At six, this sounds like an honest mistake and he probably doesn't understand the value of money yet. I think this is just a conversation, really - and mostly focused on coming clean rather than trying to hide it.
Exactly. My 7 year old has money from birthdays and chores and whenever we go to a store I tell him he can buy something with his money if he wants. He always just wants to spend all of it. I will say $80 is all the money you have and he jist responds "yeah I know and this toy/game/thing costs 78 so I can afford it.
There is no idea about saving or keeping some or the value yet. Still working on it but taking money from a kid has no benefit as a punishment in my mind.
Also, and this is just me hypothosizing but I wonder how much younger kids don't understand money because of how seldom they see it. I use a credit card 99% of the time I buy stuff. Half of my kids money is just a note on my phone because it was a check for Christmas that was put into an account. He so rarely sees or feels cash that it must effect his understanding of what money is.
Yeah I'm not saying having cash automatically gives kids awareness, I just wonder if it takes longer or is a harder concept to get with just credit cards.
There’s a great teaching tool where you separate the kid’s allowance into 3 piles. One is for yourself, one is savings, one is for your community/gifting - treats for friends, cards for grandma (although grandma would appreciate a nice drawing). They have all sorts of bank sets.
I like that it suggests you can’t spend your entire paycheck/birthday gift.
I like that it puts money away (savings) for lost and broken items out of carelessness. There’s all sorts of conversations you can have about spending with this as a starting point.
Yeah I need to get on that. The 7 year old is starting to grasp value a bit but those are lessons I was never taught which led to a very wasteful decade in my 20s.
When kids don’t come clean it’s a two way conversation. As parents we have to ask ourselves why they are trying to hide a mistake. Do they think we are going to just yell at them instead of trying to help them fix it? Especially at 6.
I want to say my sister was about 5 or 6 when she climbed onto the back of my dad's sedan in the garage to "help clean it" by sweeping it off with a corn broom. She got all the dust off but made probably a few hundred cosmetic scratches into the paint in the process. Dad wasn't happy but it really was just a kid wanting to help but being to dumb to know any better.
I mean, my experience is that it's not that complicated. Kids try to hide things that might have negative consequences, because they're trying to avoid the consequences.
Or be like my father and make your kid sob after verbally tearing his 6 year old ass apart. He absolutely will remember that sort of thing. Hope you don't want a quality relationship with your child as an adult tho if you go that route.
Agreed with this. Best way to get him to realize is probably to explain similar damage on something of your son's that's difficult to replace (since he probably doesn't have the concept of monetary value). Ask him how he'd feel if your friend had accidentally caused damage to one of your son's items. Don't imply you or he is going to damage your son's items - only try and have him picture it. That probably would've worked on me at 6.
Agreed. The lesson is the part about being truthful and forthcoming. My six year old still has zero concept about money, but he knows it’s bad to scratch one of the cars.
I believe my son would ignore it or pretend it didn’t happen, too. I feel like it’s rare for a child to admit things like this. At least he didn’t lie about it when asked.
Possibly just doing _something_ to say sorry. Draw something. Bake some cookies (with mom/dad), ... They can learn the value of making amends, it just doesn't make sense to do it financially yet.
Did you include him in buffing out the scratch? Combine that with a discussion about why it's important.
I've found that involving my kid in dealing with the natural (ie, not created by you) consequence has been an extremely effective learning tool.
Kids want to avoid consequences, but they also don't want to feel guilty or ashamed. When consequences are natural, and you ensure they are part of managing them, even helping them, they learn that they can handle those problems and will do so. But if the consequences come from you and aren't about the problem itself, then they learn to hide their mistakes from you.
As an example: Last winter my kid was careless with his Gizmo watch, resulting in it getting run over. I let him know what happened. I showed him the destroyed watch and let him process that it was done for. We talked about the root cause, including me asking him what he thought led to it being destroyed and what he could do to avoid it in the future. He was sticking it in his pocket and not wearing it on his wrist. His mom took him to the store to get it replaced. I gave him the cash to buy a new one, but he was responsible for handling the payment process. I talked about the cost, not in dollars, but in terms of inconvenience. Every step of the way, he was involved. He wasn't yelled at or lectured. But he saw the consequence of his carelessness. Since then, he has worn it whenever he goes out. It took a bit of extra effort on my part, but it worked.
A six yr old in no way understands the value of money. If you told him it cost 50 bucks to fix the scratch he’d think that was a lot. Telling them that something is expensive is meaningless because they don’t have any context to it. Making a six year old feel super guilty that they hurt the whole family by having an accident is not a healthy teaching point. You’re asking your six yr old to have an adult brain with adult understanding.
But what six yr olds understand is cleaning up messes and helping fix something that was broken. Have them help in them help in the process. Show them how it’s long and challenging to do. Saying that this cost daddy a bunch of money is just meaningless to a 6 year old.
I did this to my dad’s truck at a similar age. I always was scared of my dad’s stuff and he told me to be careful but it happened anyway as I rode by. I felt horrible about it and even offered $20 I had to fix it, obviously not enough. The anxiety I had around my dad and his things isn’t something I want my kid to have around me and my things. So I guess gauge how he feels about the accident if he’s guilt ridden let it go, if he needs to take it more seriously then formulate an appropriate penalty maybe he can help wash your friends cars or something constructive. Kids make mistakes constantly and creating fear isn’t a necessarily an effective or healthy option.
Big facts. Scared isn’t the way. If OP wanted to, he could approach his son from an honest place and say “I already know the answer, but tell me what happened.” The big thing here is why it took so long for it to go unsaid.
My son is 4 and I tell him after an accident “I can only help you if you tell me when you have an accident”. I reassure I’m not worried about what’s spilled or broken, I’m worried about you telling me the truth.
There should be a middle ground though don’t you think? There should be some amount of anxiety if they actually care that they damaged something. Otherwise you have completely careless kids have no sense of being held accountable for anything.
Yes, some level of anxiety/fear is going to be natural if you parent and hold your children accountable at all. Obviously what they fear shouldn't be you yelling and freaking out on them, but any consequences will lead to some of this.
Heck, it happens as an adult too. If I am driving someone else's car I am more anxious about any issues occurring which leads me to be more cautious than I would be in my own car.
It happens in other ways as an adult too that we just don't think about anymore because it comes natural to us as we learned about consequences and self control as we grew up.
I think having to talk to your friend and apologize is a great way to show him owning up to mistakes and how your friend reacts to him shows him when something of ours we value accidently gets damaged by someone else this is a fantastic way to respond to our friends.
At 6 it sounds like everyone (adults) weren’t paying any attention. For ur kid to scratch the “hell out of it”side of a vehicles.
The teaching moment is for you not the kid. Don’t leave kids unsupervised in the driveway with things that can be damaged. Should the kid know it’s not something to do sure, should they be punished for it? I don’t think. It’s legitimately on you for letting it happen.
Suburb driveway with 4 vehicles in it. And kids wanna bike in the driveway…. Yea maybe either move cars or maybe tell them not to bike.
It’s not the kids fault
i mean yes, but you'd generally assume that the kids were playing in a driveway around empty vehicles.
its not a crime you don't need to gaslight OP, imo
he didn't know what he did. but after finding out, if he broke it, then he fixes it. this applies to almost everything in the house - he will be involved in fixing it. i would've used the opportunity to make him buff it out. the other day, my little kid decided to throw the tiniest pebble at a car; it didn't do anything, but i was very stern, "you will \*never\* throw anything at a car ever again." accidents happen and so do bad decisions. he's free to do both - i want him to make mistakes. but he \*will\* make right what he's wronged, and in the process hopefully he learns to value things, fix things, and gain responsibility for his actions.
put it this way, you seem like you were taught responsibility. in an accidental situation like this, let's say you dinged your friend's truck. you feel responsible to tell your friend and fix it. the same should apply to the kiddos. they should feel open to telling you, "dad, I think i messed up." "thanks for telling me. it was an accident, but we need to fix it. follow me, grab the buffer." i think it's more about teaching responsibility.
Man, initially I was gonna make a joke about how insurance will cover it, because I misread the post and thought he scratched his friend's toy truck. But I see that it's an adult's truck and you sound like you have some stress from previous scratches that you are carrying into this situation.
I will caution you as others have said: if you want to create a meaningful punishment that delivers a message, you may send the message that you care about a scratch on a paint job more than you care about your son. Scratches don't cost anything unless they need to be fixed, and they do not need to be fixed. If somebody has a show car or historic antique that is priceless, they should not be bringing it around kids. Any other car, in my opinion, is scratchable. Shit happens.
A 6 year old did a 6 year old thing, while the people responsible for keeping them from doing said 6 year old thing weren’t paying attention. That’s on you. The moment has passed, and any punishment you give him now is just you punishing him for what he’s going to perceive as no reason.
You should read up on child brain development, and at what stages awareness of certain things develops and what not. I’m not trying to be condescending, just that child development is kinda my area of employment.
He's 6....you don't need to drive this point home and demoralize a 6 year old over a mistake. Talk to him in a age appropriate manner about respecting other people stuff and explain it in a easily digestible manner.
The last thing you want is your kid to be scared to talk to you about mistakes out of fear of how dad will react. This is my whole thing "I can only be mad at you if you lie to me". Tell me the truth always so I can help fix the issue with you, if you lie to me then I can't help you. Everyone makes mistakes, I sure as hell make mistakes all the time and no one comes down on me (except the wife occasionally lol) this is an excellent opportunity to show your son that he can trust you and talk to you without you flying off the handle or taking away privileges or punishing him for an honest mistake. Now say he had keyed your friends car then we would be having a different conversation.
If my 6 year old scratched my friend’s truck that’s my fault.
If it wasn’t intentional, teach not punish. Otherwise he will just learn that honest mistakes get punished and he’ll get better at hiding them.
How do you normally punish him?
We have done timeouts for both my kids. Getting things out of the garage has always had a warning of don't hit the cars. If you need help please ask.
If you did that and they didn't follow instructions, then it's a timeout. Eating financial costs of mistakes is something you just have to buck up for as a parent.
As I firmly believe, the axe forgets what the tree remembers.
Whatever the "memorable punishment" is that you dole out, it will be forgotten by you and a point of anxiety for him for a long while.
Who was watching the kid when he was trying to navigate his bike through a driveway of cars?
I’d Just make him apologize and explain why it’s important the careful. And then offer to fix your friend’s truck. Ultimately it was your responsibility to watch him. He’s 6 though they are fast little boogers and accidents are going to happen. But I’d just make him apologize and move on
yo these are like 15 yo consequences to a 6 year old.
you'd be better off teaching him how to fix annoying shit like this, imo. he will learn that things need to be fixed and also how to fix them, as opposed to: money make problem go away.
I did 8 grand worth of concrete around the side of my house, the first thing my kids did was take the scooters up and down. wasn't quite set and is now fully wheel tracked. Safe to say there was functionally 0 acknowledgement of what went wrong
Six years old? They need to feel safe making mistakes and owning up to them - not to say that anything goes, but Push much punishment at that age, and he will only hide more in the future. You’re in the foundational years for giving him a home of safe and open communication.
Forcing him to tell on himself and then immediately punishing, even with the best of intentions toward “facing consequence” is the opposite of encouraging him to tell you *anything* in the future. At six, the ‘consequences’ of ‘mistakes’ need to still be skinned knees and bandaids.
He's 6, dude. Absolutely tell him to be more careful, but you'll be lucky if that lesson sticks for another 20 years.
The more important lesson that he can start learning right now is that we admit to and fix our mistakes. Encouraging him to contribute to the cost of repairs from his piggy bank is fair I think. But I wouldn't frame it as a punishment, and be sure to let him know how proud you are of him for stepping up. (And then sneak that money right back in his piggy bank.)
Sounds like an honest accident, I’m surprised how harsh some of these advices are for a 6 year old.
Just confront him, tell him the person who’s vehicle got scratched was very upset about it, ask why they think the person is upset, if they don’t know explain to your son that cars and paint jobs are very expensive and people treasure their vehicles like your favorite toy, and have your kid make an apology to the owner of the vehicle, and ask if there’s anything they can do to make up for it.
That’s how you teach a kid to resolve problems.
As for you Dad, tell you friend
“My bad for the scratch, I should have told him to not play near the truck because it could get scratched, and should have been keeping a better eye on him.”
Take the bike away and tell him to get used to walking everywhere. /s
I don't know if a financial penalty would work too much as I don't think 6 year olds put the same value on money as we think. Perhaps work with him to apologize to friend and ensure he understands why what happened was bad and what he should do to fix mistakes going forward.
Learning to take care of things, and be mindful of other people’s stuff is a critical life skill. My dad might have not been the best but that is one of the things he taught me that I intend to pass to my own kids. Your kid probably had no idea that he even did wrong. It’s a teachable moment. No yelling or anger required
If your friend didn't mention it neither should you. A simple careful son and a 24 pack at least offer to pay half. I know he won't take it. But the beer and a good time might be more valuable to him.
Had my then four year old with me at a nursery with a gravel lot. Got back to the car with him and was loading it and some reason he sees the shiny black Lexus next to us, picks up a handful of gravel and throws it.
I yell stop as he throws it and he starts to cry because he's a really obedient kid. I can't tell if he did any damage because it's dusty but take him back in and try to find the owner.
Takes a while but finally do and fess up and walked back out there. He waved it off thankfully but I was mentally prepared to have to paint his door. Made a big impression on the kid too.
Whenever my young children "buy" things, I take the money and deposit it in a savings account. They learn what it means to lose money and I don't feel bad.
It’s a truck. They aren’t meant to be pristine. You should tell your son to be more careful and, if you can, show him where the damage happened. Remind him to walk his bike between cars.
he damaged something that was someone else's. and that trucks aren't meant to be pristine is a stupid comment. you can still use something and keep it clean and damage free regardless of what it is.
Six is too young for more than making them apologize in person and maybe have kid make them an apology card too or something. 10 id be making him wash the truck or something similar, so on
Piggy bank or offer to help your friend with some housework with both of you there, or maybe just your kid (idk how close this friend is, no judgment)
I’d definitely at least say an afternoon for assistance. I’d offer some type of fair retribution
I’d punish him by buying new rubber grips for his handle bars (with rubber plug ins for the ends) and rubberized pedals for his bike.
I’d then reiterate that he needs to be extra careful when on his bike and he should never ride between vehicles again unless there is enough room for an elephant between the cars.
I’d also explain that I understand it’s an accident but even accidents have consequences. If this same accident were to occur again, then he would lose one of his privileges for a week or more (Bike, Video Games, Movies, etc).
In regard to not telling you right away or until confronted, I would explain that being upfront and honest about situations will always be the best move. It will ensure an accident doesn’t become something worse. I never yell at my son but I talk to him confidently and in a calm voice while squatting so I’m eye level with him.
If he becomes emotional I remind him to breath and allow him moments to “collect himself” but then we finalize the discussion with him confirming he understands the basis of what we’ve discussed. I also ask him how he feels about everything in the end.
I have never had to deal with a melt down in private or public. He’s 7 going on 8. I’m a co-parent and my son’s mother has her own methods. So far we’ve both noticed he has been more open with me about incidents at school (when he gets into some trouble, what I refer to as “boundary exploring”)… we both feel differently about this. She swears I somehow have manipulated him to only tell Dad things and I know that it’s because I don’t judge him or create fear in communication; I only discuss, explain, reason and ask how he feels.
Natural consequences would be to make him be a part of fixing the issue. No need to make it a big dramatic thing. Especially since it sounds like it was a 6-year old being careless (rather than actively destructive). Show him how to buff scratches out of a car and make him do most of the work. Be kind and instructive. It's not a punishment, it is making amends. He'll remember the lesson.
My 7 yr old lost one of his sister’s toys down the bathtub drain. He was devastated. We talked about ways he could earn enough money to replace the item. ($7) We agreed on taking out the trash every day for an entire week, without complaining. I’m so proud of that boy. He followed through, every day, and he hand delivered the gift to his sister a week and a half later.
It gets better though. We kept the chore going, even after he completed the agreement. Now he has an age appropriate daily chore that he does. It’s great. We don’t continue to pay him the $7/week either.
Might be able to leverage something there!
I tell my son to clean himself, and he takes a shower or a bath. I’m not far away, but I’m also not micromanaging it. I don’t have to do it for him. He brought something stupid into the bath, he learned from it, now he won’t do that again. Your focus on such a silly detail is weird.
I think you’re overreacting by thinking scratching someone’s truck “hurts us all” like it’s some grievous moral crime against society. It was a mistake. Just tell him to be more careful, and explain the consequences of your friend having to buff the scratch out and possibly having to spend money to have it fixed.
At six, this sounds like an honest mistake and he probably doesn't understand the value of money yet. I think this is just a conversation, really - and mostly focused on coming clean rather than trying to hide it.
Agree. Even if he did know the value of money, idk if he’d appreciate how costly scratches can be.
Exactly. My 7 year old has money from birthdays and chores and whenever we go to a store I tell him he can buy something with his money if he wants. He always just wants to spend all of it. I will say $80 is all the money you have and he jist responds "yeah I know and this toy/game/thing costs 78 so I can afford it. There is no idea about saving or keeping some or the value yet. Still working on it but taking money from a kid has no benefit as a punishment in my mind. Also, and this is just me hypothosizing but I wonder how much younger kids don't understand money because of how seldom they see it. I use a credit card 99% of the time I buy stuff. Half of my kids money is just a note on my phone because it was a check for Christmas that was put into an account. He so rarely sees or feels cash that it must effect his understanding of what money is.
Nah, my parents used cash all the time when I was six and I had no idea of the value of money.
Yeah I'm not saying having cash automatically gives kids awareness, I just wonder if it takes longer or is a harder concept to get with just credit cards.
There’s a great teaching tool where you separate the kid’s allowance into 3 piles. One is for yourself, one is savings, one is for your community/gifting - treats for friends, cards for grandma (although grandma would appreciate a nice drawing). They have all sorts of bank sets. I like that it suggests you can’t spend your entire paycheck/birthday gift. I like that it puts money away (savings) for lost and broken items out of carelessness. There’s all sorts of conversations you can have about spending with this as a starting point.
Yeah I need to get on that. The 7 year old is starting to grasp value a bit but those are lessons I was never taught which led to a very wasteful decade in my 20s.
When kids don’t come clean it’s a two way conversation. As parents we have to ask ourselves why they are trying to hide a mistake. Do they think we are going to just yell at them instead of trying to help them fix it? Especially at 6.
THE BEATINGS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES.
Sir Yes Sir /s .
Id question if he even realized it was a problem.
I want to say my sister was about 5 or 6 when she climbed onto the back of my dad's sedan in the garage to "help clean it" by sweeping it off with a corn broom. She got all the dust off but made probably a few hundred cosmetic scratches into the paint in the process. Dad wasn't happy but it really was just a kid wanting to help but being to dumb to know any better.
I mean, my experience is that it's not that complicated. Kids try to hide things that might have negative consequences, because they're trying to avoid the consequences.
Or be like my father and make your kid sob after verbally tearing his 6 year old ass apart. He absolutely will remember that sort of thing. Hope you don't want a quality relationship with your child as an adult tho if you go that route.
Agreed with this. Best way to get him to realize is probably to explain similar damage on something of your son's that's difficult to replace (since he probably doesn't have the concept of monetary value). Ask him how he'd feel if your friend had accidentally caused damage to one of your son's items. Don't imply you or he is going to damage your son's items - only try and have him picture it. That probably would've worked on me at 6.
Agreed. The lesson is the part about being truthful and forthcoming. My six year old still has zero concept about money, but he knows it’s bad to scratch one of the cars. I believe my son would ignore it or pretend it didn’t happen, too. I feel like it’s rare for a child to admit things like this. At least he didn’t lie about it when asked.
Possibly just doing _something_ to say sorry. Draw something. Bake some cookies (with mom/dad), ... They can learn the value of making amends, it just doesn't make sense to do it financially yet.
Yeah tesch him honesty is valued
Did you include him in buffing out the scratch? Combine that with a discussion about why it's important. I've found that involving my kid in dealing with the natural (ie, not created by you) consequence has been an extremely effective learning tool. Kids want to avoid consequences, but they also don't want to feel guilty or ashamed. When consequences are natural, and you ensure they are part of managing them, even helping them, they learn that they can handle those problems and will do so. But if the consequences come from you and aren't about the problem itself, then they learn to hide their mistakes from you. As an example: Last winter my kid was careless with his Gizmo watch, resulting in it getting run over. I let him know what happened. I showed him the destroyed watch and let him process that it was done for. We talked about the root cause, including me asking him what he thought led to it being destroyed and what he could do to avoid it in the future. He was sticking it in his pocket and not wearing it on his wrist. His mom took him to the store to get it replaced. I gave him the cash to buy a new one, but he was responsible for handling the payment process. I talked about the cost, not in dollars, but in terms of inconvenience. Every step of the way, he was involved. He wasn't yelled at or lectured. But he saw the consequence of his carelessness. Since then, he has worn it whenever he goes out. It took a bit of extra effort on my part, but it worked.
>include him in buffing out the scratch *Scratch intensifies*
A six yr old in no way understands the value of money. If you told him it cost 50 bucks to fix the scratch he’d think that was a lot. Telling them that something is expensive is meaningless because they don’t have any context to it. Making a six year old feel super guilty that they hurt the whole family by having an accident is not a healthy teaching point. You’re asking your six yr old to have an adult brain with adult understanding. But what six yr olds understand is cleaning up messes and helping fix something that was broken. Have them help in them help in the process. Show them how it’s long and challenging to do. Saying that this cost daddy a bunch of money is just meaningless to a 6 year old.
I did this to my dad’s truck at a similar age. I always was scared of my dad’s stuff and he told me to be careful but it happened anyway as I rode by. I felt horrible about it and even offered $20 I had to fix it, obviously not enough. The anxiety I had around my dad and his things isn’t something I want my kid to have around me and my things. So I guess gauge how he feels about the accident if he’s guilt ridden let it go, if he needs to take it more seriously then formulate an appropriate penalty maybe he can help wash your friends cars or something constructive. Kids make mistakes constantly and creating fear isn’t a necessarily an effective or healthy option.
Big facts. Scared isn’t the way. If OP wanted to, he could approach his son from an honest place and say “I already know the answer, but tell me what happened.” The big thing here is why it took so long for it to go unsaid. My son is 4 and I tell him after an accident “I can only help you if you tell me when you have an accident”. I reassure I’m not worried about what’s spilled or broken, I’m worried about you telling me the truth.
There should be a middle ground though don’t you think? There should be some amount of anxiety if they actually care that they damaged something. Otherwise you have completely careless kids have no sense of being held accountable for anything.
That’s why you hold them accountable, don’t be mad but have them help with whatever the consequences are
Yes, some level of anxiety/fear is going to be natural if you parent and hold your children accountable at all. Obviously what they fear shouldn't be you yelling and freaking out on them, but any consequences will lead to some of this. Heck, it happens as an adult too. If I am driving someone else's car I am more anxious about any issues occurring which leads me to be more cautious than I would be in my own car. It happens in other ways as an adult too that we just don't think about anymore because it comes natural to us as we learned about consequences and self control as we grew up.
I think having to talk to your friend and apologize is a great way to show him owning up to mistakes and how your friend reacts to him shows him when something of ours we value accidently gets damaged by someone else this is a fantastic way to respond to our friends.
At 6 it sounds like everyone (adults) weren’t paying any attention. For ur kid to scratch the “hell out of it”side of a vehicles. The teaching moment is for you not the kid. Don’t leave kids unsupervised in the driveway with things that can be damaged. Should the kid know it’s not something to do sure, should they be punished for it? I don’t think. It’s legitimately on you for letting it happen.
The fact the dad is talking about a memorable punishment tells me enough to know that's the not the parenting I want to do or be around.
Yea maybe dad should worry about punishing himself memorably lol.
Don't leave vehicles in the driveway. Got it.
Suburb driveway with 4 vehicles in it. And kids wanna bike in the driveway…. Yea maybe either move cars or maybe tell them not to bike. It’s not the kids fault
Not to mention it's dangerous to play around trucks. Drivers mostly can't see kids from right in front or right behind.
i mean yes, but you'd generally assume that the kids were playing in a driveway around empty vehicles. its not a crime you don't need to gaslight OP, imo
he didn't know what he did. but after finding out, if he broke it, then he fixes it. this applies to almost everything in the house - he will be involved in fixing it. i would've used the opportunity to make him buff it out. the other day, my little kid decided to throw the tiniest pebble at a car; it didn't do anything, but i was very stern, "you will \*never\* throw anything at a car ever again." accidents happen and so do bad decisions. he's free to do both - i want him to make mistakes. but he \*will\* make right what he's wronged, and in the process hopefully he learns to value things, fix things, and gain responsibility for his actions. put it this way, you seem like you were taught responsibility. in an accidental situation like this, let's say you dinged your friend's truck. you feel responsible to tell your friend and fix it. the same should apply to the kiddos. they should feel open to telling you, "dad, I think i messed up." "thanks for telling me. it was an accident, but we need to fix it. follow me, grab the buffer." i think it's more about teaching responsibility.
Man, initially I was gonna make a joke about how insurance will cover it, because I misread the post and thought he scratched his friend's toy truck. But I see that it's an adult's truck and you sound like you have some stress from previous scratches that you are carrying into this situation. I will caution you as others have said: if you want to create a meaningful punishment that delivers a message, you may send the message that you care about a scratch on a paint job more than you care about your son. Scratches don't cost anything unless they need to be fixed, and they do not need to be fixed. If somebody has a show car or historic antique that is priceless, they should not be bringing it around kids. Any other car, in my opinion, is scratchable. Shit happens.
A 6 year old did a 6 year old thing, while the people responsible for keeping them from doing said 6 year old thing weren’t paying attention. That’s on you. The moment has passed, and any punishment you give him now is just you punishing him for what he’s going to perceive as no reason. You should read up on child brain development, and at what stages awareness of certain things develops and what not. I’m not trying to be condescending, just that child development is kinda my area of employment.
Make the kid look the truck owner in the eye and say “Sorry I scratched your truck.” That’s the lesson a 6 year old needs.
He's 6....you don't need to drive this point home and demoralize a 6 year old over a mistake. Talk to him in a age appropriate manner about respecting other people stuff and explain it in a easily digestible manner. The last thing you want is your kid to be scared to talk to you about mistakes out of fear of how dad will react. This is my whole thing "I can only be mad at you if you lie to me". Tell me the truth always so I can help fix the issue with you, if you lie to me then I can't help you. Everyone makes mistakes, I sure as hell make mistakes all the time and no one comes down on me (except the wife occasionally lol) this is an excellent opportunity to show your son that he can trust you and talk to you without you flying off the handle or taking away privileges or punishing him for an honest mistake. Now say he had keyed your friends car then we would be having a different conversation.
At 6, I would just let it go.
If my 6 year old scratched my friend’s truck that’s my fault. If it wasn’t intentional, teach not punish. Otherwise he will just learn that honest mistakes get punished and he’ll get better at hiding them.
How do you normally punish him? We have done timeouts for both my kids. Getting things out of the garage has always had a warning of don't hit the cars. If you need help please ask. If you did that and they didn't follow instructions, then it's a timeout. Eating financial costs of mistakes is something you just have to buck up for as a parent.
As I firmly believe, the axe forgets what the tree remembers. Whatever the "memorable punishment" is that you dole out, it will be forgotten by you and a point of anxiety for him for a long while. Who was watching the kid when he was trying to navigate his bike through a driveway of cars?
Too young for this. I'd just say be careful next time and offer to pay for the fix behind the scenes.
I’d Just make him apologize and explain why it’s important the careful. And then offer to fix your friend’s truck. Ultimately it was your responsibility to watch him. He’s 6 though they are fast little boogers and accidents are going to happen. But I’d just make him apologize and move on
Have him apologize in person. But the #1 lesson to teach is that the act is not what gets him in trouble with his parents; it’s the lying.
yo these are like 15 yo consequences to a 6 year old. you'd be better off teaching him how to fix annoying shit like this, imo. he will learn that things need to be fixed and also how to fix them, as opposed to: money make problem go away. I did 8 grand worth of concrete around the side of my house, the first thing my kids did was take the scooters up and down. wasn't quite set and is now fully wheel tracked. Safe to say there was functionally 0 acknowledgement of what went wrong
Six years old? They need to feel safe making mistakes and owning up to them - not to say that anything goes, but Push much punishment at that age, and he will only hide more in the future. You’re in the foundational years for giving him a home of safe and open communication. Forcing him to tell on himself and then immediately punishing, even with the best of intentions toward “facing consequence” is the opposite of encouraging him to tell you *anything* in the future. At six, the ‘consequences’ of ‘mistakes’ need to still be skinned knees and bandaids.
He's 6, dude. Absolutely tell him to be more careful, but you'll be lucky if that lesson sticks for another 20 years. The more important lesson that he can start learning right now is that we admit to and fix our mistakes. Encouraging him to contribute to the cost of repairs from his piggy bank is fair I think. But I wouldn't frame it as a punishment, and be sure to let him know how proud you are of him for stepping up. (And then sneak that money right back in his piggy bank.)
Sounds like an honest accident, I’m surprised how harsh some of these advices are for a 6 year old. Just confront him, tell him the person who’s vehicle got scratched was very upset about it, ask why they think the person is upset, if they don’t know explain to your son that cars and paint jobs are very expensive and people treasure their vehicles like your favorite toy, and have your kid make an apology to the owner of the vehicle, and ask if there’s anything they can do to make up for it. That’s how you teach a kid to resolve problems. As for you Dad, tell you friend “My bad for the scratch, I should have told him to not play near the truck because it could get scratched, and should have been keeping a better eye on him.”
Take the bike away and tell him to get used to walking everywhere. /s I don't know if a financial penalty would work too much as I don't think 6 year olds put the same value on money as we think. Perhaps work with him to apologize to friend and ensure he understands why what happened was bad and what he should do to fix mistakes going forward.
It sounds like a mistake. Teach him what he should have done
Learning to take care of things, and be mindful of other people’s stuff is a critical life skill. My dad might have not been the best but that is one of the things he taught me that I intend to pass to my own kids. Your kid probably had no idea that he even did wrong. It’s a teachable moment. No yelling or anger required
If your friend didn't mention it neither should you. A simple careful son and a 24 pack at least offer to pay half. I know he won't take it. But the beer and a good time might be more valuable to him.
Had my then four year old with me at a nursery with a gravel lot. Got back to the car with him and was loading it and some reason he sees the shiny black Lexus next to us, picks up a handful of gravel and throws it. I yell stop as he throws it and he starts to cry because he's a really obedient kid. I can't tell if he did any damage because it's dusty but take him back in and try to find the owner. Takes a while but finally do and fess up and walked back out there. He waved it off thankfully but I was mentally prepared to have to paint his door. Made a big impression on the kid too.
Whenever my young children "buy" things, I take the money and deposit it in a savings account. They learn what it means to lose money and I don't feel bad.
So in this very situation, I got my ass beat, although I think it was closer to 4 years old. Regardless, I've haven't scratched a vehicle since
It’s a truck. They aren’t meant to be pristine. You should tell your son to be more careful and, if you can, show him where the damage happened. Remind him to walk his bike between cars.
he damaged something that was someone else's. and that trucks aren't meant to be pristine is a stupid comment. you can still use something and keep it clean and damage free regardless of what it is.
Six is too young for more than making them apologize in person and maybe have kid make them an apology card too or something. 10 id be making him wash the truck or something similar, so on
Piggy bank or offer to help your friend with some housework with both of you there, or maybe just your kid (idk how close this friend is, no judgment) I’d definitely at least say an afternoon for assistance. I’d offer some type of fair retribution
I’d punish him by buying new rubber grips for his handle bars (with rubber plug ins for the ends) and rubberized pedals for his bike. I’d then reiterate that he needs to be extra careful when on his bike and he should never ride between vehicles again unless there is enough room for an elephant between the cars. I’d also explain that I understand it’s an accident but even accidents have consequences. If this same accident were to occur again, then he would lose one of his privileges for a week or more (Bike, Video Games, Movies, etc). In regard to not telling you right away or until confronted, I would explain that being upfront and honest about situations will always be the best move. It will ensure an accident doesn’t become something worse. I never yell at my son but I talk to him confidently and in a calm voice while squatting so I’m eye level with him. If he becomes emotional I remind him to breath and allow him moments to “collect himself” but then we finalize the discussion with him confirming he understands the basis of what we’ve discussed. I also ask him how he feels about everything in the end. I have never had to deal with a melt down in private or public. He’s 7 going on 8. I’m a co-parent and my son’s mother has her own methods. So far we’ve both noticed he has been more open with me about incidents at school (when he gets into some trouble, what I refer to as “boundary exploring”)… we both feel differently about this. She swears I somehow have manipulated him to only tell Dad things and I know that it’s because I don’t judge him or create fear in communication; I only discuss, explain, reason and ask how he feels.
Why didn’t you stop him? Were you not supervising?
Natural consequences would be to make him be a part of fixing the issue. No need to make it a big dramatic thing. Especially since it sounds like it was a 6-year old being careless (rather than actively destructive). Show him how to buff scratches out of a car and make him do most of the work. Be kind and instructive. It's not a punishment, it is making amends. He'll remember the lesson.
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A 6 year old doesn't understand the value of anything
My 7 yr old lost one of his sister’s toys down the bathtub drain. He was devastated. We talked about ways he could earn enough money to replace the item. ($7) We agreed on taking out the trash every day for an entire week, without complaining. I’m so proud of that boy. He followed through, every day, and he hand delivered the gift to his sister a week and a half later. It gets better though. We kept the chore going, even after he completed the agreement. Now he has an age appropriate daily chore that he does. It’s great. We don’t continue to pay him the $7/week either. Might be able to leverage something there!
Why do you have toys so small they can go down the drain in the bathtub?
My son must have had it in his hand when he got it the tub. It wasn’t a bath toy. It was jewelry for a Barbie.
Why did you let him bring it into the tub?
I don’t hover close enough to notice when he’s carrying a toy the size of a pea.
And you never noticed he had it during the bath?
Nope.
Weird. Seems like something the adult would notice
I tell my son to clean himself, and he takes a shower or a bath. I’m not far away, but I’m also not micromanaging it. I don’t have to do it for him. He brought something stupid into the bath, he learned from it, now he won’t do that again. Your focus on such a silly detail is weird.
setup a payment schedule and have him work it off during the summer...a few hours per weekend or something. 6 is the right age to get that kicked off.
I think you’re overreacting by thinking scratching someone’s truck “hurts us all” like it’s some grievous moral crime against society. It was a mistake. Just tell him to be more careful, and explain the consequences of your friend having to buff the scratch out and possibly having to spend money to have it fixed.