8 and half years old write ‘F’ word

[midget]

Today my 8 and half years old kid wrote the ‘F’ word at the school’s mirror and caught by the janitor. The kid has been showing interest about this word recently by asking questions about it. None of the parents use this word ever nor the kid watches TV/play online unsupervised. We are in shock and do not understand how to manage the situation. This behaviour doesn’t match at all with the kid’s usual behaviour. Please provide me some suggestions on how to talk with the kid and to manage the situation.
Thank you!

 

[steve12]

@midget He most likely learned it from his peers. I guess teach him to not repeat any words those specific peers said or wrote.

 

[lalynx]

@midget It sounds like maybe this child is curious and yeah, I agree they probably heard it from peers. I can remember standing in line in recess and I was like digging dirt out from under my finger nail. someone said that I was flipping them off, which I didn't even know what that meant. I asked my parents when I got home and what they told me was it was disrespectful to do to adults. but I wasn't flipping any one off, I didn't even know what that hand gesture meant at that age. if i were to guess, I was probably around the same age as the child. What did they use to write it on the mirror? I would question this child and find out what they know about the f word. From there, give them an age appropriate response. And if it was in permanent marker, make sure you tell them that is messed up that the janitor would had to scrub it off.

 

[ozpeaceseeker]

@midget He’s exploring and maybe testing limits. Respond just like you would to any other fairly minor transgression.

 

[marshmelly]

@midget

We are in shock

Really? Because he wrote on the mirror or because of the word?

I mean, obviously, he learned it at school. At 8.5 that's rather late, tbh.

He will learn many more bad behaviors from his peers and you won't be able to stop it. And the bigger a deal you make out of curse words, the more interesting they get...

As for the writing on the mirror: Kids are naughty just for the sake of it sometimes. Testing limits, feeling the thrill. Was it okay? No. Does that mean he's on the path to jail? Also no.

There is a talk in order about how writing on mirrors is not okay. Did he get punished by the school? Ideally they made him wipe it off himself. If the janitor cleaned it, I'd send him to apologize to him for giving the man extra work.

As it's obviously the first time, I'd leave it at that.

 

[midget]

We are in shock, as this kind of behaviour never happened before.

We explained and he wanted to apologize specially to the janitor.
Yeah, the school punished by making him wipe it off.

 

[lalynx]

@midget It just occurred to me that perhaps the child was dared to write the F word into the mirror. Peer pressure can be difficult to resist at that age.

 

[midget]

Thank you very much everyone for all your comments and suggestions, really appreciated!

 

[destroyed]

@midget At this age, all of my boys and all of their friends l1oved to use the dictionary of non permissible words..especially on the car. They would not do ot when at home
..unless a sleepover. Having no success st stopping it with the oldest , etc al..I just turned the radio up. No writing on school mirrors!

 

[pinoytvshows]

@midget We teach our kids there are home words and public words.