Developmental Blog 9

Bullying

                When do kids start bullying? Well, if you look at my practicum site, its when they are four years old.While at my practicum site I sometimes sub for a four year old classroom of typically developing kids. One day while I was watching the kids play I observed an interaction between the girls of the classroom.  Apparently the new craze in kids shoes are these sparkly toed pink shoes that look like glitter was vomited all over them. A couple of the girls have these shoes and began to bully the ones that didn’t. They were not allowing the girls play with them because they didn’t have the sparkly shoes and they also stopped talking to them. As the adult in the room I stepped in and tried to explain to the girls that it doesn’t matter what type of shoes they have, they should all be friends. They shouldn’t tease the girls who don’t have the shoes because that hurts their feelings and it wasn’t being good friends. I don’t know how much this talking to and explaining helped with the bullying situation but I tried.

                After the day had ended and I was reflecting on the events it shocked me that four year olds could be bullies. These children at some point had been taught that it matters what kind of shoes you wear. It worries me that four year olds are aware of such things and that possibly parents are teaching their girls to be bullies at such a young age. If four year olds are bullying other girls now, what will they be doing to others when they are in middle and high school? The movie “Mean Girls” flashes into my head when I think about it. I certainly hope that someone pays attention to what they are teaching their children and that they learn that material things are not as important.