Monday, August 02, 2010

Mean Girls

My daughter has figured out the power of words. Specifically mean words. It's so disheartening to hear her say calculated things to get a reaction out of her friends. After one loooong week of trying "discipline" her about it I finally just sat down and talked with her about it on Saturday. At church on Sunday I asked the nursery leaders to keep their ears open and notify me if anything was said and then again at playgroup today and they said she was great. Hopefully that little streak was broken. It just makes me sad for the time, which I know will happen, when she's the recipient of that sort of behavior. Hopefully that isn't any time too soon.

1 comment:

Dan's mom said...

Sometimes it is so hard to know which is worse: hitting or mean words. When Katelyn was in pre-school, there was one girl that just had it in for her- pinching, scratching & pushing her. The rules against hitting back were very strict and over and over she was told to "use her words". When she would "use her words" to tell the girl to stop, the girl would cry and say Katelyn said mean things to her - and Kate got in trouble FOR using her words. Finally, she got so frustrated she would just push back and take what came. We need to let kids find an acceptable means of working out their frustrations -if they can't use physical actions, and they can't use words, what's left for a 3 year old?
It's one of the parts of being a mom that "they" forget to tell you about.....