Should I Teach My Child To Hit Back?

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Sooner or later, every baby has a period of first contacts and interactions with other children, and, unfortunately, this experience is not always pleasant. Children push and fight, take away toys or do not want to share them, they can throw sand or break the "bean" - deliberately or accidentally, just like that or out of spite. And in such situations, parents begin to wonder how to teach the baby to stand up for himself. How to make sure that your child learns how to react correctly in such situations, and the offender understands that he did wrong. And the first thing that mom and dad usually decide is to teach the child to "hit back." But what is the right way to teach a child to stand up for himself?

To begin with, the period up to five to six years is the age of the immature nervous system and brain of the child: the departments responsible for self-regulation (including emotional) are not yet developed, the ability to establish logical cause-and-effect relationships is not yet available, and therefore - the behavior of a preschooler is still conditioned by impulses, momentary desires, and sudden emotions. The child still simply does not have time to physically inhibit his feelings (for example, anger) and can, succumbing to an impulse, hit if, for example, someone accidentally touched him or took a toy without permission. Thus, in no case should such a baby's behavior be considered aggressive, labeled and considered a fighter. The child is not yet capable of aggression in the adult sense of the word, this is just an immature behavior. And it is observed in absolutely all children, with varying degrees of severity and frequency.

But what can you do to protect your child from such manifestations in your address? First of all, to understand that such situations when they offend your baby are inevitable. In the same way, your child can become a "bully" for someone. And you need to treat such actions calmly, without drama, without weaving your own adult context into such situations.

Secondly, parents should remember that a baby up to at least three years old needs constant support from an adult in all situations of social interaction. This is necessary both in order to prevent the aggressive actions of your child, and in order to protect, if necessary, from the attacks of others, as well as to show by your own example how you should react in certain situations. An adult who accompanies a child must physically suppress all violent actions - simply intercepting the child's hand in order to prevent a blow, substituting his hand if the kid wants to push or bite, taking his son or daughter from the conflict zone.

If we broadcast to the child the idea that if he was hit, then he should hit back, we risk meeting with completely different consequences than we expect. After all, a preschool child is not yet able to calculate the force of a blow and correlate his strength with the desired one, and, accordingly, can hit harder and even cause serious injury. Are you ready for this? In addition, children can often push or hurt through negligence - does it make sense in this case to hit back? You should also be aware that by informing the child of the postulate "if you were hit, hit back", we instill in his consciousness the idea of the normality of violence, of the admissibility of physical force in principle. It is not known whether the kid will understand that this is such a way to protect himself, but he will definitely learn that you can fight, that strength decides everything, that if you don't like something, you need to attack. Because in preschool age children the main way of learning is imitation, thoughtless repetition, without realizing the essence and content of these actions.

But what if the child is out of the parent's field of vision? If we are talking about preschool age, responsibility for the behavior of the child is still on the adult who is responsible for him: on the grandmother, nanny, teacher. Because a child is still physiologically incapable of consciously and maturely controlling his behavior, let alone influencing the behavior of other children. Teaching a child to "fight back", we, in fact, give him an adult tool of self-defense, and this is completely unfair, because, firstly, a child of this age should not defend himself, and secondly, it is definitely not his responsibility to regulate the behavior of others children.

Does this mean that we should not teach children about self-defense? No, it doesn't mean at all. But there are many more ways to stand up for yourself than just hitting. You should definitely teach your child to say such phrases: “Stop!”, “Stop, I don't like that. I don’t want to play like that”,“It’s unpleasant / painful for me, stop it!” It should always be emphasized that conflicts need to be resolved verbally.

Being in the company of other children, the child should always know who the main adult is, who is now responsible for him and to whom he can come if he is offended. There is no shame in involving a caregiver or nanny in resolving a conflict on the site or in a group. Child protection is an adult's responsibility! In our adult life, we also do not always use force, even for the purpose of self-defense - sometimes in a situation of danger it is wiser to even just run away, scream, call for help. Well, to stand up for ourselves, we also resort to all sorts of methods, and physical strength is definitely not on the list of the first.

I would like to emphasize one more point. From birth, children are endowed with certain features of the nervous system: there are babies that are lively and active from the cradle, there are children that are calmer and more sensitive. And the former does not even need to be taught to “fight back” - they will resort to this method in a situation if they are offended (just succumbing to an impulse, completely unconsciously throwing out their anger at the offender). However, they themselves are most often the initiators of physical conflicts (again, because of their temperament, and not because they are aggressive, bad or ill-mannered).

But to teach cautious and balanced kids to give back - to expose them to additional stress, they are usually indecisive in situations of social interaction, and here you still need to be able to defend themselves. In no case should such children be shamed, ridiculed, or labeled - this is especially common among boys' dads. Here, adult projections and complexes of the parent are already connected, who has his own rigid ideas about the "masculine", and also fears for his image of the correct dad. But it should always be remembered that what is acceptable in the adult world should not be carried over into childhood reality. Just because a child's brain is still immature, it is physically incapable of much of what an adult can. And if a sensitive kid, instead of supporting an adult, faces condemnation, this will not make him “stronger”, on the contrary, it will cause a feeling of loneliness and confidence that he is bad, unnecessary for his parents.

Finally, I would also like to draw the attention of parents to the fact that very often we exaggerate the significance of certain situations, we look and interpret them in a very “grown-up” way. Yes, it happens that someone takes a toy away from a child or pushes him. But this is not a reason to arrange a showdown. Your baby may not have noticed this, but in the head of an anxious mother, the thought "My blood is offended!" or "If he misses it now, then in adulthood he will not be able to stand up for himself!" It is important not to exaggerate, to realistically assess the situation and not to generalize a single episode from the whole life. In the event that a child is faced with the aggression of another, you should protect him and take him out of the danger zone, and not wait for your son or daughter to decide this situation themselves. Have pity on him, console him, if necessary, try to explain the state of affairs.

Do not worry that your child will not be able to stand up for himself if you do it for him - everything has its time. And if you give your little one reliable support and support in difficult situations, it will give him confidence and a feeling of solid ground under his feet. And when he becomes mature enough, he will naturally begin to use other methods of self-defense, without resorting to your help.