Is my 6 year old a bully

[ForMashGetSmash]

She's a nice little thing my DD,friendly nd sociable...her teacher has previously praised her abiliy to play with just about anyone despite always retaining her "special" friends...she is not given to naturally "mean" behaviour....but this year 5 new kids have come into her very small class and one of them has become friendly with my DD...she seems a nice kid but I don't "know" her yet....anyway...my DD has always been impressionable and is also attracted to the kids with more daring behaviour because my DD is usually very law abiding if you see what I mean...she is the type of kid who hates to rock the boat.

One of the other new kids is a little boy with suspected Aspergers...I think they are still in the middle of establishing things for him....I will call him Joe...my DD has come home tonight and last night with "In jokes" about this little boy...which she seems to be sharing with the new little girl friend. It's always "X says this about Joe...and X drew a "funny" picture of Joe drowining and showed it to him...or X made up a song about Joe and what a messy eater he is...and we told him to put jam on his head and he did"

I feel really worried! Should I speak to DD's teacher? Mention it? How should I word it without being too incriminating about DD? I am not saying she is innocent of blame but she has never teased another child before...

I speak to Joe's mum some days at the school gates and she is so nice and always so worried about Joe's progress that this is awful! He joind our tiny school as he hated his large state school and made no friends there..Originally my DD played with Joe a few times...when term first began...but now it seems that with X's lead she is being drawn into isolating him....should I leave it up to the teachers to notice? I HAVE poken to DD about being nice and not teasing kids...but I am still worried.

I wouldn't worry too much about incriminating your dd: the important thing is that this behaviour is stopped. For your dd's sake as much as for anyone; being enticed into bullying is not good for you. It's hardly as if the teacher would haul her off to boot camp, but hopefully she will keep an eye and stop anything that is inappropriate and also do some general teaching about caring with no names named. I would tell the teacher what you have just told us. She will appreciate your honesty and caring attitude.

I've just found out today that my DS has been cruel to another child in his class (the child is autistic). I'm devasted my child would behave in this way and selfishly glad to hear he's not the only one. You sound like a caring parent,so maybe that means I'm not a bad mother..... I've also spoken with my child about not being mean to other children (many times), it's really important to me and I so want my child to be kind. I don't know what the answer is, but I do know that you clearly care about your child. I'm sure she'll do just fine.

Thanks...it's very hard because for me it is a sign of peer pressure already. She is only 6 and I feel that at this age, they should be blind to differences...in my opinion it is some influence from the other girl and some power tripping on my DD's part.

I am going to speak to DD's teacher tomorrow... [terrified emoticon]

My response has always been "I don't care what the other little girl did, my job is to teach you to behave". Yes, peer pressure starts early, but then that means you can get a lot of practice in about standing up to it, before you get to the stage where it can get you into serious trouble.

Also, I wouldn't be too sure that the peer pressure is all from one side. I have known children tell stories about what X made me do, when independent witnesses have afterwards revealed that the child was actually the ringleader. But the approach I mentioned will do equally well in either case.