My DS (5) has nicked something - how do I deal with this?

[bintofbohemia]

To be fair, it's 4p, but that's not really the point. The school were having a charity collection and making a picture out of donated coins, all of which then go to charity.

DS came home tonight and showed me the coins in his pocket. I asked where he got them from and he said he took them from the coin pot because his friend told him to. I had a talk with him about this and he knew that what he was doing was wrong but X said he should do he did. I've explained that it wasn't his to take, and if X jumped off a cliff would you, the money was for charity etc - but am wondering if a talking to is enough? I know that it's just 4p, and he's only young, but he knew what he was doing was wrong and he needs to understand that stealing (anything) is wrong and sometimes your friends are going to behave like muppets and you need to do what you know is right. Etc. What do you think?

bumping...

Its only 4p, but the principle is wrong. If I were you I would make him hand them back to the teacher tomorrow and apologise for taking them.

If you don't nip this in the bud it could well be something more valuable next time, he needs to know that it is never ok to take something that isn't yours.

Hmmm, on the odd occasion that I have had to deal with kind of stuff with dcs, I have made them return said item face to face with whoever they took it from, or to their teacher if it's a school item. 5 is very young though. I'm not sure he would get that copying his friend is a poor idea at this age through any kind of punishment, but I think you could have a quiet word with his teacher, get him to return the coins and say sorry, and make sure she is on board to give him a big hug for owning up and being so honest.

Thanks - I was thinking getting him to hand it back to the teacher himself and saying sorry was the right thing to do. He did seem quite mortified and said he would apologise. I wondered if anyone might think was BU but I really feel strongly that he has to learn from the word go that this sort of thing is not on. On the one hand, I was quite impressed that he knew at the time it was naughty but disappointed that he didn't act on that.