Mean people are international.

I'd like to thanks you for the comments you mad eon my last post. Although I am not feeling much better, it did help to have both professional and parental (which are also professional, right?) opinions. I dug out an article from Multilingual living which I've been storing in the back of my brain for a while. It put me back on track a little. Multilingual Living: Don't Take Your Childrens Mulitlingualism so Personally.

The bottom line is that kids are kids, whether they are bilingual or monolingual. There are mean kids, oversensitive kids, intelligent kids and dumb kids. And kids can be mean in any language. I think that Suzanne may be getting the brunt of one of the class queen's storm (reminds me of me!). A couple weeks ago, the little girl said to Suz as we arrived in school,; "oh, c'est la vilaine Suzanne". I called Jerome up after to ask if it was mean or not since to me, it was really hurtful and since the parent didn't say anything I wasn't sure. Of course, I am American and all about my kid's self esteem, yadda yadda. He said it could be hurtful depending on how it was said, but he thought it was probably ok?

But today, when we got to school and Suzanne had finally finished a tantrum the same girl said "oh, c'est Susu" and then giggled. Suzanne looked at me sheepishly and said "I don't want people to laugh at me".so I asked who and she pointed to the class queen. I told Suzanne that she should ignore her. And if she laughed, then Suzanne could laugh back. What else can a parent do?

Read the article from Mulitlingual Living and then take a step back...you may not feel better emotionally, but you will intellectually.