Child bully’s birthday party! Do I let my daughter go or do I decline the invite

[Foofloofah]

Just that really. DD isn’t bothered about going as she dislikes this child who bullies her in Y1.
AIBU to insist she goes her to the party to show her my DD isn’t afraid of her or is this wrong message I am teaching my child?
Need advice x

Frogface69 I am so sorry that happened to you. I agree with you that there is no excuse for that and you shouldn’t have been the target of someone who had ‘issues’. It wasn’t your fault or problem. Bullying is damaging. I had it for a large part of primary school too until I changed schools but by then the damage had been done. I want to avoid this for my DD. I don’t want history repeating itself having lived through it. X

Lamdalipa i think the point is that while everyone else involved with the bully (teachers/parents/ health workers/ social workers) should care about her unmet needs, it's not relevant to the OP. Her job is to protect her child.

Porkflute agree with you. I am going to decline the invite. My DD can have a lovely day doing something she wants to do instead. I think it’s my mothers influence of “you just march right in and face them head on” mentality I need to shake off. Different generation and rationale.

It’s absolutely my job or role to protect my child. She is 5 and doesn’t have the tools to deal with the bullying. That’s up to me to sort and hopefully fix for her. The birthday invite threw me as it was expected but hard for me to work out what’s best. My DD gets to decide but I am pretty sure she won’t want to go and I wouldn’t force her to. Ever.

Lam.
So 15 children all in the same class all had something going on to cause them to bully me the way they did ?.
There was 16 of us in my class.
I mean...what are the chances of that, eh ?
I have had enough now. I make no excuses for my bullies.

There is no excuse for bullying. It’s cruel, damaging and quite frankly the responsibility of the authorities & parents/guardians to sort out. Bullying is tremendously harmful and has long lasting effects.

Frogface you were terribly let down by the adults who should have been supervising and supporting you.

I don’t think anyone is arguing that bullying is ok OP. Just that demonising a teeny child is as misguided as being angry at a baby for crying.

If my child got an invite to a child's birthday party who'd been bullying them, I'd just ask them if they wanted to go.
If they did, all good, I'd take them and let them enjoy the party. If they said they didn't,though, still all good and we'd do something else nice on the day.
I've been bullied by a girl at school (verbally) and I know there's no way that if I was ever invited to her party I'd have wanted to go.
It's up to your child and what they want to do in the situation, let them decide.

OP I know you weren't asking about the bullying - but the next time this child bullies your dc and they're hurt (mentally or phyiscally) go into school and say that they are repeatedly failing in their duty to safeguard your dd. Tell the mum of the other bullied child to use this phrase too. Follow up the meeting at school with an email, ensuring that you use the phrase plenty of times - and that include what you want them to do to safeguard your child.

I know that telling school that they are not looking out for her and she is being bullied should elicit the same response as telling them that they are failing in their duty to safeguard her from xxx child - but one of them is just a set of words that they can ignore or brush under the carpet or act on in their own time. The other - duty to safeguard - carries a legal requirement that they need to follow up on, act upon and will get noted in stats and ofsted and the like.

If the other child's mum also complains of their repeated failure in their duty of safeguarding her child, when it's the same child causing the problems, it's going to be taken even more seriously.

you can ask what they intend to do to safeguard your child and hopeully they will come up with some good suggestions. However, you need to think it through in advance and have some of your own too (maybe in collaboration with the other mum?) rather than let the school suggest a few feeble measures.

If it's bad then it's worth suggesting a few strong measures - one - to show how seriously badly it's affecting your child - and two - because from a negotiating point of view it's always sensible to ask for more than you want so you can be negotiated down to what you really want! For example - you could ask that the other child is moved into a different class (don't accept them moving your dc - absolutely the victim should not have to move while the bully doesn't!) which is something that they are unlikely to want to do - but it might mean that you will get them to ensure that they are kept on a different table on different sides of the room and at carpet time they are kept away from each other, which would be a good start for your dd.

rosablue thank you. Your advice is immeasurable and I will certainly use it and speak to the other mother about your information. Thank you! X

My child wouldn’t be going, and I would ask the mother of the child why her child has invited my child to the party if she bullies her at school.

I don’t think the mum is aware her daughter is the class bully. And that’s a pretty full on approach that without a shadow of a doubt would cause either A) a playground punch up or B) strong denial and a complete breakdown of class mum cohesion. Neither is my preferred approach but thank you for the suggestion.

One thing I don't see addressed:

If the child is possibly acting out due to negative exposure at home, what parent in his or her right mind would allow a child to attend a party supervised by those parents?

I certainly wouldn’t encourage my child to attend the party; what I don’t understand though is how this has been going on for a year and you don’t think her parents know - surely you must have raised it many times with the class teacher who would have spoken to her parents?

Decline ! No brainer

Five year olds can bully. I’ve also seen it in my nursery class with 3/4yo and it was the first time I’d come across it in children so young. At that age the bully does need support, but so do the children they target. The child doing it had no need for SS involvement or any concerns with the family.

As for the birthday party - I’d probably not send my child unless they themselves wanted to go or it was a whole class thing where their friends would be going.

Decline.

And I'd start going in with guns blazing. It's got to be dealt with and if the teacher brushes it off then go to the head.

I was bullied and my daughter was bullied for a while. I agree that there is probably something going on at home, but I don't care. If a kid is bullying I wouldn't send my daughter to their party, or would I invite them to one.

I don't understand - if you're really good friends with the mother of the built, do your really not see where the child's behaviour might be coming from?

*bully
*you

@Lamdalipa

Just that demonising a teeny child is as misguided as being angry at a baby for crying.

In what way has Op demonised or is planning to demonise the child? If anything, OP has been too passive for fearof offending the child's mum, her friend. She has also taken the correct approach of speaking to the teacher, rather than the child's mum. You may be well-intentioned but you are coming across as a bit thoughtless and condescending. We all know the kids are 5, no one wants to harm a child!

OP, does your friendship with the girl's mum mean that your dd spends more time with this girl?

It’s tough as I am good friends with the kids mother

I can't get past this. If my child was being bullied by another child, there is no way in hell I'd consider being friends with that child's parent/s.

I may or may not tell her directly that her kid is bullying my child (I might leave that to the school), but I most certainly would drop the friendship. I'd also be on the school's case about this until they actually did something to my satisfaction.

There's absolutely no way I'd be letting my child go to the party. I wouldn't even give them a choice. It'd be an immediate 'no'.

Definitely decline! Speak to school about the child's behaviour.

I don't think anyone is demonising the other child (the bully). It seems pretty obvious that there is something wrong going on in that family - not necessarily that they are bad people, but that they aren't paying enough attention to their child.

The other child's parents need to become aware of what their child is doing to other children. Either the school tells them or you (and the mother of the other bullied child) do. Your child shouldn't have to put up with this. It's horrible for any child.