If your child attends a new school, including entering middle or high school, you can expect more challenges and homework!
For your student, a new school means developing new friendships. More than likely, this is probably one of the scariest things for them. Meeting new friends is hard. It makes kids feel insecure and vulnerable. Even as adults, we can feel this way in new social settings.
While great new friendships can develop, unhealthy ones can develop as well. Some kids may be rude, mean, or even bullies. I understand this is a sensitive issue for many families. My intent isn’t to debate each situation but to share some resources that may help your family.
Therefore, to start, it’s essential to understand some definitions.
Rude = inadvertently being impolite or discourteous. An example of a rude person may be someone who jumps ahead in the lunch line or brags about being the best athlete or student.
Mean = saying or doing something with the intention to hurt someone else. An example of a mean person may be someone criticizing your clothes or lunch. A person who is mean may say something hurtful one day and be nice the rest of the school year. Their behavior isn’t repeated on a regular basis.
Bullying = repeated, unwanted aggressive behavior that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. Different types of bullying include:
- Verbal;
- Physical;
- Social; and
- Cyberbullying.
It’s estimated that we’re connected to our electronic devices almost five hours per day. To me, this is why cyberbullying is so concerning. Cyberbullying can happen 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
If your family struggles with too much time on electronic devices, check out my blog “10 Tips for Parenting the Digital Child”.
If you’d like to learn more about bullying, visit stopbullying.gov. You’ll find information about:
- What is bullying;
- Cyberbullying;
- Who is at risk;
- Preventing bullying;
- Responding to bullying; and
- Getting help.
If your family is struggling with a particular situation, don’t sit back and hope that it passes. Talk to a teacher, principal, therapist, police officer, or religious clergy. Help is available if you look for it.
Do you have any tips or information you’d like to share? I’d love to hear them; please share them in the box below.
Source:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/signe-whitson/bullying_b_2188819.html
https://www.stopbullying.gov/what-is-bullying/definition/index.html#frequency
