Strollerderby

Ugh.  That is so disheartening, and I wonder if it has to do with our "selfish" generation creating these overly-entitled bastard bully kids.

I also wonder if it has anything to do with school size?  I grew up in a small town everyone knew everyone else and bullying couldn't really get as out of hand as it seems to be getting because: a) you were probably a cousin of the kid or b) your mom or his mom worked at the school et cetera.

The schools here in NJ are just enormous and I'm afraid that the teachers just can't give the kids the amount of time they require and that's how this kind of stuff snowballs.  I wonder how much private schools cost.......

Rachel, about private schools....my kids go to a small private Waldorf school across the river from you in PA, a school where you would expect the kids to be, I don't know, more gentle maybe?  Waldorfy?  Some are and some aren't.  Like anywhere, I guess.

Hey, maybe if I homeschooled, *I* could be the bully!  ;-)

It is so sad.  I hate bullies in our school.  I wish someone would come up with a way to stop them.  Counseling doesn't work.  I have tried everything and I have yet to figure it out.  In fact, they sometimes wait until they get off the bus and then they bully on the way home.  I am actually scared of some of these kids.  I have several bullies in my classroom.  I have them separated from the others but that doesn't mean they don't do their worst at home in the neighborhood.  I do believe it is because both parents work and this is how they have learned to deal with the world and get what they want.

I don't know...

Despite the growing discussions about 'bullying', I don't know that the phenomenon is any more <b>prevalent</b> than it used to be.  Surely, had I been offered that questionnaire when I was a child, I'd have responded both to have being 'bullied' and to have been the bully.  And I was a pretty quiet, minding-her-own-business kind of kid.

From reviewing the intially referenced article, I saw no indication from the research that would indicate that bullying is any more prevalent than it has been from an historical perspective.  I'd suggest that we are simply more aware of bullying than we used to be.  

That doesn't, however, remove the indignation we parents feel when we see one of our little ones being subjected to the machinations of a bully.  Nor does it remove the fear that our kids feel when they are subject to bullying.  

I am a former elementary school assistant principal, current stay at home mom to an 18 month old.  In both these roles I've had the opportunity to assess the current "bullying" crisis.

I think the most important thing to consider is that we are talking about children--children who are still learning how to get along with each other (aren't we all?).  

While I was surprised to find my own visceral indignant reaction of wanting to squish the other kid like a bug when my own son was pushed around, a bit of time away from the situation confirmed what I had learned in school--that it is up to us adults to teach children how to get along with each other.

In that situation the other child's mother did not do anything which I found infuriating.  And this is a child who has a mom who stays home and takes him to playdates regularly.  Not all kids have that kind of situation--many have no one to teach them how to interact socially (one could argue that this boy, privileged though he was, had no one either, but I digress).

Is it really so audacious when you're 7 to ask for/even demand cookies and a piece of birthday cake from a child you know has just had a birthday?  Rude, certainly.  Completely socially inappropriate, yes.  But bullying?  I don't think so.

Once we throw that label around and give it to children who likely don't know any better we give them little choice but to live up to it.  

So indeed, give your daughter strategies for how to deal with the other girl demanding her snacks.  But don't buy into the idea that your daughter is a victim (a label that may be just as deleterious), and that another child, who really, is just a child, is a manipulative evil "bully."

btw, did you see this article?  thought you would appreciate:  www.nytimes.com/2007/05/09/us/09down.html?hp

I see Tracy's points - that the seven-year-old bossy girl might not be an "evil bully."  But, seriously, I would be appalled if one of my kids (my eldest two are nine and six) behaved that way.  Call me a ninny or a priss, but that's RUDE.  Really rude.  And obnoxious and off-putting and all kinds of things.  By grade school children should know not to do that.  And in doing that (demanding cookies, for example) they do appear threatening (perhaps bully-like) to children who are caught off guard.  There's no excuse.  It's not the worst thing in the world - I mean there's no knife or gun mentioned - but if a seven year old child finds that she can get something from another child via intimidation, then perhaps she is on her way to more serious stuff.

I agree about not labeling anyone a victim (if at all possible.)  My oldest son has a classmate (they're all in third grade now) who spent most of first grade getting in everyone's face about everything - no boundaries.  I never intervened, though I did roll-play in the safety and privacy of our kitchen to help my son develop responses.  Now the other kid is thought of as a "loser kid" because he has acted like such a jerk that nobody will do anything with him anymore.  Very sad, but I'm glad the other kids just worked it out and blow him off now.  His problem.

The fact that anti-bullying programs are only on average about 15 % effective is truly disheartening. I teach at-risk teenagers, and I have been blogging/podcasting (www.teachersatrisk.com) about the issue of bullying including teacher bullying, student bullying and cyber-bullying.  Thank you for the link to the article about the effectiveness of anti-bullying programs.  I intend to include that report in my next post. Thanks again.

I intend to teach my daughter the same lessons about bullying that my parents taught me ... some reasonable coping skills, and if those don't work, how to report it to a responsible adult (teacher, aide, me, etc), and if it doesn't get handled appropriately over time, how to fight back.  Sure it will land her in the principle's office.  However - sometimes, showing the bully that you can stand up for yourself is all it takes - and then suddenly, the bullying stops.  Really, it does.

And don't worry about your child's famed 'permenent record' ... at least in my case ... that little scuffle in fifth grade and pushing the other boy under the table didn't seem to have any lasting effects other than actually stopping the bullying.

I still remember the principal's face when he asked why I thought it was okay to fight, and my response was that my parents taught me that it was okay to defend myself when threatened.  And then when he called my parents and my mom confirmed that ... he was just floored ... it just didn't fit in with his little world viewed.  Even at 10 years old or so I enjoyed watching this little exchange.o

What is it about a child who is left out? Their palpable loneliness and disappointment when other kids exclude them from play for reasons of age, disability , or difference , is so painful to watch. As a parent, one of the challenges is of course to decide