Bad Words

Last Thursday, I was told by my 4-year Old’s teacher that he grabbed a classmate’s hair. Apparently, the other boy grabbed my son’s toy and my son grabbed his hair! I was embarrassed and shocked at the display of such behavior. I mean, no one in our home grabs anyone’s hair … Obviously the weekend was spent in teaching the little fella right from wrong. I also sent a note of apology to the other boy’s mom who let me know that her son has complained about my son on another occasion a couple of weeks ago. I was a little perplexed … Where is this behavior coming from?

2 days ago, on Monday, I decided that it is a good idea for my son to walk home with this boy. Perhaps, they could make up? At least, that was my intention! As we walked home, I also took the opportunity to apologize to the boy and in return, he insisted on pulling my son’s hair. This boy tried to grab my son’s hair which was luckily under 2 hoodies. While he was attempting to demonstrate “an eye for an eye”, his nanny managed to stop him. I was relieved as I am little uncomfortable disciplining other people’s children’s behaviour. My reaction would be to pull my child away and walk away. Since the nanny intervened, we continued to walk together. I thought I will make small conversation to diffuse the situation. I asked the boy what he likes about school. I will never forget his words. He said, “I hate school. I want to take a gun and shoot everybody at school.” As I was reeling from this revelation, my son said, “Yes! I will take a gun to school too!” What? Where is this coming from? At that point in time, I actually told the other boy and my boy that they are not supposed to speak such language. The other boy ignored me and I decided to walk separately with my child.

As we walked, I talked to him about guns and how they are bad. For good measure, I also told him about how people with guns can go to prison. I was so scared that I didn’t even register that I am talking to a 4 year old! I kept repeating that he should not even utter some words since they are bad words. After a couple of minutes, my son asked me, “Like washroom words?” I nodded in agreement. I went from scared to sad when I looked at his face. He is so little. I let him know that guns should only be used by police officers to catch bad people. Good people don’t use guns and good people don’t say bad words. The rest of the walk home was quiet.

However, when we got home, my son asked me if he can say bad words when he is a grown up?