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How to Protect your Child from Bullying at School – Tips for Parents of Bullies

Article by Auriel Blanche

Creator

Thursday, May 10, 2012

A Stop Bullying book that is on a baby blue background

Picture credit: Dee Cooper and Wild of Unsplash

Helping parents of bullies might be the last thing on or your mind if your child is currently being bullied but what happens if you discover to your horror that it seems to be your child who is doing the bullying? Why, you might ask yourself – whatever did we do wrong for this to happen.

Well don’t despair …help and understanding is at hand in an article from The Huffington Post as documented by Mary Pulido’s excellent observations about bullying among children…

Having just seen the powerful documentary “Bully” that depicts the horrific tragedies that befall innocent children by bullies teasing, humiliating and assaulting them, I felt compelled to ask “What about the parents of the bullies?” How do they get support? What can they do to recognize and stop the harmful acts that their child is perpetrating on innocent children?

Bullies come in every shape and size. They are from every ethnic group, race, socio-economic class, gender and religion. As a parent, you’ll probably be shocked to learn that your child is intentionally causing pain and humiliation to other children.

Research shows that children who resort to bullying often:

- Lack empathy and compassion for others’ feelings
- May be expressing anger about events in their lives
- Want to be in control
- Have low self esteem
- May be trying to impress their peers
- Come from families where parents or sibling's bully
- Do not receive adequate parental attention or supervision
- Have parents that do not enforce discipline
- May be the victims of bullying and are trying to retaliate

The good news is that there IS a lot that a parent can do to help their child stop bullying. By taking immediate action; you can help your child learn new ways of handling their feelings, peer pressure and conflict with others.

Here are a few tips:

Remain calm. You will probably have to deal with the school officials and the child’s parents; no one wants to speak to an angry adult ….

The whole of the above article by Mary Pulido can be read by clicking on the following link about bullying.

So, with this wealth of practical & supportive tips from Mary for parents of bullies as a way for them to start moving ahead, why not help your child channel any so called negative energies into taking positive action. Suggest they take the initiative to help rather than bully other kids.

Help your child start feeling great about themselves, feel empowered and satisfied by taking positive action. Isn’t this really what the so-called bullies are looking for, to feel good about themselves and to improve their self-esteem? I suggest that this could be a more positive solution all round to protecting your child from bullying others and yet not making them “wrong”.