Tips for Parents: Help Kids Use Brains to Battle Bullies

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Sooner or later, your child may encounter a bully. How will your child handle that encounter? How might you help?

There was a time when it was thought that bullies didn't intend to be malicious—underneath was a lovable sweetheart suffering from low self-esteem. Researchers are rethinking that point of view, says Maggie Greene, a safe-schools trainer with the National Resource Center for Safe Schools at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory.

"Bullies seem to have pretty strong self-esteem," Maggie reports. "Their behavior is learned, it's learned early, and it needs to be remedied early, before the age of eight, in order to prevent chronic bullying behavior."

Bullying, she explains, is when one child or a group intentionally hurts another child over and over again, and over a prolonged period. It's beyond good-natured occasional joking or teasing. Hurt is inflicted through assaults that can range from words, such as name calling or taunting, to physical aggression -- kicking, shoving, fighting. And a subtler, but just as damaging form, says Maggie, is shunning or socially isolating a child.

Maggie suggests that parental antennae be attuned to signs that could suggest that their child might be having trouble with a bully. Here are just some of the signs to watch for. If your child:

• Comes home from school with cuts and bruises, damaged school materials, and/or clothes dirty and/or torn
• Frequently loses possessions
• Appears afraid, or depressed, or moody
• Often cries before going to sleep
• Feels ill in the morning to avoid going to go school
• Loses interest in school work
• Becomes quiet, passive, or anxious

Kids often hesitate to reveal they are being bullied. If you suspect something is amiss, take the direct approach and ask if there's a problem. Although kids typically will deny it initially, encourage him or her to share their feelings by assuring that you'll help and support them in solving any problems.

Maggie advises, however, not to promise that you won't tell. Instead, reiterate and reassure of your support and assistance in helping the child to work out the problem. The best strategy, says Maggie, is to teach your kids ways of avoiding encounters with a bully. Some parents worry that they're teaching their kids to be cowards, and that socking the bully will solve the problem once and for all. On the contrary, contends Maggie. Returning aggression with aggression escalates and inflames a situation.

Instead, help develop strategies to solve the problem. Here are a few:

• Avoid the bully. Don't be alone where the bully can pick on you.
• Enlist a friend to help. Bullies have a harder time picking on one person if someone else is around.
• Try not to show a reaction; bullies like reactions.
• Ignore the bully.
• Say Stop! or No! and walk away.
• Get away fast if it gets physical.

If you suspect your child is being bullied, immediately alert the teacher or caregiver so that the situation can be monitored for your child's safety. And keep talking with and listening to your child, Maggie urges. Ask about school, social and other activities, other kids in class; encourage your child to talk with you at every opportunity. The conversations may help you to identify problems.

This column by Karen Lytle Blaha is provided as a public service by the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory, a nonprofit institution working with schools and communities in Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington.