Playmates that say mean things

I am just starting to hear this "mean talk" with my kids playmates. We dont say those things in our home, but my kids do attend nursery school 4 mornings/wk, so I know they are learning it from there. I am a little baffled, what do you do when another child comes up to your child and says "you are naughty" then runs away laughing, or says "i dont want to be your friend", etc, etc. Do you intervene? I know that if my children were saying that to other children that I would definitnely intervene and try and tell them that those are not words we say to someone, and if they continue to use them I would use a timeout (which usually works for my kids). But, I am finding that other parents dont even notice when their kids are saying these things to my kids...so I am not sure what to do.
i want to equip my kids to handle this situation as they get older (because I know they will encounter it), but I am just not sure that at 3yrs old they can "work through it" without my intervention. Do I just need to minimize my time around these parents and kids?

ANy thoughts...??

 

I just say "that's not a very nice thing to say" or "those words hurt my ears". I think it depends on how much it occurs, if it happens every single time your kids hang out with a certain playmate then I would probably shy away from my kids hanging out with them. But if it's just a random thing then I wouldn't worry about it.
I try to focus more on how my kids handle things then what other kids say. Like when the other child says that and runs away, I get down to my childs level and talk to them about it. Say they are silly and just not being very nice.

 

Ditto (especially the bolded part). You (and your kids) will never be able to control what other kids do. If it's someone they play with often, you might want to say something either to the child or their parent, but what your kids really need to learn is how to handle it.

At my DDs' school, they encourage kids to tell their friends if the friend says or does something mean/inappropriate/whatever. The teacher will coach the child on what to say, like "That makes me feel sad when you say that," and then walk back over to the kid who said the mean thing and encourage the sad one to say how she/he feels. If they can't do it, the teacher will say it for them.

Or, if the other kid is already long gone or your child doesn't want to confront them anyway, you can remind them that sometimes people say things they don't mean, or sometimes kids experiment with saying things just to see what will happen. They can choose whether to confront their friend or whether they want to just not play with them for awhile.

 

I agree with Brigette and Alden. I work on how to respond with both my girls. But I also have one kid who is sometimes the perpetrator of these interactions (she just sometimes says mean things and I don't know why!). I work with her before we go somewhere to remember to play nicely and be kind to others (she's a sweet kid, but something she gets impatient if you don't want to play her way). Thankfully (?!) she is usually just lashing out at her sister so I have the opportunity wacko to work with both on how to be kind AND how to stand up for yourself.