WIBU to cancel DS birthday party as a punishment?

[Superheroessidekick]

DS is due to have friends over at the weekend for his birthday. I have just been called into the school because he ripped up a sentimental item that another child brought in for show and tell. The poor child was devastated and I am mortified. He was also messing around with another boy kicking each other. With 2 weeks left till the summer holidays it seems like there has not been a week where the teacher hasn't had words with us about silly behaviour and he always gets grounded/ punished appropriately in and out of school. I have got to the point where I feel something really has to be done I do not want this to carry on into year 5/6 then god forbid secondary. Is it too harsh to cancel his party?

If you cancel the party, what are you going to say to their parents, and children (who presumably are looking forward to it also?)

If I'm honest, in primary school there are so many birthdays and celebration events, the other children will quickly get over it. Events get cancelled all the time. All she needs to say is: 'Hi, I am so sorry this is last minute but we have had to cancel DS's party. I know your DC was looking forward to it and I hope we can have them over soon. Again, so sorry for the late notice but I hope you understand.' And leave it.

Is it worth using the MN Massive to try to source a replacement? There are people world wide on here. I know it's not the same but it may comfort the poor victim a bit.

I would find the item if I possibly could
I wouldn't cancel the party, bad behaviour normally has a cause.
Whilst I would tell him how upset you are; possibly taking away something of his as a punishment or pocket money to replace the gift, taking away a party seems barbaric.

What it means is they can say whatever they like on the internet especially if they are trying to prove how great they are at parenting.What they do in RL is often very different.

Something is definitely going on here. I'd get to the bottom of it if you can.

Your son is not a bully. One incident towards one child does not make him a bully.

He is 9 and what he did was shitty but he is still a child and they do stupid shit without thinking through the consequences. I am sure he has learnt a lot from this now he has had time to sit back and think about what he has actually done.

A poster said they wouldn't even give their child gifts on their birthday.. that isn't punishment, that is spite.

I am not a fan of punishments as a rule. I prefer to give out natural and logical consequences where possible. I have also found that with my children talking it through with them was enough to make them realise what they have done wrong.

There was one incident with my child that worried me but after talking it through it was clear he felt bad enough on his own and would never repeat anything like it again. He is 18 now and he never did repeat similar behaviour again. I don't think punishing unkindness with more unkindness is always the right way.

I am not a softy parent with children out of control by the way. This kind of thing can be dealt with without harsh punishments. Of course there might become a time where it is needed but right now he is 9 and if he is feeling remorseful and understands exactly what he has done there is no reason to think he will repeat this behaviour again. Children can and do learn that their actions were wrong and when they realise how deeply they have hurt someone they can learn from it themselves without needing any punishment at all.

I think the behaviour at school should be treated as a separate issue. A school report type thing sounds like a good idea.

9 is still quite young, and some children still struggle to manage their emotions at that age. It's natural. Counter intuitive as it seems, throwing punishment into the mix doesn't help. Consequences, yes (so apology, choosing another present for the boy), and dissection of the incident (what led up to it, how does he think the other child feels, what could he do differently next time, praise for when he acts differently in a similar situation in the future). Building empathy rather than resentment I think would be more productive in the long term.

Absolutely this.

Bet he won't destroy anything again on impulse! I won't take that bet, because there is absolutely NO way that anyone can say that! He may not rip something else, but he may do something worse, what then? Cancel his actual birthday, Christmas?

I'm not too sure why he has been acting so bad lately

Look at what is causing this sudden onset of behaviour. A kid, whether they like being the class clown, or are easily led doesn't just randomly start to "hit out" for no good reason. What is causing this most recent behaviour?

You say that you cannot cancel him going out with your mum, as you don't want to ruin his day, but what about ruining the day of his guests, or even him?

And talk to the child's parent...don't just randomly show up with a gift, imo that is like saying the sentimental item is replaceable.

But boys don't tend to build resentment if they feel that a consequence is fair and consistent. All the research around boys and their social learning suggests that they don't respond well to post mortems and lots of talk. In fact talk around this impulsiveness might be good coming from his dad.

ruin her day, not his!

Reading this, my knee-jerk reaction was cancel it.

Having thought about it, though, it's clear you need to back-track to when the poor behaviour started.

If you can track it back to something like his sibling being born, then maybe a long-term strategy for building in more one-to-one time should be in order.

However, he does need a consequence, and he needs to understand how many people are devastated by his impulsive action. In that one moment, he's upset the child who the document belonged to, the child's parent and grandparent, the teacher who presumably feels some kind of responsibility, you and his dad...he needs to see that doing something stupid is like chucking a rock into a pool. The ripples extend far beyond that moment.

Let him see how upset you are, and tell him what you are contemplating doing about his party, so he knows exactly how angry you are. Ask him what he would consider a suitable punishment. His answer will tell you how seriously he's taking his actions.

If he says 'dunno' or 'nothing' or similar, cancel it. He still doesn't get it.

If he says 'cancel my party' I'd probably let it go ahead, but postponed until he'd done something to make amends, or have a reduced version - maybe one mate over for a sleepover.

I'd make him part of the decision, though.

But boys don't tend to build resentment if they feel that a consequence is fair and consistent. All the research around boys and their social learning suggests that they don't respond well to post mortems and lots of talk.

You don't have to have a lot of talks though. OP could ask him how he would feel if someone broke something that was irreplaceable to him and quickly explain how this boy may be feeling. I think most children would be able to empathise with that and come to the conclusion that they did something horrible without long talks.

If this was the second or third time he has done something very hurtful to another child I would consider going down the punishment route then. All I can see from the OP is that he has a history of silly behaviour at school and the kicking thing was two boys play fighting. There is nothing to suggest that he won't learn from this without a harsh punishment. He has no history of bullying behaviour, he has no previous history of doing mean things to children. He can learn from this and still have his party.

I don't know about the research around boys. It worked well for my boys though. I have three teenage boys, one just turned 18 and it worked for me and it is working well for my two girls as well.

I liked to trust that my children can learn from their own behaviour, that they could understand how they messed up and how it made the other person feel with some direction from me. If they were the type of children who just didn't care about hurting others then we would have had a huge problem, but most children will care and just need some direction.

Harsh punishments like cancelling parties should be for times when a child has shown they aren't going to learn from their behaviour without a harsh punishment. Not as the first resort for the first incident of mean behaviour.

Heaping punishment on top of punishment is also useless, cruel and stupid. this is what is happening here.

Punish him in some way but don't cancel his birthday. That sounds nasty to me

It sounds pretty nasty ripping up something sentimental and causing distress to some one else.
Definitely not too harsh

Thus behaviour needs nipped in the bud before secondary school.

Just keep it simple. Tell him it is unacceptable to behave like he did and why and you can show anger (a bit), frustration etc at first but don't go on about it. Make sure you tell him that you know he can do better in future and that you belive that he will. He needs to know you believe in him, even as you implement whatever punishment you think is appropriate.

What you have done so far seems fine (writing letter etc). If you want to implement another punishment, decide on one. Maybe ask him what he thinks is appropriate (you might be surprised how hard he is on himself). Implement the punishment then move on. In the end the actual punishment matters less than the fact that you implement it calmly and consistently.

After this has all died down, spend time with him as has been suggested, develop a closer relationship. Don't sit down and "talk", intead do things with him. While you are doing things you may find he opens up and things will come out to give you clues as to what is happening for him but you have to be present and pay very close attention for a while.

I am talking from experience. DS's behaviour was appalling at school in primary (truly very bad) for a very long time. At home it was not an issue in the same way so it was difficult for us to do much other than support the school and work with him at home on his empathy and how to behave etc. Where something was particularly bad we punished at home as well, though not for everything as that would have meant he was constantly being punished.

He came out the other side and is now doing so much better in school. It is like he is a different child but it took a lot of time and patience (not my best quality tbh).

DS does have ASD but tbh most of the issues around behaviour were to do with his lack of skills in a number of areas. Many "nt" children lack these skills in childhood as well so the same techniques but work with them though they will generally learn quicker than children with ASD, though some need more help than others to do so

Try not to despair of his behaviour or to catastrophise that this means he will be awful in future. This is very very hard to do when you have a child whose behaviour difficult and I didn't really manage that very well but it really does make things worse. DH was much better at dealing with DS calmly but firmly so I tried to follow his lead as much as possible, though I was much better at finding out what might have lead to specific incidents etc by spending time with DS.

One way of lookign at things that I found really useful is Ross Green's
life in the balance www.livesinthebalance.org/. His philosophy is that children do well if they can. That last bit if they can is really important.

He doesn't advocate punishments very often and in many ways I wish we had been able to implement this with DS but we did punish sometimes. Looking back though I do think that punishing a child for something is often more about showing others you care as a parent and being "seen to be a good parent" than actually helping that child to behave better. Ross Green uses somethiung called "collaborative problem solving" which is explained on the link

Often the child would behave better "if he/she could" . It is just that some children have less of that skill than others so they need to learn how to, like any skill it takes time to learn . The Ross Green website gives some really good ideas for how to deal with this and how to help your child.

Good luck OP I am certain you boy is going to come out fine.

I suppose my view on this would be to look at whether I can see a circumstance in which his behaviour was explainable.

With the possible exception of the child being the long-term victim of bullying from this other boy and taking a chance to 'strike back' as it were, there are no reasons why it was okay for him to take action which was so hurtful.

Issues in the home, other issues at school, issues with other children, yes, they need to be addressed, but that doesn't excuse his bad behaviour towards this child. Therefore, there needs to be a consequence for his actions. It my well need to come hand in hand with action being taken to address other issues, but the one is not the balance for the other.

I find, too often, children get away with poor behaviour and bad habits because they themselves are victims of something else. It's not problem-solving to say 'yes, Tarquin was horrid to Jacquetta three times yesterday, but we can't punish him because he's only doing it because xyz.' It just perpetuates a cycle of misery.

Understanding, kindness, listening and love can and should go hand in hand with clear boundaries, discipline and consequences. Letting bad behaviour slide because there's a background issue only means a child is being failed twice instead of once.

OP has already said she's going to talk to him, try to spend more time one to one and chat to the school. She's also said that there doesn't seem to be any backstory between this other boy and her son. Whatever is going on with her son, this other boy, then, is an innocent victim. It's not okay for her son to make another child his victim, no matter what is happening in his life, and certainly not in such a permanent, hurtful way.

He understood what he was doing, and there was no reason for him to hurt this other child. I'd be cancelling his party, too.

Great advice bumblingbovine and so true re. doing things to be seen to be a good parent. I often see on here- "I wanted him told off in front of me" as if public embarrassment was so important rather than teaching the child (when things go wrong with my child, that is the worst possible time to talk to him. I sort it out when we're both calmer.)

Hey girl - I've posted about it before on a different matter but I was one of those kids being publicly bawled out in shops and in front of friends over minor misdemeanours, and when I asked mum about it as an adult she said thought it showed she was in control and was highly surprised when I said none of my friends parents did it and it made her look unhinged. (It really did). Once a lady came up to me afterwards and said quietly "I don't care if that's your mum, you shouldn't have been shouted at like that,". She said it quietly in case my mum heard . (I was skulking "in disgrace" where mum had left me in the shop).

Oh and it made me highly resentful of mum and our relationship is still mit where it should really be although much improved.

mikado1 I was tired last night and thought I would read this thread and give some thoughts. I was agreeing with you this sounds similar to my life. Its about finding that balance theres to many angry people out there in the world.

No one will ever blame the child if the child is showing any form of aggression its the parent they look at. How is the parent parenting him and the op has already said its been going on all year. How is she going to address issues without continuous punishments because its not getting any better.

If he was my child he would still have his party I wouldn't want to kick his self esteem any further down. Its up to me to teach them better.

bumblingbovine49 I love your post and you articulate better than me about punishments. Make them think about what they done and decide what they think is an acceptable punishment. Its a good way to make them think as well as teach them empathy.

Can someone explain to me how 'consequences' or 'natural consequences' differ from 'punishment' when you want a child to appreciate how bad they may have made someone feel? I'm having trouble understanding.