Let's Stop Bullying

Bullying is an unacceptable anti-social behavior that is learned through environmental influences such as home, school, peers or even media. It also can be unlearned or preferably, prevented from occurring in the first place.

Such mistreatment can cause children to become depressed or fearful, so teach children from an early age social skills that will decrease their chances of being bullied. Various ideas include:

• Teaching children self-respect will increase their confidence and make them less of a target for bullies. Do this by expressing encouragement and appreciation and by avoiding labeling or name-calling.
• Let children know it’s OK to express anger or dissatisfaction. This demonstrates their opinions are valuable and can prepare them to stand up to bullies. However, make sure children are still respectful even when they’re assertive.
• Teach children to use body language that can help them appear self-assured, even if they aren’t. Teach them to hold themselves confidently, relax, keep their hands steady and maintain frequent eye contact.
• From a young age, help children develop friendships and build social skills, which decreases chances that bullies will make them a target. If children have a hard time fitting in, encourage them to seek out children who are not in an apparent group or unstructured activities such as the jungle gym rather than trying to break into a group or an organized game already in progress.
• Instruct children how to express themselves clearly yet diplomatically. By using “I” statements such as, “I don’t like this game,” to express how they feel, children can tell others what they want in nonjudgmental ways. Children who can avoid offending others tend to have more friends, which wards off bullies.

Teach children how to defend themselves if a bully confronts them. Don’t encourage them to fight the bully, who is probably a bigger child. Some defensive techniques include: using humor to deflect a bully, not letting the bully know they’re afraid, avoiding a bully and asking for help from a responsible adult.

Even if children have been taught these techniques, it’s still important to pay attention to possible signs of bullying. If children often come home from school hungry or needing to use the bathroom, recognize it could be because of intimidation by a bully.

Ask pointed questions about who the bothersome child is in class or on the bus and always ask children about their day. Parents should snow children they care and want to hear what their children have to say.