After all we went through in September with Ellie getting bullied, now its Gracie's turn. That's right – mean girls in preschool. Two girls have been teasing her because she loves to draw animals. They tell her she makes "boy pictures." They also call her a boy because she likes to play with bikes and in the sandbox on the playground at recess.
(Let us just take a moment to ponder that they are teasing Gracie - the girliest girly-girl ever – about being a boy. Seriously!! Girlfriend throws a fit when she has to wear pants and when her nails aren't painted!)
What am I supposed to tell them? Its an awful, awful truth: there will always be mean people in your life. Sometimes they will be mean to you.
But YOU must not be mean back.
Its such a hard lesson. (Even for us grown-ups.) Where to begin?
Well, this week I learned about these wonderful books called 'Little Lights' from Berenstain Bears. We've been reading Faithful Friends, The Golden Rule
and Love Their Neighbors
a lot lately as we've dealt with these mean girl issues. Take The Berenstain Bears Faithful Friends: its a wonderful story about Sister Bear dealing with being left out and having a friend be mean to her. Sister is advised by Brother Bear to love her friend, ask her
whats wrong and to extend forgiveness (all with supporting Bible
verses). Sister reaches out to her jealous friend and they work it out.
Then – I love this – the book provides discussion questions and activities that relate
to the book's lesson.
I love finding books for the kids that relate to exactly what they are going through and reiterate what we are teaching them at home. These have opened up some great discussions with my girls about how we should treat others.
Check out more What I Learned This Week posts here.
i had received copies of Little Lights to review on girlymama reviews.
see the review here. this post is just because i really, really liked them.
i was not
compensated financially for this post.
About Melissa
I’ve been reading your blog for a while. I can’t believe things are so different than when my son was going to school, he’s 27. I used to just tell him to ignore bully’s and they left him alone. Maybe he was just lucky. I also had books, don’t remember what they were now, that taught kids lessons about bullies, manners, all sorts of things. I think it’s a good way to teach kids things.
Can’t believe it’s happening so early. I say have a playdate with the “mean” girls at your house, so they can all bond.
That is horrible that kids so young have to face this!
Glad you have found some great resources.
It really stinks that bullying starts so young. Sounds to me that you handled this well with reading these books to your girls.
Thank you for commenting on my blog. I cannot wait to see New Moon. My husband wants to wait and take me when the theaters aren’t so crowded. I really don’t think he will enjoy the movie and hope he doesn’t mind me drooling over Edward too much. LoL!