2.5yr old pushing, squashing and kicking 1yr old brother

[Rflo92]

Hi all,

I know it's not unusual for siblings to fight etc but I'm struggling to know how to effectively address the behaviour with my 2.5yr old. He is behind with language development so we can't have proper conversations with him.

He is kind and gentle a lot of the time, albeit never really wants a huge amount to do with his younger brother. However, if he feels that little bro is messing with his toys or if he doesn't want him nearby, he has started being quite aggressive. He will kick, push over or even try to squash little bro. When it happens we comfort the 1yr old and remove 2.5yr old from the fun he was having and try to use simple phrases just saying no kicking or gentle etc. but it just doesn't feel like it's very effective. 2.5yr old just kind of looks at me, sometimes tries to push me too which I also stop. But then just goes back to playing. Once or twice he has shown remorse through actions like bringing a toy to little bro or a biscuit or something. Im aiming for setting boundaries and being authoritative but respectful but I feel like I'm failing and falling into permissive in this scenario because I just don't know what to do to be effective.

Any advice appreciated.

Many thanks

If he’s behind with his speech @Rflo92, is he under SaLT?

@BunnyRuddington we were referred to early intervention but at the session we had with the speech therapist, she determined that his delay was not very severe and likely a result of exposure to multiple languages.(To be clear she doesn't think that bilingualism causes delays but said that it can mean they talk a little later in some circumstances). She will assess him again in a few months but for now she is satisfied with his progress albeit happening slightly later than others.

I think you could potentially make the 'remove from fun' a little stronger so that he has a bit more of a natural consequence. How is his understanding? It will be easier if he can understand something like 'no hitting! Come sit with me and calm down', but even if he can't understand all of it, if you're consistent, he'll still make the link between hitting/pushing and boring sitting away from the toys.

If there are two adults, you can divide and conquer, both briefly give attention to little one, then one sit with big one for a couple of minutes to calm down (he might get more upset at first at being prevented from playing, so it might end up being longer, but that's okay). If there's only one of you and you're at home, I think it's okay to pop the 2.5 year old somewhere safe but boring for a minute or two whilst you comfort the 1 year old (for us it was the hallway) and then sit with the older one whilst little one plays, but that I think really does have to be only a minute or two, possibly less if he gets distressed by it. Big brother is actually still only tiny himself, after all.

The flip side of that is how much is little brother getting into big brother's stuff or wanting to be right there with him when big brother wants space? If realistically, it's a fair bit, then big brother probably needs more time/space where he can play on his own.