It’s not the “B” word that you are thinking of. Honestly, I think I could have handled that word better than the word she was called. When I received the phone call from my child’s elementary school principal I felt the wind get knocked out of my sails.
My five year old was called a bully by another parent and was being accused of bullying.
You’re kidding me, right? This was what I was able to muster out before I then got angry and nauseous. I felt like I had been punched in the gut. Now, I don’t feel like I am one of those “not my kid” kind of moms. If anything I am the complete opposite. I am well aware, having three little girls, of exactly what things my girls are capable of. Bullying was not one of them. I never would have thought that my daughter would be called a bully, I actually would have pegged her as a child that could have the potential of being on the opposite end of that equation.
As I am listening to the principal tell me about the “allegations” I am shocked (because of the nature of what happened) by how serious this is. The superintendent had been notified by the other parent; an investigation would occur. Whenever a bullying incident is reported the school district has to follow the policies in place. We would get a letter in the mail outlining the accusation.
A letter? Accusation! Would this go in the ever dreaded “permanent record”?
All the while I can only listen through my tears and think something is not right. My child would never bully another child. The child that has always been praised by others for her manners and behavior. Just a week prior her teacher commented on her report card that she was a “model with her social behavior” and is “an extremely respectful, responsible. and caring person”. What changed in a week? Surely this is a mistake. A meeting was scheduled for Monday morning at 8 am with the parents of the other child. I would have to stew on this for two whole days.
We have a rule in our house that is along the lines of “you don’t have to play with everyone but you have to be nice to everyone”. My five year old, who was in kindergarten at the time and just learning about her social graces, took our teachings to the playground. Without giving a complete detailed account of the event, my daughter encountered a situation where a peer wanted to play with her and her friends, for whatever reason, my child and her friends did not want the peer to join. The things my child said to her peer were not rude or vicious; she actually informed me that she simply said “no thank you”. She did not harass the other child. My daughter tried to preserve the game with just her friends and hurt the other little girls feelings by leaving her out. It wasn’t a scene from the movie “Mean Girls” but still needed some adult guidance to help the girls figure things out. I remind you that they were in kindergarten! The details of the situation did not really vary from child to child, so we all pretty much agreed on what happened. For me, I quickly determined that what my child did was not bullying. It didn’t stand up anywhere near the definition of bullying. Should she have handled the situation differently? Maybe. But she is five. Five! What happened on the playground that day is something that happens all too often, especially with girls. I’m not saying it was right or wrong (r that a five year old is not capable of bullying) but merely reminding everyone of what is age appropriate behavior for this stage in their lives. Would we have used it as a learning opportunity and a chance to teach her more about how to handle social situations such as this? Yes! Unfortunately we weren’t given the chance before it became out of our hands.
It was how it was handled and the events that followed that had me baffled and at a loss for words. The label of this word is horrifying, especially for a five year old. My daughter had never even heard of this word before or knew what it meant. This situation tore at my emotions for days if not the weeks that followed. How could someone call a five year old little girl a bully for an incident on the playground that did not deserve that accusation? Have we lost such faith in our educators and school administrators to handle these kinds of situations that we need to take them into our own hands?
Now, I understand that some of you reading this may have encountered your own child being bullied, truly bullied, and as parents you may have had to go outside of the realm of the school to address it. It is horrible, which is why my child being given that label was so sickening to me. To have her classified as something so horrendous and mean was unjust based on the incident that occurred.
Bullying and being called a bully is a serious accusation that is not taken lightly by any school district. Most districts, if not all, have anti bullying or bullying prevention policies in place. Therefore if the accusation is made, they have to follow their policies to investigate the incident. The policies are necessary to keep all children safe while at school, I understand this fully and did not fault the school for following their protocol. Bullying has become a national problem which only is further amplified by the use of technology. Most states have adopted anti bullying laws and legislation that even bring criminal charges against the accused. School shootings and suicides have increasingly risen where bullying is present. In no way do I look at these policies lightly, what I do look at is the definition of bullying.
We are throwing around the term and using it too loosely. Your child won’t play with mine, well, she is a bully. My son fell and your son laughed at him, well, he is a bully. Your child pushed my child in the classroom, well, your child is a bully. Constantly labeling kids as bullies discredits when a situation really is bullying and needs to be addressed! My child’s school district, Franklin West Supervisory Union, adopts the following policy on bullying:
For the purposes of this policy,” bullying” is defined as any overt act or combination of acts, including an act conducted by electronic means, directed against a student by another student or group of students and which:
A. is repeated over time
B. is intended to ridicule, humiliate, or intimidate the student; and
C. either: a. occurs during the school day on school property, on a school bus or at a
school sponsored activity; or b. does not occur during the school day on school property, on a school bus, or at a school sponsored activity and can be shown to pose a clear and substantial interference with another student’s right to access educational programs.
We need to take the time to learn about what bullying is before we label children as bullies.
Children take their own lives and the lives of others due to bullying. Throwing that term around without any regard for the consequences is reckless. Kids are bullied every day in situations that are unsafe and need to be handled before they get out of hand. Thankfully, this situation was quickly determined to not be one of bullying and my child was cleared of any wrongdoing. But the emotional impact of the accusation was considerable. I wont forget when we explained the situation to our daughter and how she cried, tears pouring down her face, telling me that she was a good person, because she immediately connected being a bully to something bad. We live in a great community, have a good school, a great administrator, and wonderful teachers that supported us along the way. But, my daughter should never have had to experience this in the first place. Is it so difficult for us as mothers to go to one another and talk when our children need some support through a tough situation? As parents it is our responsibility to protect our children but not at the expense of shaming another.
According to stop bullying.gov:
Social bullying, sometimes referred to as relational bullying, involves hurting someone’s reputation or relationships. Social bullying includes:
Leaving someone out on purpose
Telling other children not to be friends with someone
Spreading rumors about someone
Embarrassing someone in public
While I think at 5 a situation like yours needs to be dealt with by working with the kids and not taken to extremes because they are 5, I do think what your daughter did was not ok. Excluding others makes cliques and leads to an environment of more serious bullying in my opininion. My 5 year old daughter is being excluded and has had no one willing to include her and has had no one to play with at recess multiple days in a row. Teaching
children they can tell others they can’t play with them is not ok. We should be teaching them about acceptance and inclusion and a sense of community.
And to answer your above question, yes, we teach them to include not exclude. They will not all be best friends and may never have a play date outside of school but they should feel like a community while at school.
Girls do become territorial with their friendships compared to boys who are just easy go lucky. My daughter tends to be that way and of course by any means I do not teach her that. As an adult, I think we all have to admit that we do the same with others having preferences who we should associate ourselves to. We are all not friendly believe it or not. It’s just a matter of how to say/act it indirectly in a social setting. The only differences we have with these kids is that we were trained with what is considered right or wrong. I think we should all watch “Mr. Peabody & Sherman,” where Penny’s parents did something similar. The only difference is that Mr. Peabody resolved the problem by setting up a dinner with Penny’s parents and have Penny and Sherman resolved their issues with one another. I do not think any 5 year old means to be a “bully,” which I somewhat agree that it is used loosely. But I do believe in owning up to parental responsibilities of teaching your kids what is right and what is wrong and making the school environment a better place.
Why should one child’s wants trump another’s? That’s what you are saying when you state that children should be inclusive of their peers whether they want to or not. If a child walks up in the middle of the game and says “I want to play with you” those who are already in the middle of it should not be forced to say yes just because it’s what that child wants.
Yes, the children who say know need to learn to do it politely (we’re in the middle of the game right now, but next time you can join us). But the child who wants to insert him/herself into the middle of it also needs to learn that you don’t always get your way.
And there is a very large difference between situational instances of “exclusion” and constant, ongoing, exclusion particularly when it is coupled with the excluded child being harassed. The latter absolutely needs to be addressed from the bully’s side. The former needs to be addressed by the child learning you can’t always get what you want.
As a former school counselor, I can tell you for sure that this word is misused often. In fact, it became such a norm that I couldn’t take it anymore and found my true calling at home with my kids. Just this week, my son (in kindergarten) was told he couldn’t play basketball at recess with group of kids. Was he hurt? Yes. Did we use it as a learning tool? Yes. Did I file a complain against the other kid? Heck no. We reminded him once again what it means to be kind as he should be to everyone. HE IS FIVE. And not once did we use the term bully. I fully agree with your response. I feel for the other little girl too – this is not how bullying should be defined to her either.
Great article. Thanks for sharing your story.
I agree with Kim. As a mom of a daughter who has asked kids to play with her at recess and been rejected by her peers, I feel sorry for the other little girl. Sticks and stones as well as words hurt. Kids can be cruel and what would it hurt to let one more 5 year old play with them. I think we all need to teach our kids to be kind to everyone. Leaving people out just makes for hurt feelings.
Toni thanks so much for your comments! I definitely felt horrible for the other child because my daughter has been in that “position” of being left out before. It hurts! Was it bullying though? No. We would have used it as a teaching lesson but ultimately she wasn’t mean, she was kind, she was just not interested in playing with her. Do we force our children to play with everyone, even children they just don’t really have a natural connection with?
Kim, thanks for the validation. Sticky situation for sure because it is a word that gets overused. The sad thing is that this event only hurt the other child’s relationships with these girls rather than helped it. My child was petrified to even look at the other child after this. Sad.
wow. So this mom complained to the admin. that your daughter bullied her kid just because a group of kids didn’t want to play with her? This world is creating a bunch of thin skinned whiners. We need to spend more time teaching our kids that “sticks and stones can hurt my bones, but words CAN NEVER hurt me.” Instead if buying into this drama of hurt feelings, why don’t we empower kids to laugh it off? Walk away and realize their worth isn’t derived from ANYONE else? Give the bully label back to actual bullies, not just anyone who doesn’t do what we want? I hope you gave the school a piece of your mind about how foolish their behavior was and how their actions could actually hurt someone. Thank God we homeschool, this is yet another reason why my kids won’t ever step foot in government school.
Tina thanks for the comment! I actually was really impressed with how our school handled it. They knew, from the second the complaint was received, that this was not bullying. With that said though, most all schools have a bullying prevention policy so when the word gets used they have to follow their policy (legally, did you know there is legislation on this type of thing?!). I understand and respect that because true bullying incidents do need that type of intervention. I place 100% of the overreaction on the other parent and could not have said it any better than you just did. Thankfully we have a good school, it could gave gone the wrong way if we didn’t. Your right, we are spending a lot of time worrying about our kids hurt feelings and being afraid to tell them no rather than toughening them up for tough situations.
I kinda agree with you and I also don’t if my child was called a bully I would get down to bottom of every detail of the situation like you did and I would defend her her and stand by her side yet you also have to put yourself in the other child’s mother and view her side that child by your definition was himulated when she was excluded and if I were her mom I would be outage too like you said they are 5 and no 5 ur old should fee lonely and excluded
Thanks Nadia for the comment! I actually have put myself in the other parents shoes and seen her POV because this type of thing (being excluded from play) has happened to my daughter before. It is really hard to see that as a parent, your child hurt and feeling excluded. I think at the same time though, it is not bullying to not want to play with someone. It may not be nice to exclude but we should handle it in a way that defines the situation. My goal is to just make sure that we understand what bullying is before we call a child one. It was a sad situation all around!