T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines |
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122.1 | | COOKIE::HOE | Hi hoe, hi hoe, it's Sammy Hoe's we go! | Wed Jul 11 1990 20:42 | 25 |
| Milton
I think that you might be over sensitive. BUT, I know what you
mean. My sister takes Josh to her inlaws, they have two sons who
are 5 and 7 and they will have nothing to do with Josh who's 3.
They also have a different life style. The parents takes the kids
out to eat at Mac's while my sister cooks for her family as well
as holding a government consultant job.
My son is adopted. He's Japanese-American, I am Chinese-Canadian
and my spouse is American with a mix of German and French. We
will be facing those impolite, racial slurs when it happens (like
I went through when I was a kid). I was removed from "friend's"
houses when ever such terms were brought out by the kids. My
parents believe the kid's attitudes are a reflection of the
parent's so my folks never graced the doors of folks who have
belligerant kids.
I hope that you might see the difference between kids not wanting
to play with little ones versus kids who espouse racial slurs. I
am sometimes glad that Sammy won't play with bigger kids since he
runs infront of older kids and they may not see him and hurt him
(like infront of a kid sliding down sa slide).
calvin
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122.2 | Lots of issues here | SHARE::SATOW | | Wed Jul 11 1990 21:53 | 68 |
122.3 | imho | MLCSSE::LANDRY | just passen' by...and goin' nowhere | Thu Jul 12 1990 12:37 | 23 |
|
It sounds to me like your child was sort of the "third wheel" in
this game which was already started with the other two. In other
words, "we've already established our relationship with eachother
and you don't fit in right now." Kids (and often adults) don't
know how to handle 3-way relationships. One on one is fine. But
you start to get more than that and someone is bound to get hurt.
I agree with .2 about starting another topic about racially mixed
families. However, my short reply to that is that I really *HOPE*
you're being overly sensitive. I'm not from a racially mixed family
nor am I a partner in one, but I hope I've taught my children that
"kids is kids" or "people is people". There are nice people and
not so nice people...in all shades and sizes.
I agree that maybe a solution would be to invite a friend of the
little one's along so she won't be left out. I have 2 girls ages
10 and 6 and often one is left out (usually the youngest). If I
invite someone for her to play with it really helps a lot, otherwise
be prepared to devote a lot of your time to entertaining her.
jean
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122.4 | It's Pecking Order | HYSTER::DELISLE | | Thu Jul 12 1990 14:23 | 23 |
| It sounds to me your daughter was left out because she was much younger
than the others. If she is two, and the others some years older, I'm
not surprised they didn't want to play with her. It has (probably not
having been ther eto witness it) nothing to do with racism, but has a
lot to do with agism. Kids are very AGE conscious when they hit about
3 1/2 or 4. They become aware of the status of age, of what they are
permitted to do as they age, what they are capable of doing as they age
etc.
Having four children between the ages of 10 months and 5, I see this
all the time. I hear about it at the dinner table, on the swingset, in
the backyard. "Jacob can't come cause he's only 4..." Joshua's not
allowed to play with that cause he's too young..." "We're going with
Daddy cause we're OLDER..."
It's their way of making sense out of their world, and of acquiring an
identity. It's their way of establishing a pecking order. And
unfortunately it can hurt. What you could have tried to do is to be
the OLDEST one in their group for a period of time and include your
daughter in that group. As the oldest, you would have had the highest
pecking order, and been able to include her. But it would have
required you to play with the group for awhile.
|
122.5 | great responses so far | AQUA::SAMBERG | | Fri Jul 13 1990 14:30 | 19 |
| These have all been great responses. Children have to be
encouraged to be generous and thoughtful. Some are more
naturally so, but it's still a skill to be learned, and at
3 or 4, it is still hard to reason with them -- in fact as
we all know, they can be pretty rigid as it is their way
to deal with a big, scary world.
I have tried hard to instill generousity and thoughtfulness
in my kids. There are times when Leah (9) "naturally"
includes the Matthew (6) in play, there are times when I
ask Leah to include Matthew, and there are times I realize it
would be unfair to Leah to have Matthew included.
And I have found friends of the kids that have or have learned this
skill and some who haven't. And kids have to have some resilency
and understand they will meet plenty of kids who haven't.
Eileen
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122.6 | | RDVAX::COLLIER | Bruce Collier | Fri Jul 13 1990 15:07 | 23 |
| .0 > The children/ grandchildren said, "No...you can't...you're too
.0 > young" (or you're too whatever). Both times we could see that
.0 > Leah was upset and on the second time she started to cry.
Don't overreact to this one. I would be surprised if Leah doesn't feel
that she is treated this way all the time, at the hands of (oh horrors)
her parents! Now, her parents doubtless try to confine "you're not big
enough . . ." or the like to cases where it is fairly literally true,
or where an attempted activity would be unsafe for a toddler. Those
other kids may be excluding her more because they don't want to be
bothered. But it is unlikely that Leah follows that distinction, and
she's probably more hurt when her parents are the "nasty" ones. I know
that Eric (4) is much more likely to have a fit when I tell him that he
isn't big enough to do something than when his big brother tells him
that.
I am certainly in favor of teaching kids to be sensitive to others'
feelings, and to try to avoid hurting them needlessly. But the
distinction between necessary restraints and needless insults is really
two subtle for a two year old; so, in effect, they experience the
latter all the time.
- Bruce
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122.7 | Crooked Smile | COGITO::FRYE | | Wed Jul 18 1990 20:12 | 29 |
| Peer rejection is a tough one for me, and an issue that I am having to
face with Maggie. It is just amazing how cruel first-graders can be!
Maggie has underdeveloped or damaged nerves in the left side of her
face. When her face is essentially relaxed it is completely unnoticable.
But when she laughs or cries her face "pulls" to the right side since
the muscles in the left side are not getting the signal to do likewise.
Small problem? You bet from her parents perspective. We don't even
notice it. But she has come home from school crying because she was
told her face was "inhuman"! I have found her in the bathroom smiling
and holding up the other side of her mouth to make it work the same
way. She is starting to balk at having her picture taken because she
has to smile. It breaks my heart! (A brief aside - my kids look very
much alike except for this quirk in Maggie. Many people tell me how
beautitiful my son is.......)
In any case, we have had a lot of talks with Maggie about what counts
in a person - what kind of friend they are, how good a helper they try
to be, etc. We have even talked about some things that are different
about people she cares for a great deal, and how little they matter.
We also had her pediatrician, who she trusts implicitly, talk about why
her face is that way, and that it won't get better BUT that it also
will not get worse.
It all helps a her a little - now what do we do about me! I just want
to go down to the school and knock a few heads! First grade was an
incredible education - for Maggie's parents!
Norma
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122.8 | | BUFFER::CHOW | | Fri Jul 20 1990 18:16 | 49 |
| In rereading .0, I can see where there may have been some misunder-
standing because of my mixing the two separate issues of exclusion and
racism under the same note. Thanks Clay, for starting a new note for
the latter.
I didn't mean to imply that the reaction to Leah were racist. I think
I can recognize racism and the two incidents in question were certainly
not. They were, as some of the previous replies indicated, just kids
being kids. What I found a bit ironically amusing and frustrating was
the comment to Leah about being "too young" when the girl who made the
comment was, herself, only *5 months* older than Leah.
Some of the suggested responses on how to handle the situation next
time the occasion arises are good and I may try to apply them.
Although I didn't state it clearly enough in .0, my concerns regarding
situations such as those previously described are not only "how do I
respond to this situation and correct it" but also, "what, if any,
lesson can Leah learn from this?". Right now, the focus of Leah's
socialization process is sharing (or depending upon your perspective,
lack of sharing). If I were the mythical "Superdad", I would have
been able to say to Leah something like "Gee...those kids aren't
being very nice not wanting to play with you and share the ball....
(take some time out...get Leah involved with the game of kicking the
ball around)....and then later on reinforcing the lesson by talking
with Leah and saying something like "Remember when the kids didn't
want to share the ball with you and then they did....isn't sharing
a lot more fun?". Perhaps it just a matter of practice.
re: .5
> Children have to be encouraged to be generous and thoughtful.
Agreed. I'm just working on the most effective means of "encouragement".
It would give me a great deal of parental satisfaction if some time
down the road, I see Leah involved with a group of kids playing
something or other and it is she who makes the initiative to include
any "outsiders" into the game.
re: .7
> In any case, we have had a lot of talks with Maggie about what counts
> in a person - what kind of friend they are, how good a helper they try
> to be, etc. We have even talked about some things that are different
> about people she cares for a great deal, and how little they matter.
Good for you! This is the kind of rapport I hope to develop with my
daughters as time goes on. It sounds like you've taken what some may
have been considered a "handicap" and developed something positive
out of it. Way to go!
Milton
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