Is my child a bully? Is it my fault?

[Worriedmum2]

I'm heartbroken to find out that my 5 year old daughter may have been bullying another girl in her class. She seems to pass nasty comments to even her closest friends sometimes with no thought to their feelings.That's all it was until last week when there was a more serious incident encouraged by an older girl. I am freindly with the little girl who was picked on's mum, and she is understandably furious and tells me the nasty comments have been going on for quite a while.

I have promised to resolved this but to be honest I don't really know where to start. I have done the usual things like taking away her toys and not letting her spend time with friends but I feel I need to do something else.

If this were an isolated incident it would be different, but the spitefullness has gone on for a couple of years. When I look back I'm not sure she has ever been too considerate of peoples feelings. And yet, if someone were to fall in the playground she would be the first to help. I always considered myself to be a good mum and my husband a good dad, but now I am left wondering what we are doing wrong to make her so desperately unhappy that she would act like this. At least thats what all the bullying websites are teling me the reason for the behaviour is.

Any advice would be appreciated as I feel like a failure that has had her heart ripped out.

have you talked to the teacher? this happened to me, a little bit. my friend told me my dd was hurting hers, and that she was going to speak to the teacher, who sorted it out with our support at home.

Just wanted to add that at 5yo, your DD is still developing her social skills and things like empathy are pretty complicated for young children to properly feel. She will be taking cues from the people and children around her, and will be heavily influenced by older children - which seems to have happened from what you say. She is trying to find ways to fit in and seems to have found something that makes her feel big and important and she doesn't realise the impact it is having on the other child.

Your DD is acting inappropriately, and needs help to understand that she needs to behave differently. But that doesn't mean she is desperately unhappy or destined to be a repeat offender, so try not to beat yourself up about it and instead find constructive ways to help your DD. The motivation and behaviour of a 5yo is different from an older child - it may be that the information you have found relates to older children.

Talking to the teacher is a really good place to start - that way you can make sure that your approach to the problem mirrors the schools approach and that you are not sending confusing/conflicting messages.

I'd also rope in the teacher. Your daughter spends several hours a day at school and that, presumably, is where the problems happen. Make it clear to your daughter that the teacher is 'keeping an eye on her' and that she will tell you straight away if she's being unkind to other children. You also have to hold out some dire punishment as to what will happen in the event of a repeat performance- and mean it. If children think they are being monitored 24/7 then they're more likely to correct their behaviour.

I agree with the above that bullying and name-calling is often a way of children trying to make themselve look more important. Praise her if she says kind things to others, perhaps. Also, watch your own speech patterns... children pick up on how we refer to others.

Thank you for the replies. I have spoken to the teacher this morning and she will keep an eye on things for me. She feels that my daughter is popular and a "born leader". They have not noticed any behavioural problems. My daughter and I have had long chats over the weekend and I have tried to emphasise that if others spoke to her little sister they way she speaks to her friends that she would be upset so to try and think about this before she makes comments to others. Hopefully this will help

sounds like a bright little girl with a strong personality and good verbal skills which are just too big for her infant social skills

I went through a phase of being like this but didn't develop into a bully

she needs guidance and kindness and she needs to be picked up on her inappropriate comments and gently required to think them through

No experience, but think I would try and keep calm and go with 'victim empathy' type conversations...

As you say, trying to get her to understand what the consequences of her actions might be for others

I do think age 5 is too young to be labelled a 'bully' though

Agree with Greensleeves, children this age may have the verbal capacity to behave in this way but not the emotional maturity to understand their behaviour properly

Not sure punishments will help too much at this stage