to think my 9 year old son should not push his brothers head under the water in the pool?

[QuintessentiallyShallow]

Is this a normal thing to do?

I was livid. Ds2 was spluttering. He is learning crawl, and he accidentally bashed his older brother, who proceeded to duck him. He was really scared, and could not reach the bottom of the pool, and about a meter from the edge. Dh was a little distance away, but managed to stop it.

Do boys usually do this when playing and swimming in a pool? Is it to be expected?

Not sure that we are abit OTT regards to punishment. He is to to pay all his birthday and Christmas money to a suitable charity that supports people whose family members have drowned (if there is such a charity)

Actually OP, in an attempt to make you feel better I know of a girl who told her little sister (roughly the same age as your two) to jump off the top of a slide and she'd catch her. She stepped aside just to see what would happen, two missing front teeth if you're interested They're both lovely adults now.

I really don't think there is anything wrong with your boy other than not quite grasping what consequences are likely in some situations. The fact he got so upset when you told him what might've happened is good.

I really do think it's just time to start educating him about the nastier consequences of life, and some sort of group like I mentioned before, scouts even would help dramatically with that.

I had an older sister, and she was a pain in the butt. She never tried to hurt me, she just wanted me to pay for stuff for her (on the assumption that I had money from our parents so it was ok, whereas SHE "only" had her own salary....)

Thanks for thoughts and insight. I will mull things over, give ds1 more big boy duties, and keep an eye out for any torture, and see what happens if others try to torture ds2. (not likely, as he will walk up to y6 kids to hug them and tell them he is a little teddy bear and they are a big teddy bear and can he squeeze their nose, or something to that effect. )

Dunking his brother for that would be fairly normal sibling behaviour at those ages and all I'd do is shout a lot explain calmly why it is a really fucking stupid unsafe thing to do and make him sit on the side of the pool for the rest of the visit (but appreciate it's too late for that now!!).

However, in light of the egging on of him to run into the road, I'd be getting quite concerned. As well as keeping a good eye on DS1, I'd be having firm words with DS2 about listening to you (not his idiot brother) and thinking for himself and not just doing what his idiot brother tells him to.

OP - are you an only child? Children can be very cruel to one another, siblings even more so. You made him see the consequences and got him to cry, I'd think that was good enough punishment.
I bet he wouldn't have tried the road trick if you hadn't been there as a safety net.
My little brother got a knife out on me. He was about 4 and I was 8 so I saw it before he could pull it out on me. In fairness we would try to wind him up to see how angry and violent we could get him to be. My little brother is a happily married father of 2 now and we've always got along well.
This sort of behaviour is perfectly normal so don't worry. Don't let him get away with it, but don't worry about him being unusually cruel for his age.

The money punishment is a bit unrelated, I'd say getting him to cry and making him stay home the next time DS2 went swimming would be more suitable. Also let him know you are watching him more carefully now and praise him when he is kind.

I think the punishment is OTT.

It was a really horrible thing to do though!

Does he enjoy swimming? I'd maybe ban him from the pool for a while as a punishment. Certainly impress on him how dangerous it was and how horrible it would have been for his brother.

I think at 9 though it was probably a spur of the moment reaction rather than a calculated drowning attempt and that would make me a bit leniant on the punishment.

Not OTT treatment. I still have problems with water after my brother attempted to drown me. We were about the same ages as your two.

He went unpunished and it led to many years of him harming me / encouraging his friends to harm me as entertainment.

If you can't find a suitable charity then get him to give his money to the RNLI.

friends used to do this to each other. it was hilarious and terrifying all at once.

good times

If he was red in the face and spluttering that is a lot time and not really on for horseplay

But make the punishment a positive thing. May I suggest reconsidering the punishment to:

If he's old enough sign him up for Bronze Medallion lifesaving or pool life saving classes

If he isn't a visit to the coastguard, RNLI to similar organisation. Perhaps even spending some time volunteering there

If you're lucky and you call ahead maybe you could find somone official looking to do a quick 5 minute talk on water safety with him

The classes you could make you DS pay for if you were feeling really strict!!!

You cannot give HIS money away as it has been given to him. What you can do is to stop him spending it so take it away and put it in his bank and by the time he gets to spend it this will all be ancient history.

If you do give his money away you could well just build up more resentment against his brother as he could well see it as all being his brothers fault.

The punishment should fit the crime so for the dunking i would have removed him from the water and possibly cancelled the next swim trip for him all depending on how sorry he was.

For the telling his brother to run across the road then he should have been punished at the time by being made to walk at your side if he cant be trusted to be sensible being allowed to run ahead.

The life saving lessons are great, my oldest two have done/are doing them. They can start at age 10.

The national swimming lessons scheme also covers life saving to a much lesser degree; my youngest did the personal survival award as part of stage 5 or 6, I forget which now. Stages 5-7 all cover some elements of life saving.