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Behaviour/development

Siblings hitting each other

2 replies

MrTumblesCrackWhore · 03/04/2013 15:45

Ds(3.5) is quite a physical child and enjoys rough play (we did have problems with him hitting other children but this is now much rarer) however, dd (18 months) has witnessed the rougher physical side of him and has just started copying him, precisely at the stage when he was learning to be much gentler with her. However, she instigates the situation with a gentle shove or hit with a smile on her face, but wails if she gets whacked back since ds is much stronger than her.

I've reinstated the reward chart system for ds (which worked to get him to stop being so rough with her before) but dd is too young for this - I do tell her off and remove her but its hard for ds to see parity in reward/punishment.

Dd is gentle with other children and only seems to 'hit' ds for fun/to see a reaction. Ds doesn't understand this and hits her back in retaliation.

There are times when they get on brilliantly and dd is particularly free with her cuddles for ds. Ds also loves making dd giggle. I wish I could replicate this all the time.

Does anyone else have any experience of this or tips?

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NeoMaxiZoomDweebie · 03/04/2013 16:59

Ds still needs to learn to withold smacks...she's almost a baby still and can't yet reason as well as he....of course on the flip side, she's old enough to grasp "no" and whilst she wouldn't get a reward chart, she'd certainly understand no!

As the parent of two warring girls..who love one another one minute and the next are scrapping (mine are 8 and 5) I understand your pain.

At the moment it's just a case of telling the offender NO and giving the other attention....I also sometimes ignore mine....they sort it out themselves! but yours are smaller and less able to do that...it does get easier though.

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MrTumblesCrackWhore · 03/04/2013 18:55

That's the issue- thanks for your response. Dd does it in jest but gets more than she bargained for.

Ds did it about half an hour ago and managed to scratch her neck a little - he was sent to his room for 3 minutes for getting a 'sad face' on his chart( he gets a smiley face for behaviour like ignoring or walking away) . I went up to speak to him saying things like "we have to teach dd that hitting is not ok, you don't want her to grow up to be a badly behaved sister,do you? You need to help me...I don't hit you do I?' That kind of thing.

He seemed to respond and was reasonably contrite but he's done this before and it's gone back to the same the next day.

It doesn't help that ds is recovering from the flu and we've all got cabin fever- her 18 month behaviour must be quite irritating for him when he's feeling even more grumpy than usual with her.

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