Conference moira::parenting_v3

	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

An interesting topic; I'm sure we'll get a lot of interesting responses.


�	in the future, there'll be times when neither Jan or I will be there 
�	to talk with the other children and have to explain to Leah, after 
�	the fact, that there are just some kids who are selfish, mean and 
�	just not very nice.  

I'd be careful to say that kids (not just some kids) sometimes ACT selfish, 
mean, and not very nice.  This is more than just semantics.  There will be 
times that any kid act bad.  That does not make them a bad kid.  Remember, 
condemn the behavior, not the child.  

I also think that there are a number of issues here.  I think that exclusion 
due to someone's (1) being too young, (2) having entirely different interests,
and (3) being <fat, clumsy, wearing glasses, unattractive, etc.>, and 
(4) race are different.


TOO YOUNG

This happens frequently when there is a group of kids the same age, but one of 
them has a younger sibling.  This is tough, because even if you CAN succeed in 
making the older kids play with the younger, you may build up resentments, 
particularly if it happens continually.  And I think that if you do it 
continually, the resentment may be justified.  I know of siblings who carry 
these resentments well into adulthood.  In the isolated case, I DO think that 
it can be genuinely tough on the older kids, where the younger doesn't 
understand rules etc.

If you know in advance that this will be a problem, some solutions might be to 
have some activities planned that can be done by kids of mixed ages or allowing 
the younger child to invite a friend.


DIFFERENT INTERESTS

This happens frequently when the "left out" is the only boy/girl.  I think 
this one usually develops a bit differently, because it's not that the "group" 
WANTS to ostracize anybody, it's that the "left out" doesn't want to do what 
the other kids want to do.  In a sense, they ostracize themselves.  Often, 
this solves itself, if the "left out" kid can just goes off and does their own 
thing.  Sometimes, it may mean that an adult has to play with the "only", but 
often at a large gathering, there are enough adults to handle that.  Another 
solution is to allow the "left out" to invite a friend.


TOO ______

I guess this one I am pretty much uncompromising with, particularly if it is 
accompanied by teasing or cruelty.  At this kind of outing, I would approach 
the group collectively and try to get them to include everyone.  If my child 
were in the group, I would talk to them individually.  If necessary, I would 
enlist the help of other parents.  I would not allow either of my kids to be a 
part of an exclusionary group.

That's not too say that I expect them to be friends with everyone.  I am 
talking about a typical family outing or something like that.  If someone is 
excluded for a good reason -- for example, a bully -- that's much tougher, and 
could mean that the group needs to be supervised by one of the adults.


MULTIRACIAL FAMILIES

If you don't mind, I will start topic on this one when I have time.  I think 
that it's a different issue, too broad to be covered in a general "peer 
rejection" topic.

    
    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

    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.
    

	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

    .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

    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

	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