Sensitive toddler - if you had one can I please ask your advice?

[Doowop1919]

Morning all.

I have a little boy who turned 2 in July. He has started nursery for 2 mornings a week and loves it. He's been with me at home before. We went to playgroups and tumble tots so he's been around other children but it was often broken up with lockdowns / travelling etc. Due to COVID, I never had the chance to make "mum friends" in his first year of life so there hasn't been many playdates, a couple here and there.

He's a sweet and sensitive little boy, and plays well on his own. What I'm worrying about - and would love advice on how you helped your children - is that there is a little girl who follows him around nursery and snatches (literally) whatever he's picked up out of his hand. My son goes very quiet, looks sad, then walks off to find something else. She then follows him and does the same. This girls mum and myself are still there in the morning for a bit for settling in sessions which is how I see it. His nursery teacher doesn't see this all the time, which is fair enough, she has other children too. I watched the little girl snatch a bowl of cars out of his hand today that he had picked up, her mum saw and said nothing (not the first time). I said very loudly that he can play with the cars too and they can share and he can go play with one. But he then gets too nervous and doesn't want to.

Is there anything I can do to build his confidence? I see other children saying no when children snatch things from them but my son just goes quiet, looks sad, and finds something else. I've tried to tell him he can say no, that he's playing with it, that they can play together but he just gets too nervous.
If you had a sensitive child, how did you manoeuvre these situations? What did you do to help your child become more confident?

I just want to add I know the little girl is acting in a normal way for her age so I'm not angry about her (at the mother yes for not correcting that behaviour), and when the nursery teacher sees, she corrects immediately but it's just all the time so I would love some advice on being there for my son / teaching him how to react. I'm also 25 weeks pregnant so my emotions are quite high at the moment and I know I might be being a bit sensitive towards this but it just pulls on my heartstrings.

Thank you everyone

Model it and role play it at home and talk to the teacher about supporting him in this.

DP and I have some very pointed interactions modelling asking for stuff, waiting for our turn and asking for and accepting help for the sake for DD who's nearly 4 😅

Thank you! That's a great idea with the role modelling. I will talk to DH about doing that in front of him. DS is quite good at telling us when he wants to play with something, it's just a shame he's not like that with other kids.

I have mentioned it to the teacher so she's aware, but it was in passing. Hopefully she's remembered as there's only 5 kids in each class so less to concentrate on 😅

You can also role play with some toys.

Bunny snatches a toy from lion and lion can say 'I'm not finished! I'll give you a turn when I'm done'

I think it's really important to teach children to be assertive and stand up for themselves, to build their confidence that way. There is a world of difference between being able to stand up for themselves and being aggressive or snatching in return etc.

Role playing with toys is great for lots of issues.

To be honest, you sound like you are being a bit too sensitive. It's possible to undermine a child's confidence by stepping in too much and conveying to them that they can't handle a situation. I'd only step in if violence is involved, otherwise leave them to it a fair bit and if they're struggling, enter the situation with a 'how do we find a solution' mentality rather than a 'stop being beastly to my child' mentality.

Eg - oh, this child wants to play with this too, DS is looking at the moment, let's say he'll have it a minute longer then you can have it - or you've had this for a while DS and other child is interested, do you want to show it to them? Could they find something to swap for it etc

I think role playing as people have suggested, but also playgrounds can be good for this. If there's only 5 kids to one teacher, things can't go too wrong and the teachers will be skilled in dealing with this as it's basically what nursery is about.

So at the risk of sounding heartless - I'd drop DS off and not agonise over what exactly happens at nursery. It all comes out in the wash.

This was DD, by the end of the first year of nursery she was fighting to the death to keep her stuff. She was scared of other children and she just needed time to become accustomed to them. We didn’t actually do anything about it tbh.

I would go with the suggestions of modelling. The problem with a teacher intervening is he becomes dependent on an adult to sort it out for him. He needs to deal with conflict himself. It hurts your heart though, I worried so much DD would be unassertive and always scared.

Agree so much with not intervening too much, it tells kids you need them all the time and they aren’t competent. I have to stop DH from doing it but being at nursery by herself has made her much better at standing her ground.

My son was like that at 2- at 18 he is confident, outgoing and assertive

I know how hard it is though,.

Thank you everyone for the advice. Role playing with toys is a good idea and we'll do it every now and again I think.

I do appreciate the honest advice about stepping back and being too sensitive, and thank you all for delivering it in a kind manner. My emotions are definitely heightened (something I didn't experience in my first pregnancy), so I do know I'm being extra sensitive to his wee reaction. Today was the first day that I said something as I got a bit frustrated watching the 5th toy being taken out of his hand 🙈usually I observe and stay out of it at nursery. I will also take on board the advice to let DS deal with it in his own way and only step in when there's something serious like violence, and mix that up with some toy role playing.
The settling in sessions should be over soon so I won't be there anymore at all.

@Rinatinabina and @Nishky32 thank you for sharing your experiences with your sensitive little ones. It's reassuring to read

I remember that stage of second pregnancy, I think you might be in a jumble of thinking you want to freeze time so DC1 is still your baby forever and not being shuffled along the birth order by the new baby, how can you protect DC1 if DC2 takes up lots of your time, how can you possibly spread your care over two kids not one - been there! It's like anticipating that you won't be so close with DC1 and being afraid of it.

It's a big deal but you have to take a deep breath and plod on, it all sorts itself out. Once DC2 came out, DC1 seemed like a giant lumberjack of a child in contrast and I wasn't so worried about her being hurt!

Best of luck :)

We've been there twice! Best thing I think is to equip them with short, age appropriate things to say to assert themselves. eg "That's mine" "My turn now. Your turn after" "No, stop it, I don't like it" "That's not kind" "We need to share" etc