how to deal with badly behaved neighbor kid?

[angiemarie]

Our next door neighbor's 7 year old son acts terrible. He is mouthy, he hits his mother and lies to me and my kids (who are the same age as him).
Every day he comes over and asks to play with my kids. My kids like playing with him, but I am worried that he is being a bad influence on them. And that by allowing my kids to play with him, I am condoning his bad behavior.
His parents do not discipline him at all. If he hits his mom or calls her names, she shrugs it off.
How should I handle this situation? I want to do the Christ-like thing. The family does not go to church (I keep inviting them), they know the Lord, but have no desire to go to church.
I feel I should confront the boy about his lying, but don't want to over step my boundaries. I also want to tell my kids they can't play with him anymore, but don't feel that is the right approach either. Any suggestions.

Thanks

 

[GuidanceNeeded]

Our next door neighbor's 7 year old son acts terrible. He is mouthy, he hits his mother and lies to me and my kids (who are the same age as him).
Every day he comes over and asks to play with my kids. My kids like playing with him, but I am worried that he is being a bad influence on them. And that by allowing my kids to play with him, I am condoning his bad behavior.
His parents do not discipline him at all. If he hits his mom or calls her names, she shrugs it off.
How should I handle this situation? I want to do the Christ-like thing. The family does not go to church (I keep inviting them), they know the Lord, but have no desire to go to church.
I feel I should confront the boy about his lying, but don't want to over step my boundaries. I also want to tell my kids they can't play with him anymore, but don't feel that is the right approach either. Any suggestions.

Thanks

My personal opinion is if your children see the child's behavior without it being corrected they are going to think "if he does it, then I can do it". Especially at the impressionable age of 7.

If the child behaves at your house I would allow the child to play at your house with your supervision, but would not allow my child(ren) to go over to his house to play. If you catch the child lying to you I would tell him "I know you are lying, we don't lie in my house, it's not nice" or something along those lines.

Hope that helps.

God Bless

 

[Jilly123]

Maybe if he asks to come over and play you can say something like:
You are welcome to come over and play, but you will have to follow the rules here just like everybody else does. The rules are __________________ . If you can't follow the rules then I'm afraid you'll have to go home.

Supervise and just see how it goes. I definitely think you have the right to step in and say something if he is at YOUR house and his parents are not supervising him. I agree with the previous poster about what you should say if you catch him in a lie. It is kind but firm.

Hope things improve!

 

[suzybeezy]

I think I would try to talk to his parents first. Let them know what you are seeing. Let them know that their child can play at your house but will have to respect the rules of your house. This gives them the opportunity to talk to their child and keeps you from superceding their authority.

 

[Robinsegg]

We have quite a few kids come to our house to play (outside) with our kids. There is only one that does anything like what you describe. The way I handle it is:
1. I teach my kids what our family standard is, and the consequences for not meeting that standard.
2. I teach my kids that, no matter what someone else is doing/saying, it is their job to uphold the family standard in their own behavior.
3. I let the neighbor kids know what's acceptable here. If they choose not to follow acceptable standards, they will be sent off our property.

Seriously, if you let this kid know there are boundaries on your property, he may *just* surprise you on how well he follows your rules. He needs structure and someone who cares enough to hold him to it. That may be the best picture of Christ you can give him.

Rachel

 

[CrystalBrooke]

My mom had this same problem with my little brother playing with one of the neighbor kids. He didn't hit his parents..but he was pretty much a terror otherwise. Mom stopped letting my bother go down to their house and the neighbor kid wasn't allowed at our house. The child's parents were good friends of my parents and it obviously hurt their feelings that my brother wasn't allowed to play with their kid. But mom told them that my brother was picking up on some of their son's behavior that they didn't approve of. After a few months mom let my brother go back down to that child's house and they never had another problem. My mom also made sure to tell my brother all the time that what other children did wasn't neccissarily ok for him to do also.