So, two nights ago, Kitten was scolding Buppy and putting him in timeout. She was shaking her finger really good at him, giving him a thorough tongue-lashing about "naughty" and the like.
And then she hit him. She hit Buppy. Wacked him right upside the head.
My stomach sank. Kids are parrots - they do and say what they see. Believe me, I've had the days where Kitten walks around after me and repeats the last 2-3 words of every sentence. It's like that annoying kid in 4th grade who did it to tick you off because he couldn't think of anything more intelligent to do to tick you off. Except sorta cute and funny.
But it means that Kitten must have seen this somewhere. She must have seen someone get smacked because they were naughty.
I pulled her aside right away, not in a frightening way, but she immediately suspected she was in trouble. I tried to assure her she wasn't, that I just wanted to talk about what happened. I told her we don't hit in this house ever because it hurts people and hurts their feelings, and I asked her to say she was sorry to Buppy, which she immediately did. We reread the book "Words are not for hurting" that night and I think we're over the issue.
Except we're not. Pants and I are definitely not over it. Where did she see this? Who was hit for being naughty? It certainly hasn't happened here. I don't think for a minute that Kitten's daycare lady hits her or Meimei - they go to her every morning with no problems or issues and are happy to see her every day. They like her husband. They like her daughter. They like her puppies.
So where? TV? I'm trying to think of something we might have seen that had hitting, but I can't. The Simpsons? We might have to cut out The Simpsons, which we would have had to do anyway. MIL thought maybe one of the other kids at daycare had gotten physical with another kid. I know there is a kid with a discipline problem, but I don't think the daycare lady would allow him to hit anyone else either. He also goes to school all day, so not much opportunity there.
So where did it come from? We think the scolding came from the daycare lady telling her dogs to be quiet or to get down from wherever. It's kinda funny. We think the finger-pointing came from the daycare lady, either scolding the dogs or pointing at the kids when she corrects them. I can't get my two kids' names straight, I can't imagine she can keep 10 straight all day. But I just can't see her hitting a kid and I'm almost positive she's never hit mine.
But there's that lingering doubt. She had to see it somewhere. Maybe the daycare lady smacked the dog once. Maybe Kitten caught me watching Super Nanny. Maybe it's some weird extrapolation of my chucking Pants on the arm when we're goofing around and it just happened to be a scenario that scares the hell out of us, instead of some funny interpretation of what's really going on.
Any idea of what's going on with this?
3 comments:
Have you asked her where she saw it yet? I know our friends had an incident with a day care provider pinching the kids. It wasn't until they pinched eachother that they had any idea.
Ok-given, I am not all that experienced with this, but I think that it's possible that she didn't necessarily experience something like that in order to be able to act it out. My kid learned how to hit and bite with no one hitting or biting her first, you know? Toddlers express anger and frustration with hitting, even if no one has ever hit them because it's a human response. So, it's possible that she is just expressing or exploring anger in a general way and not reenacting a specific incident. It's also possible that she saw some other kid playing this way and is just mimicing them, not an adult. However, I can certainly see why you'd be concerned and I would definitely ask the daycare lady about it.
Yeah, I hear your concern. I know toddlers express frustration by hitting, biting, yelling, tantruming without being taught it, but since this was such a specific role-playing type incident, I don't think that's it. I'm guessing she saw it in real life or another kid acting it out or on tv.
(We used to watch Simpsons together, too... but can't anymore 'cuz she's getting to where she'd sort of understand some of it... and have questions and be distressed about Itchy & Scratchy)
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