I'm the winner .. no I'm the winner!!!

[newandlearning]

:panic: :panic: :panic:

I think I have inadvertantly started some sort of a competition between my boy who is 4 and my mindee who is 2.5 years .. it all started when I said my the kids.. 'who can get in their carseat first'.. this was ages ago as my mindee wouldnt get in his car seat and I wanted him to start doing so.. he's really heavy and physically capable.. anyway.. now we get loads of competition.. I want to go in the car first.. i wanna get out first... I'm the winner whilst having lunch.. I've got the blue car (sung to nahnahnahnahnah) .. I'm the winner going down the garden in the trucks.. now the mindee is starting to throw balls over the fence when he doesnt want anyone else playing with them.. and its friday and I've had enough of this week.. if its not being the winner its gotta be bigger.. my mindee is making my own boy :censored: on occasions which lead to him having tantrums as I suppose he's probably feeling my mindee is always trying to get one up on him... today.. instead this lunchtime they spoke about not being the winner :angry: :angry: which isnt much better. any :idea: would be warmly received..

I really feel I need to nip this in the bud.. I don't understand by the mindee needs to win, be better, have the better toy etc.etc. he's with me full time
so as you can imagine it wears a bit thin by friday..xxx

[Chatterbox Childcare]

My 4 year old mindee is so slow at everything so we have a race to see who wins, him or me. It does work but not when I have 3 others to put in as well!

[sarah707]

I have a 9 year old mindee and I laugh at him sometimes. Whatever the other little ones say he has to have at least 2 bigger, better, higher, taller... or he's found 3 and they are longer and so it goes on :rolleyes:

I don't like it either but I've yet to find any magic cures apart from sometimes if I join in it stops for a bit :D

[Blackhorse]

if they seem to enjoy cometitions...could you maybe organise a few little events for them every so often where they can compete..
teach them how to be good winners and loosers (very hard I know) and try and emphasise that there are times and places to do competitions, but it is not acceptable to do it all the time...
try and teach them about feelings..how they might hurt someone elses feelings..
if all else fails..ignore it..might not be as much fun if nobody is interested in it..

[Louise_Oaktree]

I have a 6 year old mindee like this but he makes things up and tells fibs. My 5 year old mindee has just got a new puppy, he has therefore just got a new puppy but it is a "fighting dog" :panic: I know he makes stuff up because when I speak to his Dad he has no idea what I'm on about!

He's been in full time nursery before starting school and is away from parents 8-6.30pm weekdays I always wonder if he does it for the attention?

I try to ignore it as the more I question him the worse it gets because he has to make up a long story about why he said something and where it came from etc.

His granddad also has an ice cream van and he helps out at weekends :laughing:

I would try and divert the conversation onto something else...but we all feel like this at some point or another :cool:

[newandlearning]

hmm.. interrestingly enough he's spent most of his life in full time nursery.. its taken nearly a year to get him to help put things away.. he still throws things instead of putting things down on table (for example).. and a lot of this seems to happen the minute I go out the room .. like into kitchen etc. but I can still hear everything.. I know my own LO couldn't give a toss about winning .. I am beginning to talk about times when we do race.. compete etc.. and othertimes when it really doesn't matter.. when I asked the mum this morn if he is very competitive at home she felt I was trying to attack her LO .. I wasn't I was just
trying to figure out if this was happening at home too.. somehow the more I tried to explain the worse it seemed to sound...:panic: ;) ..

its an odd one childminding sometimes isnt it.. I try to keep everyone feeling good.. feeling equal and feeling like they can be the same as at home.. I even spend more time than any other person in their lives.. yet with all of that said and done there is no place like home in a child's world... and indeed in ours..xx

.. hmm.. something to ponder me thinks;)

[Roseolivia]

My 2 mindees are exactly the same but they are brother and sister. I have this everyday. Everything has to be a race and if the youngest doesn't win she mopes around for ages.

[Louise_Oaktree]

I'm not saying nursery is bad or anything - just really saying how important the first few months and years are in shaping a child. My son has always been quite shy and afraid of trying new things but when he was 2 I started minding full time and he is such a different child now and has so much confidence. I think reassurance and support is really important to little people :) and having me around all the time along with having other children around him he's come on really well.

[pumpkinsmum]

hmm.. interrestingly enough he's spent most of his life in full time nursery.. its taken nearly a year to get him to help put things away.. he still throws things instead of putting things down on table (for example).. and a lot of this seems to happen the minute I go out the room .. like into kitchen etc. but I can still hear everything.. I know my own LO couldn't give a toss about winning .. I am beginning to talk about times when we do race.. compete etc.. and othertimes when it really doesn't matter.. when I asked the mum this morn if he is very competitive at home she felt I was trying to attack her LO .. I wasn't I was just
trying to figure out if this was happening at home too.. somehow the more I tried to explain the worse it seemed to sound...:panic: ;) ..

its an odd one childminding sometimes isnt it.. I try to keep everyone feeling good.. feeling equal and feeling like they can be the same as at home.. I even spend more time than any other person in their lives.. yet with all of that said and done there is no place like home in a child's world... and indeed in ours..xx

.. hmm.. something to ponder me thinks;)

I know exactly how you feel. I am having a struggle everyday with one of my mindees who is 4 but much older than his years and is a very deep child. He has been in full time nursery since he was a baby too, and I really think there is a pattern here.
My own lo is almost 3 and I'm so proud of him and how he handles things. He seems more confident than ever in himself since I've been childminding, I was worried he would get jealous of any mindees but I haven't had much of it so far. The mindee on the other hand is extremely jealous of my son and any attention I give him, so I am very aware of how much attention I'm giving everyone. At the same time, it's as if he thinks he is betraying his mum if he enjoys himself when he is with me. For small chunks of the day it's great and we have a fab time, but for the most part it is mindee generally attention seeking in any bad way possible, doesn't agree with sharing anything with anyone, will not help with anything and making competition out of EVERYTHING with my lo who doesn't really understand what the competition is. His mum is lovely but anytime I try to talk about it she brushes it off, I don't think she thinks children should be that complex.
It's very hard work but I'm hoping as time goes on the fab times that make this job so worthwhile will increase.
I know how draining it can be though. :thumbsup:

[Helen79]

I have this with my 3. I don't usually mind if it helps everyone get home quicker lol but dd (being the youngest & smallest) always looses & gets upset.

Being the youngest of 3 siblings I always used to loose & it is upsetting when you NEVER get to win at anything. I ended up feeling like I was rubbish at everything, even though I matched against a brother who's 4 years older so not an even match. In the end I didn't bother trying at stuff.

It only bothers me when the older ones really rub it in that they won & gloat at dd or actually push her out the way to win. I see her little face light up when she realises she's in the lead & then fall when the 7 year old barges past her & laughs :(
They are really lovely boys so I've asked them to 'throw' a few races so dd gets to win.
I do try to reinforce the 'its not the winning, it's the taking part' mantra though.

[aly]

:panic: :panic: :panic:

I think I have inadvertantly started some sort of a competition between my boy who is 4 and my mindee who is 2.5 years .. it all started when I said my the kids.. 'who can get in their carseat first'.. this was ages ago as my mindee wouldnt get in his car seat and I wanted him to start doing so.. he's really heavy and physically capable.. anyway.. now we get loads of competition.. I want to go in the car first.. i wanna get out first... I'm the winner whilst having lunch.. I've got the blue car (sung to nahnahnahnahnah) .. I'm the winner going down the garden in the trucks.. now the mindee is starting to throw balls over the fence when he doesnt want anyone else playing with them.. and its friday and I've had enough of this week.. if its not being the winner its gotta be bigger.. my mindee is making my own boy :censored: on occasions which lead to him having tantrums as I suppose he's probably feeling my mindee is always trying to get one up on him... today.. instead this lunchtime they spoke about not being the winner :angry: :angry: which isnt much better. any :idea: would be warmly received..

I really feel I need to nip this in the bud.. I don't understand by the mindee needs to win, be better, have the better toy etc.etc. he's with me full time
so as you can imagine it wears a bit thin by friday..xxx


Iget this with my 2 boys :panic:

[singlewiththree]

I get it with my daughters 8,4, and 2 its with everything! getting dressed in the morning they are seeing who won and then again with shoes etc etc and its driving me up the wall!