my first grade son

In My Humble Opinion
1

In a previous thread, I asked about a homework situation and a lesson I was trying to impart. Now there is a lesson he is “getting” to learn all on his own. And I didn’t realize exactly how much I was stressing about it until just now.

For the back story, my kid is pretty typical in most ways, I guess, other than being pretty smart and the smallest kid in his class. And he is currently obsessed with a show called “Ben 10” on Cartoon Network. It’s almost all he talks about. And he has a big interest in super heroes in general (leans towards whatver movie is most recently released). Anyway, he lent a Ben 10 toy to a classmate who said he could “fix it up for real” in his basement laboratory.

:dubious: , says I.

My son says, “No, Dad, it’s for real.”

So for the past two weeks, this toy has been with this other kid. It was sort of my son’s favorite toy and he doesn’t like to talk about it, and I don’t like to ask cause I get mad. (Yes, I know I have issues too.) There are also a couple other boys in another class that my son sees in the caferteria and the hallways etc, who tease him whenever possible about his interest in the show. Mostly just calling him silly names. This is exactly the kind of thing that sets my boy off. I’ve tried to tell him that’s the reason the other boys tease him, but he just can’t deal with it yet. It’s just been something that he mentions every now and then, but yesterday he told my wife that after he gets the toy back he wants to go to a different school.

So my wife wrote a note for the teacher and talked to her on the phone about the whole situation. The teacher knows the boy’s family who has my kid’s toy and will talk to the mom about it. And she has the names of the boys who are teasing my son and will try to talk about it with him.

While it is far from over, I am so relieved I can’t believe how tense I was. I feel tired now! I was so mad when I found out the kid didn’t return the toy I was ready to march on down to the school. Over a toy! What if something bad ever happens? How will I feel then?

I hope that my kid can really learn something from this. How to relax, how to not let other kids make him feel bad. I’m looking a few years into the future and I see maybe a comic book collector (what with the interest in super heroes and his imagination), but I want to him to be a comic book collector of strong character, with self-esteem that can’t be damaged by some punk calling him “Ben 10 Boy”. I want him to say “Oh yeah, isn’t that the coolest show ever? Thanks!”

I told my wife when it started a couple weeks ago that this is the kind of thing I have dreaded since I first thought of our little boy going off to school. And here it is. I know that it can be much much worse (I did some searches for “bullying”) so don’t tell

me that, but as this is our first instance I am really anxious for it to be resolved.

2

Those early child rearing years can be hard. I’m sorta convinced that you leak IQ points and perspective in breast milk. How that applies to you as a dad, I don’t know!

I recall being upset around first or second grade because a neighbor girl copied my DD’s science project. Also, my son deals with social issues like the missing toy/teasing fairly regularly becase of his autism. Make sure you know the teachers and they know they can reach you anytime. I visit regularly.

Take a step back and a deep breath and try to keep your sense of humor and reasoning skills.

3

I know how you feel - my son is 16 now and I still remember how I felt the first time something similar happened with him. And how I felt when kids picked on him in school, and how I felt when he got into it on the school bus, etc. etc. etc.

It sucks - and it hurts.

4

This is the stuff they don’t tell you about when you have children. Life is full of those not so fun lessons for both of you. It’s not easy.

The first time somone hurt my sons feelings in school I was up for days. It may sound silly but it was really heartbreaking. My sister waited a year before sending her son to kindergarden because he was a bit babyish and she was worried about him. (Yea, we’re an overprotective bunch.) At the time I thought it was a bad idea, but it worked out really well for him. I’m sure he would have been fine eventually, but in the beginning he would have had problems.

5

Your kid will never see that toy again.

Either the classmate has stolen it, or thrown it in the trash, for spite.

He will soon learn his first, bitter lesson in mistrust. And in the fact that people who have no Sense of Wonder want to crush it in those who do.

:frowning:

6

My son, who is in the fourth grade, likes Ben 10. So it’s not like your son is professing his love for Tellytubbies or something. I think the other kids are just looking for something that they know will get a rise out of him.

I think you’re definitely right to get the school involved. My son had a problem in second grade because he was very willing to go along with anything his friends said, even if it meant getting in trouble or getting hurt. We worked with the school and the other parents and it wound up being a win-win situation all already. The school broke up what was turning into a toxic little clique by reassigning people to different classes the next year. My son learned how to be more assertive and say no to people. And the other boys learned how not to take advantage of people. My son is still good friends with these boys but the whole relationship is much healthier.

My advice:

  1. Don’t minimize your son’s distress. To you this is trivial schoolyard stuff, but to him, this is his life! But at the same time don’t let your own emotions escalate the situation. You want to give him the tools to solve this problem, not whip it up into something bigger.

  2. Don’t get confrontational with the other parents. Not yet anyway. Try to be friendly and work with them first. Most parents are very defensive about their kids. But most parents also don’t want their kids to be bullies. It may be helpful to initially approach the situation as “Our kids aren’t getting along.” and not “Your kid is picking on my kid.”

  3. Work with the school. A lot of schools have a zero-tolerence policy toward bullying these days. Hopefully they’ll be able to nip this in the bud.

7

Is this a mixed age classroom or a regular one? If it’s a regular classroom you might want to consider the possibility that the other kids are also six and seven years old.

It is probably the community we live in; but when we had a situation similar to the toy incident I just went and talked to the kid involved. Not like, “Talked To” but like, “So, what’s all this about a dragon treasure?”.

It turned out to have been a much less one sided transaction than my child perceived it as being which is not uncommon. So we all three talked about it and resolved it. He was over here just yesterday actually; he and my son have a rather love-hate relationship thus far. At any moment thay can be found either discussing the finer points of various Yu-Gi-Oh cards or hitting one another over the head.

But it’s certainly two sided. Their strengths and weaknesses are almost perfectly opposite – the other boy is very verbal, not physically terribly well coordinated, very detail oriented in his play and in his approach to the world, a bit sensitive in terms of teasing. My son has a language disorder and is thus very easily frustrated verbally, terrifyingly well coordinated, interested mainly in the broad outlines and action in his play, makes a joke or clowns in response to teasing and otherwise lets it roll right off him (except on the subject of the language thing about which he is quite touchy).

The teasing thing merits some inquiry. Role playing can help quite a lot as can telling stories about other kids (say, um, you) with similar problems and how they resolved them. Make sure you are not talking about him; one of the reasons little boys shut down is that they cannot simultaneously think and feel. It goes like this: Hey, that kid over there looks just like a kid I used to know at school. They used to call him lard-ass. So one day there was this pie eating contest…

He’s a smart kid, he’ll make the connection all by himself.

8

Marienee, it’s a single age classroom, although upper grades and kindergarten are more mixed.

Pochacco, I know it’s not exactly the silliness of the show (I like it too, btw :wink: ) or whatever, it’s that my son gets all worked up about the teasing. I’ve tried explaining that to him as well. The more excited he gets about the teasing the more they will tease him. And he just says the boys are mean. Which is also true.

Bosda, that’s the way I feel about it, but so far my son has been rather forgiving about the situation. He’s been upset about the toy being gone, but he’s still willing to play with the other kid. I do not want my son to grow up bitter and distrustful. There are enough cynics in the family thank you (one, and that’d be me). I would prefer that he merely learn to be more careful and cautious about lending out toys, among other things. The day he took the toy to school, my wife was going to check his book bag to see if some papaerwork was in there. My kid pulled the bag back and hollered “You don’t need to know everything about my life!”. Not a good sign, huh?

And I feel good that the school is involved, I like his teacher and she seemed very ready to take care of it. So, we’ll just see what happens.

9

He came home with his Ben 10 toy (it’s the Omnitrix, the thing that lets Ben turn into the aliens). And worked himself into a huge funk because he couldn’t actually turn into an alien. And he still is not mad at the other little boy. It’s quite strange, IMO. I’m quite relieved that the toy came home at all, I’m just a little distrustful of that other boy for some reason. Honestly, though, I’m a little forgetful myself so I should give the kid some slack.

Nothing yet about the teasing.

10

Boys at this age tend to be somewhat self-conscious, IME; the best you can do is to try and explain to your son that he’s getting teased because the others want to see him react, and hope it sticks. You may also want to look into age-appropriate books on how to deal with bullying.

As for the toy, I’d consider getting him a new one (or fixing it, if possible), and teaching your son that maybe next time he should be more cautious about who he loans his toys to.

Amen to that. A supportive parent will say, “If it’s important to you, then it’s important to me.”

11

It sounds like the teasing is bothering him more than the loaning of the toy, and I don’t see where that’s been addressed as well. Then again, it’s a very hard one to address, and I don’t have any great advice there. I’d agree that the other boys are mean, and offer him my sympathy and awareness that he’s in a tough spot, but then what? If he retaliates, he’ll get in trouble. If the teacher is overly protective, then he’ll be branded a wuss. If he ignores it, it may go away, but it may not. There’s no good answer.

I don’t have a fundamental problem with alerting the teacher to the borrowed toy situation, but what bothers me about it is that I don’t see where your son is learning how to solve his own problems. He told you and you told Mom and Mom told the teacher and it got handled, but it’s not really empowering for your son.

Here’s what I would do, take it or leave it:
“Mom! This kid borrowed my toy and hasn’t given it back?”
“Did you give it to him or did he take it?”
“I gave it to him.”
“Do you want it back?”
“Well, I guess, but it’s not a big deal.”
“OK, then, what do you think you can do about it?”
“I asked him to give it back and he said he would, but he keeps forgetting it.”
“OK, how can you help him remember?”
“Um…I could call him at home in the morning before school and remind him.”
“Great idea! I’ll get his phone number from the directory.”

-OR-
“I asked him to give it back but he won’t.”
“That sounds like a real problem. What are you going to do about it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Would you like to ask me for some ideas?”
“OK”
“Let’s see…you could call him at his house and remind him, or I could call his mom for you, or we could write a note to your teacher, or…”
“Write a note to Mrs. Jones!”
“OK. Go get me a pen and paper and then come help me figure out what we want to say.”

-OR-
“That’s okay, I don’t really want it back.”
“Are you sure? I thought you really liked that toy.”
“No, it’s okay…”
“Well, it’s up to you. If it were me, I’d want to get my toy back, but I know sometimes it can be hard to stand up to your friends. Let me know if you change your mind and I’ll help you think of ways to get it back.”

Bottom line, it’s his problem. He’s a little guy, and of course he needs your help and support and modeling to learn how to handle things. But simply going over his head and solving all of life’s problems, much as it would feel wonderful, just isn’t possible any more. I’d try and prompt him as much as possible to come up with possible solutions and let him try one, even if you can see it’s doomed to fail. It’s not a life or death situation, and only by trying what doesn’t work will he ultimately find what does work. By empowering him in solving his own problems with your support, he’ll become the sort of self-assured, brave confident kid who won’t be targeted by bullies even if he does like “weird” things.

12

He’s only 6 and in first grade. I would have called too.

13

You miss my point. I would have called too. But I would have finagled it so that it was HIS idea to call. Empowerment, and all that.

14

So you did! Sorry about that!

15

One issue is that my son doesn’t exactly care about the toy. He just wants it to be “real” so he can change into aliens. He told me last night that the way this other boy got the Omintrix to work (in his secret underground lab, of course) was to hit it with a hammer. I asked what would happen if his Omnitrix got smashed instead of “fixed”, and he said he’d just get another one. Yeah, I don’t think so. I got a lot of work there to do.

See, that’s the thing…this other boy REALLY can make it “work”. Then my son can turn into aliens and be a hero. And I can not convince him otherwise. This other boy has created a whole backstory and my kid believes it all.

The teasing thing is what really bothers him, and me too. And he won’t even discuss with us the idea of talking to his teachers about it. The first we heard of it being a big problem was the other day when he said he wanted to go to another school. So, while I like the talk of empowering your child and all, empowerment is not the issue. I let my kid make all kinds of choices and ask his opinion on lots of things throughout the day. But his reaction to the “escalation” of the teasing is immature (I want a new school) and in my view (and his mom’s), we talked to the teachers on our own.