How do you deal with lies?

[Canshopwillshop]

I have a DD who is 9 and DS aged 7. There are often times when they have had an argument and DS will shout out or come crying to me saying DD has hit him or kicked out in some way. When questioned, DD normally denies it or says he started it and he will similarly argue back that it was DD who started on him etc etc.

I am never sure of the correct way to deal with it. I usually just end up reminding them that no hitting/kicking is acceptable and end up making them both say sorry to each other but how am i supposed to deal with the fact that someone is lying? I suspect that it is often DD that is not telling the truth - she is unnervingly good at lying . When questioned she will swear blind it wasn't her who started it and then gets all hurt and huffy if I don't believe her which then makes me doubt my judgement. DS is normally a bit more transparent and I can usually tell if he is lying but I don't want to be seen to always be taking his side and not believing DD as I could be getting it wrong sometimes. I also worry that if DD gets away with lies at this age, how am I going to cope with her as a teenager?!

Any advice would be very much appreciated.

My two are doing this more & more as well (age 8 & 5). On the advice of a mum at school I have started to try giving them both 'consequences' when neither owns up ie the TV goes off / both go to their rooms. My only worry is that one of them will be pleased to get the other one punished for something they know they didnt do! Evil geniuses..... then in my head as I am sending them both upstairs/turning off tv I keep thinking about all that advice saying 'ignore bad behavior and reward good behavior' but that just doesnt seem possible some days!!

Thanks for replying Duffer. I am sorry but kind of heartened that you are struggling with this too. I was thinking I was getting it all wrong and there was some easy solution but I guess they can all be devious little buggers at times! I might try the consequences route - surely the wrong doer will soon get fed up of the novelty of getting his/her sibling into trouble when they are also being punished themselves?!

It's an odd one isn't it. We automatically think that lying is a bad thing. But we are equally mortified if our child yells out that someones fat in the street and they're telling the truth.

I would not punish the lying at this stage. It's a life skill which they need, so long as it doesn't get out of hand.

I would continue down the consequences path. Ideally they should be able to play together nicely, if they cannot then maybe they need to stay closer to you, do something less exiting that they don't squabble about.

Consequences need to be related to the behaviour not some random thing in my opinion.

Thanks lumpy. I'd not really thought about lying being a life skill but I guess you are right. Def going to try the consequences route.