when does teasing become bullying?

[thisisyesterday]

have posted previously about the "gloating child" at ds1's school.
he has upped his game a bit :(

ds1 has been upset every evening this week about something gloat boy (GB) has said to him. Apparently no-one likes him, no-one will play with him (all things GB has said to him), GB has better toys than him, a better house than him, he has a puppy... the list is endless

every single day without fail GB has something to say when i take ds1 to/from school.
this morning it was "I got to school before you" (said in whiney ner ner ner nerrrr ner voice)
I warned ds1 to ignore him, and I did too. It culminated with this boy grabbing hold of my pushchair and shouting at me that I'm not allowed to walk past him! I ended up walking along dragging him along too. His parents did nothing

Now, because DS1 has been a bit sad I decided to organise a little pumpkin party for him at halloween. I figured we could invite some of the other boys in the class and hopefully engineer some nicer friendships.
unfortunatley he has insisted on inviting gloat boy. because despite all this ds1 is desperate to be friends with him!!!

so fine, i think well maybe here, supervised, we can sort it all out and they can be friends

ds1 tells him about his party and GB says "I won't come, and I won't let X or Y come too" this went on and on, with him telling ds1 that his party is stupid, he'll be having a better party, he'll tell others not to go, he'll pretend to be ill so he doesn't have to go to ds1#s party!!!!

anyway, ds1 still wanted to invite him, despite being nearly in tears.

argh! there is history here too. they used to be very good friends in reception until GB kept telling ds1 to do stuff which got him into trouble. I thought it was all sorted

thank you if you have read this far! basically, do you think i should chat to the teacher about it? or should i leave them to figure it out themselves?
normally i would go for the latter, but ds1 has just been upset every single evening this week and in my opinion this is gradually crossing the line from boyish teasing to actual bullying.... what do you think???

Well I'd say it's bullying. Can you talk to his parents about it? I'm probably more bolshie than you, but I'd have stopped the buggie and asked them to sort their son out. You don't have to be aggressive about it, but at least it'd show him it's not right. Couldn't you talk to the parents about it though? You don't have to describe it's bullying, but you can tell them specifically what he's said about the party. I'd be mortified if my son behaved like that; surely most people would.

Or yes talk to the teacher. In DS's class they had a similar situation. DS wasn't targeted but his friend was and the teacher did a special carpet time talk on how to talk to friends. She made it a general 'If you do this, or if this is being done to you, it's not acceptable' sort of thing. Gave the boy in your son's situation confidence to tell the other boy to stop it as soon as he started on at him and also gave him the confidence to tell the teacher if he didn't stop. The other kids backed him up too. Hope you can sort it soon though. Your poor DS.

thanks, i am not sure i can talk to his mum about it, simply because she is really overprotective and would either cry or just make excuses.

i might see if I can chat to the teacher this afternoon when I pick him up

I wouldn't bring it up with the other mum - its an issue for the school to deal with. It's not teasing - when its teasing, it could be done the other way round too, because its not intended to hurt. But if your son did the same to this other boy, he wouldn't think it was "fun" or "just teasing" would he? No, he'd be annoyed as hell! So - its bullying, and the school need to nip it in the bud.

Why, why, why are some children like this? It must break your heart. I had this in a mild form with DD when she was in Y1. I went to see the head and cried in her office! It was sorted out to some extent, but the other girl would do things like tell my DD she was not allowed to sing in her mum's car (when she was being given a lift somewhere) and generally put my DD down.

They are now 11 and the best of friends.

Take heart, and good luck.

thank you both! i never know if i am just over-reacting with stuff like this
we've talked to ds1 and told him that proper friends don't talk to each other like this, and tried to encourage other friendships but for some reason he just seems to want to be friends with this boy
crazy!
hopefully teacher will have time for a talk this afternoon

Lots of schools use the STOP idea to distinguish bullying from other stuff (because otherwise if someone looks at someone during anti-bullying week the kids come and say that it's bullying).

Basically it stands for

Several
Times
On
Purpose

Hi

This is definitely not teasing, it is bullying and sounds like its getting worse.

My son went through a similar thing with a boy in his class at roughly the same age and it eventually escalated into physical bullying. In exactly the same way,, my ds wanted to invite him to his birthday party and continued to play with him in the playground, seemingly desperate to be his friend. Looking back, I think he thought that being this boy's friend would prove that there wasn't anything wrong with him (obviously the bullying knocked his confidence and self-esteem) and if he was his friend he would stop picking on him.

It definitely needs to be raised with the teacher. No child should have the power to make another feel upset on a daily basis.

In our case the teachers were hopeless and we ended up going to see the Head teacher who dealt with it. I wish I'd seen the Head sooner to be honest.

We bought ds this book when he was a lot younger, to explain what being a friend really means and that you don't have to put up with other children treating you badly. It did help. We had told him all the same things over and over, but seeing it in a book seemed to make it more concrete for him.

Good luck with the teacher this afternoon. I hope you manage to get it all sorted for your ds.

am golad you got it all sorted moosemama.
the teacher was busy this afternoon as she had to get ready for magazine club, but have arranged to see her tomorrow afternoon, which is fine

ds1 said he didn't play with the other boy today which is good

bizarely we do already have that book, purchased after our toubles last year with same child! lol

That sounds quite horrible to me - I would have been in to see the teacher by now as well. IMO bullying is anything that makes a child feel awful about themselves and I really feel that there should be a zero-tolerance policy to anything like this in schools. GB's parents sound crap - I would have been fuming if he had hung off my pushchair. Don't ever think you're being pfb either. If you don't stand up for your child who will? Good luck tomorrow.

I hope your chat with the teacher goes well tomorrow. The behaviour you've described certainly sounds as though GB is becoming quite bullying towards your DS although I'd probably avoid using the term 'bullying' when you talk to the teacher and ask instead about strategies to build up your DS's confidence at responding to GB (and others in time to come) with phrases such as, "please don't talk to me like that", "when you say that I don't like it, please stop" or "I'm going to play with someone else".

Hopefully the teacher will be able to give more insight into how the boys are with each other in class and will make time for some SEAL/circle-time role play about ways to be a friend and ways to let people know that their behaviour is upsetting.

Even in my Y4 class I find we have to revisit ways that friends speak to each other and what to say/do if someone is making you feel sad/left out/belittling you. It's not always bullying but it is always heartbreaking for those involved.

GB sounds like a nightmare - why do his parents do nothing?

well my 15 minute chat with the teacher turned into a 45 minute one!!!
turns out she is really lovely (i didn't like her much before now).
She mentioned bullying first, based on what I had said and there is an action plan in place.
If it doesn't get any better she will have the boy's parents in for a chat about it, but hopefully they can sort it in school.

Hooray, that's brilliant. Bet you feel triumphant!

yeah i do.
although she also said he had 3 iep's last year, and this is the first i'd heard of it!!!