How to deal with a bully

[kisaki333]

Need aome advice on how i should have handled the below. I don't think i did very well 😔
My dd is 2.5yo, she is tiny for her age. We were at the library today. They have a little baby area with some oversized building blocks,a couple of soft toys ( including a dragon she loves) .
A grandma and her grandson (about 4yo) and granddaughter (about 5yo) came in. The grandma is foreign, doesn't speak English at all ( i know cause i interacted with them befofe). The children speak both English and their other language but talk to each other in the other language.

Last time we interacted (also at the library) the two children were quite nasty, pushed my little one once and tried to hit her. The grandma intervened then as did i and by the end, they were sort of getting along with my little one.

This time, as they walked in, i was reading a book to DD. Little boy started playing with the blocks and immediately stated "you can't play with my bloks, they are mine" directed at my dd.

We just ignored him and carried on reading. Once we finished, my little one wanted the dragon(it was up on a shelf) i got it for her. Not even a minute later, little boy comes over and snatches it from her hands. I told him "please don't do that, she was playing with it. Please give it back and wait tour turn" no reaction, he just ignored me. Grandma was on her phone, didnt even look up. My little one was getting distressed , she really wanted the dragon. So i told her, this boy is not being nice, he is a bully so let's leave him alone and go play somewhere else. But of course she didn't want to. Eventually i got her playing with another toy. Boy come over and snatches that one. Then my dd went to play with a big box. Little boy followed and was about to push her when i lost it and said very loudly "that's enough, leave her alone!". Grandma finally looks up and shouts something at the little boy (quite agressive). He backed off after that and i mamaged to convince my dd to leave (she cried a little)

I am sad she couldn't play how she wanted. I feel i should have stood up for her more. But how? What would you have doen?

Sorry for all the typos, I am on mobile and have sausage fingers 🙄

Forgot to say as we were leaving -not my proudest moment- but i turned to the boy and told him something to the tune of "you are not nice, you are a bully and we don't like you". Like i said, not my proudest moment 😟

Anyone?

The other child isn't a bully. He's just another small child who wants what he sees to play with and unfortunately hasn't yet been taught about sharing.

The grandmother (how do you know she's the grandmother btw if she doesn't speak English at all?) should obviously be stopping him from taking things from other children.

You calling him a bully was OTT and nasty.

That's not bullying. It's one small child unable to regulate their behaviour due to their age.

The grandmother should have intervened. That doesn't make the boy nasty or a bully. She wasn't doing a good job but you will come across this many times unfortunately.

You couldn't make your daughter do what you wanted her to do either.

I agree that he’s not a bully.

You know the behaviour to expect from him so preempt it by standing between him and your daughter so he can’t snatch anything off her.

To me, what was happening was that the boy was trying to get your and/or your daughter's attention but he doesn't know how to do that in any other way than negatively.

It's not your job to play with him but he's not a bully. He's just a kid whose caregivers have ignored him. He was seeking attention.

What I,would have done is when he said she couldn't play with the blocks because they were his, which was your first interaction with him, I would have said something like 'I see that you are playing with them, that's a tall tower you have made. I'll take Samantha to look at the books and when you are finished with the blocks I will see is Samantha can build a tower as good as yours' then I would have walked away from him.

I don't think a 4 year old is capable of being a bully. I would not have said that to him but may have done the other things.
That said, I know that sometimes anger (especially when it's our ot of protecting our kids) can cloud our judgement.