I have spent most of the past decade working with kids 5 years old and younger, and I have seen it all. Biting, punching, kicking, screaming—all carried out by humans with the most cherubic faces imaginable. Years as a teacher have shown me that the violence is never more acute than during those first few months of school, when the toddlers, preschoolers, and kindergartners entering new and bizarre social contexts are suddenly being told to ignore their natural impulses to fight to defend themselves in favor of “using their words.” I have watched classrooms and playgrounds quickly descend to Brad Pitt–Ed Norton levels of no-holds-barred conflict over toys, sandboxes, and fruit snacks, and every fall, I have parents coming to me, anxious at best and horrified at worst, about what their child is telling them is happening at school. Without fail, I tell them all that same thing—everything is OK! But not enough time and space is made to explain what is happening with the babies during the first few weeks of school.
Ask any early childhood teacher or developmental psychologist and they will confirm that aggression in young children is both normal and reasonable. When children exhibit small bursts of violence, it is often a result of them manifesting their “fight” evolutionary response to perceived danger. When I am pulling two kids off of each other as each uses an iron grip to hold on to some Hot Wheels they both want, I have to remind myself that although their response feels like an overreaction to me, to the egocentric child with a one-track mind, they are being denied something that meets their needs, and they will snatch or smack whatever and whoever is in the way of getting that need met. It is natural.
Also, given that children under 5 are still developing their language skills, it would make sense that most of them have no way of communicating their needs, and defer to what looks to us like violence and aggression. I’ve seen a kid kick down a tower of blocks constructed by her classmates, swat the hand of her seat partner as he did his work, and push kids one by one around the playground, all because she felt lonely. She didn’t know how to ask to be included, and instead chose to settle for negative social attention rather than none at all. “Young children lack an infrastructure upon which to express emotion,” educator Erika Christakis reminds us in The Importance of Being Little, and before the months of social-emotional learning and communication-building work begin in the classroom, children expressing themselves might look pretty scary to adults, despite the developmental appropriateness. As a result, I make sure to let my families know that the start of the school year may look a little light in terms of academic content. Much of that can be attributed to the time spent reminding students over and over again to keep their hands to themselves and come and speak to the teacher, building those self-regulation skills that will not only support them in their social relationships, but will allow them to be calm and focused enough to embark on academic learning.
Moreover, as much as conflict is a natural response given human biology and children’s still-emerging social skills, one must also consider how children—especially those experiencing the many profound traumas present in our world today—are also, understandably, replicating what they know. Psychiatrist Alicia F. Lieberman in The Emotional Life of the Toddler tells us that many times, children “learn to be aggressive as the result of frightening experiences during which they witnessed violence or were the target of it.” At a time when violence between adults is rising in ways big and small, we should expect to see some of that mirrored in children who are watching everything from outbursts on airplanes to instances of domestic violence. It often feels heartbreaking as a teacher to hear a parent vilify a kid they believe is their child’s aggressor, without knowing the context that “bully” is coming from. Having worked in a private day care, a laboratory preschool, a Head Start, and now a public-school kindergarten classroom, I have seen children of all races and socioeconomic backgrounds wrestle with truly traumatic experiences, and that doesn’t always yield the most prosocial behaviors. That should not justify their actions, but rather make us more sympathetic and patient in how we view all children.
All that being the case, even if we understand that the first few weeks are rough because children are expressing their natural instincts, they are still learning how to be around others, and many of them are working through and processing external stressors, how should those of us charged with caring for young children proceed? The first step is a simple one—recognizing and acknowledging your own feelings as an adult. Parents, guardians, and other family members have their own evolutionary reflexes that compel them to protect their child at all costs. I am always struck by how petrified parents are at the beginning of the year, dropping their kids off for hours at a time with little knowledge of what is taking place. The fear that their child is in danger is real and understandable.
Not enough is said on how triggering children going to school can be for adults, too. I have been so incredibly lucky to work with families who are vulnerable in admitting their own anxieties from childhood and their worry around their child experiencing similar pains. They don’t want their child to feel alone or defenseless or blamed as they once were, and that can manifest in pretty aggressive ways, too. Understandably so. The onus is on parents and educators to build positive relationships with each other, so that the former see that school is a safe place for their child, and the latter can be more considerate in keeping families in the loop. Schools, for so many of us, are sites of trauma, and it is imperative to affirm parents in their feelings and remind them that they and their children will be OK.
Because this is the last piece. Knowing how normal conflict is, particularly at the start of the school year, should reassure us in our knowledge that the kids are going to be all right. As much as we try to avoid it as adults, conflict is necessary in helping kids grow. It is how they learn to stand up for themselves and problem-solve and forgive and move forward. It is where they learn their own strength, and by swooping in and trying to fix or remove every problem for them, we deny them the opportunity to fight for themselves and see their own power. In The Anti-Bias Curriculum, social-justice educator Louise Derman Sparks teaches us that “for children to feel good and confident about themselves, they need to be able to say, ‘That’s not fair,’ or ‘I don’t like that.’ ” We can coach them to say those words, we can model that language, but adults cannot say it for them. We need to teach kids how to stand up for themselves, not by meeting violence with violence or aggression with aggression, but by asserting their needs and feelings with the knowledge that their voice matters. Our job is to sit with them in their pain, name it and help them process it, but not to remove it completely. For kids to trust their own power, we need to trust it too, and believe we are doing our jobs in raising and growing strong and capable human beings.
The start of the school year can feel like Fight Club: raw, lawless, and scary. And, at the same time, it can also feel like angst, expression, and growth, as we all come together, children and adults, to wrestle with this new season and all that it brings, messiness included. It won’t last forever, though, and it’s going to be OK. We’re going to be OK.
