To restrain a child from beating mine?

[JeremySmile]

I have 3 children but am back in toddler group territory with my youngest. This morning, she was playing with a push along toy at toddler group (she's 14 months and tiny) and an older girl of 3/4 came and tried to pull DDs hands off it. I explained dd was playing with it and pointed out a similar one the other girl could play with. She replied no, that she was having that one and tried shoving dd. I picked up the toy and turned it to face a clear direction so dd could walk with it, again explaining to the girl that she could wait nicely for a turn or play with something else. She started screaming in my face, looked around and picked up a pull along dog and raised it to hit dd in the head with it. I caught her arm mid air before the toy hit dd and told the girl it wasn't kind to hit etc. She then started to try and shove the slide onto dd, then picked up another toy to hit her with. Again, I stopped her and this time her mother saw and came storming over saying how dare I touch her child etc. I explained the situation and she said I shouldn't take dd to toddler groups if I'm going to follow her around and be so precious over her. I said perhaps she should follow her child around if she's aware she's unable to share and violent to other children. WIBU to have said this/stop dd being hit?

I would have scooped up my DD in that situation rather than try to deal with someone else's child.

The girl was behaving violently, the organiser and/or parent could have been invited to sort it out IMO.

The other child was doing what most children do at some stage in their young lives. Why the labels? why so much aggression (in your words and attitude to a little child?). Today it was that child. Tomorrow it will be yours. A bit of slack makes everyone's life easier.

Frankly, whether the child is 2 or 4 is irrelevant.
It is also irrelevant whether it is a phase or not.
These are essentially just making excuses for not dealing with poor behaviour
Hitting another child over the head with what is essentially a block of wood is not acceptable behaviour. EVER.
In either of the above scenarios I would expect the mother to be paying more attention not less and to have stepped in.

You should not 'restrain' and angry child, it's too easy for them to get hurt. For example, if you are holding the child's wrist and they twist to get away from you you could injure their wrist and it would be your fault. It's also all too easy to hurt little necks or backs in a grapple.

In that situation it would have been much safer for everybody to have picked your DD (and perhaps the toy) up and moved away.

smartiepants I'm so glad I'm not the only one who thinks it doesn't matter if the child was 2 or 4, it's not acceptable to hit.

The OP has clearly described 'blocking' an attempt by a larger child to hit a smaller child with something that would certainly have hurt them and possibly injured them.

Talk of 'hurting their little necks or backs in a grapple' is emotive twaddle. I've seen parents wrestling their own children into car seats/buggies in ways that would cause me more alarm than what the OP is describing. And something that hurts definitely children's ickle heady weddies is having a child twice the size smash them over the head with something.

Some children ARE more aggressive than others. Some learn boundaries earlier than others, and a few sadly never learn them properly because of poor parenting.

And btw, I have never come across a parent whose child was violent towards others because of SN or genuine behavioural problems who wasn't actively involved in supervising or guiding play away from danger - precisely because of the risk to other children.

OP, you did fine. You didn't teach your daughter that her own mother ran away from aggressive children, and you tried to reason with the larger child while protecting your own. I'd be delighted to see you at any playgroup I go to.

Quoteunquote I agree with you. The brat's mother will reap what she is now sowing, and sadly a lot of other people will be hurt in the process.

I would probably have got between my child and the aggressor to prevent her from striking my child, and would have continued to block her as best I could, while saying NO HITTING in a really loud, serious, and attention-seeking voice, hoping the other mother heard.

I hate, hate, hate toddler groups and this story reminds me of why I stopped going. What always happens is that one parent is left supervising a roomful of other people's snot-coated, horrible children while their parents chat away, oblivious to the bloody awful behaviour their darlings are getting up to.

Talk of 'hurting their little necks or backs in a grapple' is emotive twaddle

100% agree with this.

Doing that with your own child is completely different to doing it with somebody else's. I am speaking from a trained point of view having worked as a specialist teacher with under 5s with behavioural difficulties.

There was a safer way to resolve the situation.

OP, I think what you did was fine, along with many other posters. You can't let your child get hit. You were not being precious.

The other mother was a total bitch. You meet them from time to time.

I think you can often estimate how old a child is by how they speak plus height, general level of co-ordination, level of persistence and determination -- add all those impressions and whatever other ones the OP had together and you are not likely to be too far off. If this child was well able to express herself and looked as if she was 3 or 4 and was stubborn enough and not put off by a firm NO from an adult, then she probably was 3/4.

As I've already said, OP is not (as far as we know) a trained specialist. She is a mother who was put into a difficult position whilst trying to protect her own child by someone else's lack of parenting.

Whether she could have handled it better or not isn't really the point. The point is that she shouldn't have been in the position where she had to decide what to do for the best in the first place.

As someone who had an aggressive toddler on her own once upon a time, I can honestly say I would have welcomed someone else telling my child that it wasn't acceptable to hit because I think children do respond well when there is more than one adult telling them something they are finding it difficult to learn.

The OP didn't hurt this other child, therefore she did nothing wrong.

As pointed out above though, Inclusionist, if your child had behavioural difficulties and some sort of diagnosis, you would be most unlikely to let her loose where she could hurt smaller children.

Otoh, if you were the sort of mother who blasted another parent for restraining your child from hitting a smaller one and lashed out at her for being 'precious' while you were miles from the crime scene, then you would be very likely to have a child who behaved really, really badly.

She shouldn't take her child to toddler groups if she's not going to, well maybe not follow her around exactly, but certainly be aware of what she's up to. Silly cow.

Did the group leader not have a word?
The one's I went to took a dim view of people turning a blind eye when their child was causing mayhem.

Of course it is not acceptable to hit but it is equally unacceptable to character assassinate a little child. Look for a second at the language used by the OP - "she screamed in my face". OP I imagine were you sitting on the floor at face height of the child who started to scream. Quite a difference.
The three year old has to learn not to hit and indeed to control herself as all children do. But the OP has to learn to cut small children some slack and move away.

Fair enough, and I'm not critisising the op, heat of the moment decision and it turned out fine.

But the op is here asking whether she did the right thing. I would say that it was right to act, but in the same situation another time it would be safer to remove the victim of the agression.

In a work context this isn't what I would do- I would remove and deal with the agressor, because not to do so is the wrong message for the other child. I am trained to remove the agressor safely though. I wouldn't advise anybody to physically handle and angry child (other than their own) unless they had had advice about how to do so safely.

Maybe the op has overplayed how distressed the agressor was but trying to move a slide onto a baby sounds pretty far gone.

The other child could have been young and learning
Well, yes. Both children were, obviously. But what lesson is learnt when the innocent one is removed (and loses the toy) and the aggressive child "wins"? What will she do next time she sees a toy she fancies? Do exactly the same thing as she now knows it works, I imagine.
Besides, it's her own mum's job to teach her, not the op's.

You were right to prevent your child from being injured. It gets a bit tiresome when people are full of excuses as to why their DC's behave like hooligans beating up other innocent children. And then protest if somebody dares to tell them off.

I think toddler groups are for the parent and child equally but you should be watching your child first and foremost and a good chat is a bonus. I think I would have been shocked and angry to see you restrain my child had I not seen the bad behaviour that preceded it iyswim so YANBU she should have been watching

I would have removed my own child. I would not have touched another child. I don't think it would occur to me.

Agree, mathanxiety.

The thing I notice most from the OP's description of the aggressive child is that twice, the child looks around and selects a toy to hit the OP's child with. Also, she keeps going when she has been told to wait/not to hit.

I would be more forgiving towards a more immediate, reactive gesture. Which, by the way, would still not be acceptable, and I would still have intervened - but this isn't a sudden single frustrated 'shove', for example.

I would not be cutting a child who repeatedly tries to hit another child with different objects any slack. And not all children go through that as a 'stage'.

However, it is the aggressive child's parent who is a fault. Hugely. For failng to supervise her own child, and then getting aggressive herself (surprise...) when someone else is forced to.

It's not wise to cut small children slack imo. If you don't start training them when they are small you will find your chance has slipped through your fingers. It's far harder to tackle the job when they get older and have found what works for them.

Plus if you cut the aggressor some slack what are you teaching your own child?

math you talk about children as if they are dogs

Am typing fast as I should be doing something else right now -- training to me means modelling good behaviour, telling them what the expectations are and when they have fallen short of expectations, consequences for serious no-nos, consistency, etc.