Telling Tales

[Monkeysmum]

My 3.5 year ds while playing with friends often comes up to their parents to report any behaviour that he finds is not to his liking eg "excuse me but Max won't share his car with me" or "just shouted at me" etc etc, I have started to ask him not to tell tales, but I wonder whether this may cause problems in the future, if for example he is bullied at school/nursery and feels he can't say anything for fear of "telling tales". I wondered about telling him to come and whisper to me what the problem is and then if it is a real issue I can address it or tell him to ignore it if not. Any other ideas greatfully received

My aunt with 4 kids would never listen to "tales" between the 4 of them. She used to tell them to sort it out themselves- and they all get on very well- and are very close. Another aunt used to listen to tales between her 2 and the 2 kids ended up hating each other- they were exhausting to be around as they used to try and tell on each other all the time.

I can see your concerns though as this was slightly different being siblings- but maybe tell him not to tell tales on certain close friends (who you know won't bully him- or where you would be around enough to know if he was being bullied by them). As he grows older I guess he would know the difference anyway iyswim.

Whispering is a good idea though as well I think.

Good advice Jimjams, thanks, I think I probably intervene between him and his brother too much at the moment and if they get used to me doing it now they will continue and probably get worse (ds2 is nearly 2). I think I will try the whispering thing with his friends and hopefully he will soon understand that telling tales about really minor things like that is not the right thing to do - hopefully!