My boy returns from pre-school saying that a boy both spat in his face and punched him (yes I know…its south London) and asked if it is OK for him to hit him back.

It was one of those frequent parenting moments where I was lost for words.  I am a pacifist at heart and would love him to get through school and life without ever hitting or being hit but as I am already learning that is unlikely.

And part of me wondered – would the kid who punched him be less tempted to do it a second time if Rex gave him a quick but well placed whack back?

So what did I say?  Well I gave an extremely woolly answer back saying that ideally no, he would not hit back and just go and tell the teacher but if he really felt he had to punch him then that was OK.  I quickly realised that my lack of confidence in my answer had left both of us confused and I needed to do some more thinking.  To date , I have always said hitting is not OK and despite this my daughter has continued to punch her brother and he has dutifully never punched her back, but sometimes I’ve wondered if a bit of retaliation might be exactly what would make her stop.

A quick trawl of the parenting forums suggests that there are a lot of equally confused parents out there.

I suspect when he gets to school this type of thing will only become more frequent so I want to give him so really clear guidelines on what to do if he is being physically attacked.

Do you encourage your children to turn the other cheek (and tell an adult) or do you ever say it is OK to hit back?