was involved, it was totally out of the blue.
I rush over and pick my son up, comfort him etc. I ignore the other child (as I was afraid I might punt him across the room). My son was shook up but no physical damage. We went to another part of the gym and played for an hour.
Later, the larger child’s mother comes up and tells me the following:
The child is five years old.
He has a reccurring problem of attacking smaller children.
He does not push or act aggressive around kids his own age.
She has spoken to his pediatrician but doesn’t know what to do.
I didn’t know what to say other than to note in my head that the next time I see this kid, we’re leaving.
So Dopers. What should I have done? Should I say something to the managers of the play gym?
I would be curious as to whether or not there was some pattern as to how he picked his targets besides them being younger. They may be able to straighten the boy out if they can identify the trigger if there is one. Kids like this can be a pain.
No answer here for your other questions, but this one is obvious. The kind of moron who deliberately brings an uncontrolled aggressive child to a target rich environment is the same kind of moron who won’t send the kid to school until legally required.
‘Not until legally required’? Sounds like the mom needs a break; I’m betting he didn’t meet the kindergarten birthday deadline and will start next year. What are the other options? Pay for a pre-school? Why? Especially if the child is having some problems interacting.
I would have bitched him out, in an age-appropriate manner.
IME, these issues are frequently due to a lack of guidance in appropriate behavior. I try to help provide that. It’s amazing how often it works, at least on the younger ones.
Kids don’t always listen to their parents; it’s amazing how effective the interaction of a stranger can be.
Of course, that only works if you don’t have a helicopter rushing in to defend the poor wee tyke.
He has a reoccuring problem of attacking kids younger and therefore smaller and weaker than himself and she sets him loose in a playzone filled with younger and smaller kids and clearly (since it took her time to come over to the OP) doesn’t adequately supervise him there.
I don’t care what kind of break she needs that’s not the way to get it. Maybe try socializing him with kids his own age or older so he doesn’t have the opportunity to pick on the weak. I bet if his problem was that other kids randomly started beating him up for no reason she’d be beside him every moment.
Some good comments. I did not scold the kid as I wasn’t really thinking straight. I want my son to be able to defend himself but at 18 months that’s not really an option.
I did feel bad for the mom as she looked like she was at her wits end. Apparently he pushes smaller children. From behind. It’s what he does.
That’s what I’m thinking. My birthday is in November (yesterday, in fact), and my parents had the option of sending me to school at the end of age 4, which would have made me 5 through most of kindergarten. But they thought that was too young, so they held me back a year. I spent the majority of my 5 year oldness not in school.
To the kid, I would’ve had no problem saying, ‘NO. You don’t push. You’re old enough to know that,’ or something like that. I’ve done the equivalent, at the equivalent place.
To the mother, I would have no idea what to say. What on earth do you say to someone who doesn’t realise that you do not let a five-year-old get away with pushing a toddler? If it’s the first time he’s ever done it, you tell him that if he does that again you’re leaving, and then you follow through. If he’s got a habit of doing it, you tell him before you go into the play centre that if he does it once you’re leaving, and then you follow through. You don’t just watch him do it and let him keep playing, and tell the other toddler’s dad ‘Oh, yeah, he does that.’ Who needs a paediatrician to tell them that?
So the mother saw it happen and didn’t intervene/discipline immediately? Raising kids is hard, and no one has all the answers all the time, but she doesn’t need to take him there if she can’t supervise properly.
This - I was with Junior at a local mall that has one of those play-hut type things that you can take your kids into. This particular one has various climbing things (dinosaurs).
Right after we got in, a much larger child (honestly he looked about 7 or 8 and too big to be in the play-hut based on the ‘Maximum Height’ chart out front, but whatever. Junior is 2.
For some reason this kid decided to act like a little turd and every time Junior would make for a particular dinosaur to climb, this kid would jump in front of him and make comments (to me) like ‘I’m super fast at this!’ and ‘HaHa! I beat you again.’
Fine, whatever, I don’t care - Junior needs to learn to share and there are other dinosaurs. So, Junior was climbing up one end of one, and was about halfway up. The bigger kid climbed over the other side and started coming down towards Junior feet first. So I just waited to see what he would do, because I was tired of taking Junior out of the way for this obnoxious little kid. He slid down towards Junior, realized that I wasn’t going to move him, and started KICKING JUNIOR IN THE FACE right in front of me. Junior put up his hands to defend himself and the big kid drew his foot back like he was going to boot Junior hard. I got right in his face, pointed my finger and yelled ‘You’re nasty and you need to learn to share!’ The kid stopped what he was doing and looked totally shocked.
Of course by this point Junior was crying (because he’d just been kicked in the head) so I picked him up and moved away just in time to see the bigger kid being kicked out and his idiot mother protesting the whole way.
So, the point is, if your child is being picked on by another kid, I think it’s up to you to step in - I think that being yelled at by someone other than their own parent can smarten up some pushy kids pretty quick.