Bullies!

My DD is almost 20mo now, and has now twice, to my horror, bullied another child in the last two weeks The first time I was so shocked, as she is such a gentle wee soul, the worst she has done in the past is give someone such a big hug that they've both fallen over. The second time I was shocked again, and I couldn't figure out why she was doing what she was doing, until another little girl, over a year older than DD, came over, watched what we were doing for a minute, then simply pushed my DD over right in front of me for no apparent reason. This was just after my DD had pushed over a younger baby, and it all became clear to me.

Intentional aggression has not been on DDs radar, it is not in her personality to be physically agressive (vocally agressive, yes!), and I believe that this little girl who pushed my DD over today is modelling this behvaiour and that is where she is getting it from. After that happened I realised the first time DD was aggressive was also when this little girl was present, so it all clicked into place (or maybe I am looking for someone to blame!).

I am now totally stumped on what to do, as we see this little girl pretty frequently. The biggest problem, in my opinion, is that her mother appears to be oblivious to it. When she does see her daughter bullying other kids, she does come and tell her off, but very meekly and, imo, not very effectively (though I am stumped on how to discipline a bully!). The rest of the time she doesn't see it (maybe she doesn't want to know!).

It is interesting to me, as we also hang out with another girl the same age as my DD who is a bully too, but her mother is very aware and onto it, and always keeps a close eye on her daughter and disciplines her (age appropriately) when she lashes out. DD has never thought to copy this behaviour (we have been friends for a year now), so is it something to do with the fact that her aggression is reprimanded, or is she just at an age where she is going to start doing these things anyway??

So these are my questions.
What can I do to discourage my DD from being physically aggressive at her age?
What should I do when I see other children bullying DD, and their parents aren't aware?
Should I say something to this little girls mother about what I've observed, or just keep all their meetings very well supervised and not see her as often!?

ETA: spelling

Edited by SoyBasedMama

I really struggle with the word bullying being used with a 20 month old.

Your daughter is too young to have clear communication skills, so she can't talk her way out of a situation, and she doesn't have the emotional maturity to recognise what is going on, she is only a toddler.

Just teach her the way you teach her about needing to hold hands when walking, about not touching the tv, about how to pick up her toys, anything like that.
So say to her what you want her to do, and model it for her, then redirect if necessary. She doesn't know yet how to share, how to take turns, any of the social graces, she is too little, but you can start teaching her. It is never to early to teach about 'gentle hands'.
If other children are being too rough with your child, then simply say to your child something to acknowledge what happened, and redirect or remove from the situation. No need to make a big drama out of it.

maya22, I was mostly referring to the older girl who is, from what I can see, intentionally being mean to my DD by hitting, shoving, taking toys from her etc. which to me is simply bullying, though she is only just three years old so I'm not sure what to expect from a child that age having never had one myself.

I had a friend whos daughter was 5 weeks older than ds so we would spend a lot of time together. The wee girl was very rough she would bite, hit, push and snatch on a very regular basis. My DS is quite mellow and sensitive and has neer been rough he's also a bit of a wuss and get very upset when other kids a rough with him. My friend would never discipline her daughter which became a big problem for me and other mothers who we would see regularly.

My theory with telling off other peoples kids is, leave it to their parents if they are around. However when she failed time and time again to do anything about it I felt that I needed to stick up for DS so I would say things like don't hit him it's unkind, or give it back to him he hasn't finished his turn. I know this pissed his mum off but DS is my priority and I was sick of seeing him get pushed around.

Unfortunately it all became too hard and i try not to spend time with this family any more. There are other mothers who are no longer on speaking terms with her. So not a great example

SoyBasedMama wrote: but I'm just not sure what to say and find myself waffling on for a while about how that wasn't very nice and now the baby is sad so she should give them a kiss and say sorry. I want to make my point clear and concise, since she probably has a very short attention span so I need to say something effective in a short period of time before she loses interest...

How about - we don't hit our friends. You must use your gentle hands. Time for a hug and a kiss to say sorry. Now, what shall we do next.... how about we go and play with...

It is the same parenting as you would use in any other situation. Not rocket science.

SoyBasedMama wrote: I don't think it's an attention-seeking thing, it's almost like she's just doing it to see what happens. Which makes sense, in a developmental way, but I would really like to have some sort of strategy to deal with it when it happens again to discourage her from doing it...

What you said makes perfect sense and I think you've put your finger on it exactly. In those kinds of cases the best thing is to teach the child how to behave rather than how not to behave. So, she sees a young baby/child and wants to communicate interest in a physical way. I think the best thing forward there is to say "oh look, it's a baby/little girl/little boy! Let's touch her, really gentle..." and put your hand on your child's hand and stroke the head or hands together.