Discovered my dd age 8 is being bullied online.

[Juk3]

So yesterday I discovered my dd had been on the receiving end of some horrible messages from her so called best friend. The other child's mother won't accept her child is in the wrong and has blamed my dd for being controlling and mulniputive towards her child. The other child has been sending demands, telling dd who she can and can't talk to at school and threats if she dares to talk to anybody else or doesn't do as she says, these are long paragraphs/statements and extremely horrible. My dd has sent nothing more the "no" "sorry I am busy" "I don't want to" "can you please stop" so how she can be in the wrong I don't know. The other child has been sending multiple other girls in the class messages about dd and how she doesn't like her but don't tell her etc etc and the same thing has happened on FaceTime and over heard by a parent who then mentioned it prompting me looking back over the messages. I have seen messages from 3 parents so far where the other girl is being mean about dd and then warning the girls off from playing with her, all very unkind and uncalled for. The 3 other girls have told dd in messages what has been going on and dd has said it's fine she doesn't mean it. How do I get through to dd that she doesn't have to deal with this rubbish and move on and secondly how do I deal with the other parent as the behaviour needs to stop.

I have name changed for this

Why is your 8 year old child online?

I would tell school and show them the messages to her and others.

I would then remove any unsupervised access to the internet until she is much older

Are they at the same school? They can help intervene.

But what is your DD doing unsupervised on online platforms?

How is she sending the messages? I would be inclined to stop my daughters access to WhatsApp or anything like that - too young at 8. If you're aware of any bullying at school then raise with the teacher.

Why is your 8 year old child online?

My thoughts exactly. Good grief.

I’d remove the device your dd is using your communicate with the other children.
Inform the school.

It was FaceTime, I message to stay in contact with school friends over lock down and summer not chat rooms or online gaming.

You’ll get hung out to dry here for letting your 8 year old online unsupervised. Which is fair enough, to be honest.

Also maybe consider your own responsibility in this. You need to take some blame for allowing your 8 year old to use messaging without checking.

it prompting me looking back over the messages

Isn't FaceTime just face to face calls?

The FaceTime calls to my dd I was present for and nothing went on in them I was in the room, it was I messages on the iPad.

Can they send text messages via FaceTime? If so I would disable those settings.

But we are no longer in lockdown , they can talk at school surely? Involve school, no 8yo needs to be online nor should either manipulate another.

OP I don’t want to make you feel worse, but you need to check her messages daily. At 8 they’re not mature enough to deal with this.

Do you mean facebook messenger? She's so young to be on stuff like this without you sitting right next to her every single time she sends a message.

I'm so glad mine are late teens now.

Got to say my own dc can only use their devices (kindle fires) on the sofa in the living room. They only have specific games (no chat options allowed on any of them) and no social media. I really hope that I've done enough and I thought this is what others do?

What do you do?

I feel terrible she had to deal with this, as I say the calls to dd where pleasant enough it was the imessages. The messages to other children I from the friend I can't control she isn't my child.

No not face book, Apple FaceTime and the free imessages you can send from an ipad

@Juk3

No not face book, Apple FaceTime and the free imessages you can send from an ipad

That’s just taking you through to iMessage.

Take screenshots, contact school.
Remove the devices now they aren't needed for keeping in contact.
Keep your DD off iMessage and any and all forms of electronic communication. Girls of this age often do go through friendship issues and you need to help your DD negotiate this. It's often their friends that are the source of trouble!
Try not to get over involved, manage playdates etc (DD had one girl who was often mean so if I knew she was also attending, DD would be 'busy' as it always ended in tears) foster a wide group of friends in and out of school.
School may be able to help in managing school related stress points.

Ok you know your dd needs more supervision with online chats - this has been said.
How to deal with it from now on? You tell your dd that she should not put up with anything other than kindness, that’s it’s not ok to be treated in this way.
You inform school that this is happening so they can address it in school.
You screen shot the messages and print them off, give them to the other parent - facts are facts and will speak for themselves, Some parents won’t realise their little angels are capable of bullying behaviour but this is what it is.

Op if she didn’t have access to messaging she wouldn’t be getting bullied ‘online’.

She is far too young to have such access to messaging, so are the other girls. They are not mature enough to realise what they are saying and the effect it has on others.

Take her off the messaging crap and spend time with her, meet up with her friends) if you can obviously).

My dd is almost 12 and only just has access to a phone for secondary school reasons.

8 is far too young!

You can disable imessage. You cannot control another child so you need to manage your dd reactions and access. Presumably you have copies of these messages to show to parent/school. Parents will leap to their offspring's defence however you approach it.

You need to be in the room monitoring what’s going on.

8 is far too young.

Print it all out and give it to the school.