Children’s Fighting in a Childcare Centre
Children’s Fighting: From surprisingly young ages, children can resort to violence if they’re angry, frustrated or sometimes jealous.
Such behaviours can certainly pre-date their introduction into a Mardella Childcare Centre but they may increase initially due to the larger number of other children around them. Fortunately, there are positive and effective ways of dealing with such squabbles.
Children fight – a reality for parents and Childcare Centres
Most parents hate to think that their child engages in violence but unfortunately, it’s almost unavoidable as part of the growing-up experience.
Although we have written on this subject before, questions in this area are some of the most frequent we encounter from parents visiting us for an initial inspection and discussion. So, let’s recap.
Almost all children will fight at times. Siblings in the home will do, assuming they’re in roughly similar age groups. That behaviour is also seen in the typical Mardella Childcare Centre.
To put this into context, the vast majority of such ‘fights’ usually involve little more than pushing and shoving plus a lot of frustrated screaming and crying. True physical violence is much rarer and it might involve some pulling of clothes, hair, scratching or slapping/punching and kicking. It is unacceptable but it’s also very rarely of any significance in terms of real potential for harm.
By the time most children leave pre-schooling, the frequency of fighting should have significantly reduced. That tendency should continue through primary education and by the time they’re in their teens, it should largely have disappeared from the behaviours of most, though not all, children. Regrettably, as children age into their teenage years, the seriousness and potential harm caused by fighting may increase – though that is a different subject and not a Mardella Childcare Centre issue.
Why children fight
By the time most children are 3-4, if they’re in a childcare centre they should be increasingly developing social skills that better equip them to negotiate and cooperate rather than be exclusively ‘me’ centred, as is the case with most younger children. They should also be able to understand and control their emotions more, which is another step in reducing the resort to violence.
Children in this age range are also developing their empathy. That ability can be a huge factor in reducing conflict.
Unfortunately, in the age range 3-5, although they’re making progress in the above areas, they still won’t have fully mastered the need to cooperate with and respect others or fully control their emotions. Disputes that turn a little physical are therefore almost inevitable.
Gender bases
Another question we’re often asked is whether boys fight more than girls and vice-versa.
Experiments have highlighted some significant differences here, summarised as:
- boys are commonly perceived to fight physically more than girls;
- some experts have questioned the above conclusion, pointing out that it has been long observed that preschool-aged boys will typically engage in more rough-and-tumble physical games than girls, with this tendency often being mistaken for fighting;
- girls’ fighting often has a much higher verbal component and is less physical. It likewise has a higher relationship component (essentially challenging or undermining another’s position or values in the circle of friends);
- at younger ages, physical fights between the sexes may be moderately common but as children get towards primary ages, fighting tends to become increasingly gender-linear, i.e. boy and boy or girl and girl. There is little evidence to support this, it is simply informal observation.
Dealing with fights
Fighting may be commonplace with younger children but it should not be ignored. Equally, the dangers of over-dramatizing the situation need to be guarded against.
Our policy is quiet, calm, matter-of-fact but immediate intervention. The parties should be separated and spoken to individually, to understand what started the problem and to give them time to calm down. We’ll then bring them back together to discuss jointly how such a problem could have been resolved without fighting.
In our experience, this cool, calm and friendly approach is almost always effective in reducing tension. Typically, within a few minutes, both children will have forgotten the issue and are carrying on as if it never happened.
In summary, a degree of fighting is almost inevitable at younger ages but is rarely cause for concern.
