Bullying

   One area that has been keeping counselors busy has been bullying.  We tend to think of students hitting, shoving or beating up another student when we hear the term bullying.  Because both Hatton and Northwood schools have been very strict enforcing their "No bullying" policies, we see much less of this type of bullying.  We are, however, seeing more of the type of bullying called relational bullying.


    Relational bullying consists of leaving out other students, putting them down in front of others, making them feel unwanted, starting gossip about others,  and just plain being mean to them.  It can be anything from making dirty looks to manipulating others to get them to look bad in front of their peers.  You may say, "They're just kids being kids, they have to learn to ignore these things and get over it."  That is true and, as counselors, we work on building that resiliency with a lot with students.  But when this happens daily or up to 10 times a day, it can be so traumatic for students that they don't want to go to school anymore.  I have had instances where the student had put up with this type of bullying for 3 years or more before telling someone about it.  This student's grades had been slipping and finally they couldn't take it anymore.


    Also, when our class sizes are small, if a student is ostracized by one or two students in their class, much of the rest of the class will go along with them, mostly because they don't want to be the next one bullied.  There may not be anyone else in the class that they can feel comfortable with, such as there would be in a larger school.  That student feels even more alone.


   If this is happening to your child, give them a chance to talk about it and validate their feelings.  Sometimes our kids just need to vent to someone-be there for them.  Also, don't blame them.  It's easy to say things like, "Did you say something to provoke him?" or "What did you do first?"  Sometimes they are the victim because of something that happened a long time ago or for no reason at all.


  Here is a web site that has some information about relational bullying:


 http://foreverfamilies.byu.edu/Article.aspx?a=124