How to discipline a bully child

What Is Bullying | StopBullying.gov

Bullying is unwanted, aggressive behavior among school aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. The behavior is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated, over time. Both kids who are bullied and who bully others may have serious, lasting problems.

In order to be considered bullying, the behavior must be aggressive and include:

An Imbalance of Power: Kids who bully use their power—such as physical strength, access to embarrassing information, or popularity—to control or harm others. Power imbalances can change over time and in different situations, even if they involve the same people.
Repetition: Bullying behaviors happen more than once or have the potential to happen more than once.

Bullying includes actions such as making threats, spreading rumors, attacking someone physically or verbally, and excluding someone from a group on purpose.

Types of Bullying
Where and When Bullying Happens
Frequency of Bullying

Types of Bullying

There are three types of bullying:

Verbal bullying is saying or writing mean things. Verbal bullying includes:
- Teasing
- Name-calling
- Inappropriate sexual comments
- Taunting
- Threatening to cause harm
Social bullying, sometimes referred to as relational bullying, involves hurting someone’s reputation or relationships. Social bullying includes:
- Leaving someone out on purpose
- Telling other children not to be friends with someone
- Spreading rumors about someone
- Embarrassing someone in public
Physical bullying involves hurting a person’s body or possessions. Physical bullying includes:
- Hitting/kicking/pinching
- Spitting
- Tripping/pushing
- Taking or breaking someone’s things
- Making mean or rude hand gestures

Where and When Bullying Happens

Bullying can occur during or after school hours. While most reported bullying happens in the school building, a significant percentage also happens in places like on the playground or the bus. It can also happen travelling to or from school, in the youth’s neighborhood, or on the Internet.

Frequency of Bullying

There are two sources of federally collected data on youth bullying:

The 2019 School Crime Supplement to the National Crime Victimization Survey (National Center for Education Statistics and Bureau of Justice) indicates that, nationwide, about 22% of students ages 12–18 experienced bullying.
The 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) indicates that, nationwide, 19.5% of students in grades 9–12 report being bullied on school property in the 12 months preceding the survey.

How to Prevent Bullying | StopBullying.gov

Parents, school staff, and other caring adults have a role to play in preventing bullying. They can:

Help kids understand bullying. Talk about what bullying is and how to stand up to it safely. Tell kids bullying is unacceptable. Make sure kids know how to get help.
Keep the lines of communication open. Check in with kids often. Listen to them. Know their friends, ask about school, and understand their concerns.
Encourage kids to do what they love. Special activities, interests, and hobbies can boost confidence, help kids make friends, and protect them from bullying behavior.
Model how to treat others with kindness and respect.

Help Kids Understand Bullying

Kids who know what bullying is can better identify it. They can talk about bullying if it happens to them or others. Kids need to know ways to safely stand up to bullying and how to get help.

Encourage kids to speak to a trusted adult if they are bullied or see others being bullied. The adult can give comfort, support, and advice, even if they can’t solve the problem directly. Encourage the child to report bullying if it happens.
Talk about how to stand up to kids who bully. Give tips, like using humor and saying “stop” directly and confidently. Talk about what to do if those actions don’t work, like walking away
Talk about strategies for staying safe, such as staying near adults or groups of other kids.
Urge them to help kids who are bullied by showing kindness or getting help.
Watch the short webisodes and discuss them - PDF with kids.

Keep the Lines of Communication Open

Research tells us that children really do look to parents and caregivers for advice and help on tough decisions. Sometimes spending 15 minutes a day talking can reassure kids that they can talk to their parents if they have a problem. Start conversations about daily life and feelings with questions like these:

What was one good thing that happened today? Any bad things?
What is lunch time like at your school? Who do you sit with? What do you talk about?
What is it like to ride the school bus?
What are you good at? What would do you like best about yourself?

Talking about bullying directly is an important step in understanding how the issue might be affecting kids. There are no right or wrong answers to these questions, but it is important to encourage kids to answer them honestly. Assure kids that they are not alone in addressing any problems that arise. Start conversations about bullying with questions like these:

What does “bullying” mean to you?
Describe what kids who bully are like. Why do you think people bully?
Who are the adults you trust most when it comes to things like bullying?
Have you ever felt scared to go to school because you were afraid of bullying? What ways have you tried to change it?
What do you think parents can do to help stop bullying?
Have you or your friends left other kids out on purpose? Do you think that was bullying? Why or why not?
What do you usually do when you see bullying going on?
Do you ever see kids at your school being bullied by other kids? How does it make you feel?
Have you ever tried to help someone who is being bullied? What happened? What would you do if it happens again?

Get more ideas for talking with children - PDF about life and about bullying. If concerns come up, be sure to respond.

There are simple ways that parents and caregivers can keep up-to-date with kids’ lives.

Read class newsletters and school flyers. Talk about them at home.
Check the school website
Go to school events
Greet the bus driver
Meet teachers and counselors at “Back to School” night or reach out by email
Share phone numbers with other kids’ parents

Teachers and school staff also have a role to play.

Encourage Kids to Do What They Love

Help kids take part in activities, interests, and hobbies they like. Kids can volunteer, play sports, sing in a chorus, or join a youth group or school club. These activities give kids a chance to have fun and meet others with the same interests. They can build confidence and friendships that help protect kids from bullying.

Model How to Treat Others with Kindness and Respect

Kids learn from adults’ actions. By treating others with kindness and respect, adults show the kids in their lives that there is no place for bullying. Even if it seems like they are not paying attention, kids are watching how adults manage stress and conflict, as well as how they treat their friends, colleagues, and families.

How to re-educate a bully

Tags:
Expert advice
3-7 years
7-12 years
teenager

At the parent-teacher meeting of the third grade, the teacher emotionally talks about the fact that one of the students constantly disrupts lessons, violates discipline, offends classmates, does not respond to teachers' comments. “Just a hooligan,” the teacher states and looks angrily at the woman sitting at the first desk. Tears well up in my mother's eyes, and it is clear that at home she cannot cope with the little mischief-maker. nine0015

Who is a hooligan?

When evaluating children, adults often do not even think about how much their hasty conclusions can harm the child. The teacher declares the child a humanist, and the mother excludes engineering professions from a possible future, and no one analyzes that the features of teaching mathematics do not correspond to the level of perception of the child. So the concept of "hooligan" quite easily "clings" to the child. But is it?

There are two types of teenagers under the label "hooligan":

A child who does not hear the persuasions of adults, does not show respect for them, ignores appeals, shows aggression towards peers, commits antisocial acts. It is clear that such a child, sooner or later, will fall under the supervision of law enforcement agencies.
A child who does not obey the general requirements, does not obey adults, violates discipline. At the same time, he does not show aggression, and his actions are more like mischief. nine0015

The main difference between these types is motivation. The first type of children performs actions with the aim of harming, offending, securing their status. The second type often acts in a certain way out of boredom. Younger teenagers, in the absolute majority, belong to the second type of hooligans.

Why a child misbehaves

• Low level of school maturity

The Law on Education recommends entering the first grade from 6 years 6 months to 8 years. Children come to school with different levels of school maturity: not everyone is able to absorb information for 45 minutes, some simply cannot concentrate for a long time, others do not have logical thinking, and still others have a high need for physical activity. nine0015

The mechanism of violation of discipline by such children is quite simple. They get distracted, lose the thread of events, are left alone with their thoughts. An immature brain does not give a signal that you need to delve into and “catch up” with classmates. It defines a pause in the activity that needs to be occupied with something. Someone quietly draws, and someone attracts attention by pampering. At the same time, it’s boring to sit alone, you need to gather like-minded people around you, but it’s better to distract the whole class from the lessons.

It is important to understand that the child does not have any malicious intent, and banal pulling of pigtails or tying to a chair do not have aggressive motivation. The goal is not to study.

• Lack of interest

Lack of interest and school immaturity are not identical. A child with a high level of school maturity may lose interest in learning activities. Perhaps the level of pedagogical skill of the teacher is quite low, and monotonous inexpressive speech negatively affects the interest in learning. You can compare this situation with reading an uninteresting book. Few adults are able to finish reading a boring article or story to the end, unless such reading is connected with another motivation, for example, professional. nine0015

And again a well-known mechanism: I'm not interested, I'm bored, so I need to keep myself occupied with something.

An interesting fact is that in both cases the children react to the comments of adults, sincerely feel guilty, but cannot control their behavior. They become bored and uninterested again, and the mechanism of bad behavior starts up again.

• Hyperactivity

In hyperactive children there is a discrepancy between the speed of excitation and inhibition processes with the prevalence of the former. Children instantly react to any irritants, and excitability is inhibited quite difficult. In addition, the body of these children has an increased need for movement. Thus, at any moment, arousal may occur, accompanied by high motor activity. nine0015

Hyperactive children often cause negative reactions in individual teachers, but their behavior is physiologically determined. No comments can make a child behave calmly. The child is able to control his motor activity only for a short period of time.

• Demonstration

This type of behavior is due to the child's unconscious desire to draw attention to himself. It is possible that he would gladly become the best student in the class, attract attention to himself with good grades or better answers, but this is quite difficult. Therefore, the child attracts attention in the ways available to him: violation of discipline, disobedience to the teacher. If it is impossible to attract the attention of the teacher directly, then he will definitely do it through his peers, drawing them into his actions, for example, he will pinch the girl sitting in front so that she squeals at her, and then at him, everyone pays attention. nine0015

• Bad manners

Bad upbringing is often the cause of childish mischief and hooliganism. Children are simply not familiar with the norms of behavior and do not accept them. Often they follow the rules of conduct only out of fear of being punished. Thus, correct behavior is not arbitrary. Of course, parents and teachers tell children how to behave. But if the entire period of preschool childhood this information consisted only in conversations and was not supported by disciplinary methods (encouragement and punishment), then one should not expect compliance with the rules at school age. nine0015

Re-educating a bully

Most parents make the mistake of treating "bullying" as a temporary phase and hoping that everything will normalize on its own with time. Of course, you can justify the behavior of your beloved child with physiological and psychological characteristics, but this will not correct the situation. If a child allows himself hooliganism at school, then you need to immediately take measures to educate him, or rather, re-educate him.

In this case, be patient, as the process may take longer. nine0015

Express your displeasure to your child. Even if the reason for bad behavior lies in physiology, express your negative attitude to your child about his misconduct.
Do not discuss other children or the teacher in front of your child, teach your children to be responsible for their own actions. Tell me how you were ashamed, unpleasant or hurt. Ask how difficult it is for him to control himself. Let the child understand how upset you are with his behavior. nine0015
Demand answers. One of the most important techniques is to ask questions and demand answers. You don't threaten, you don't intimidate, you ask. Let the child explain why he pulled the girl's pigtail, was rude to the teacher, etc. If this is an isolated case, then the situation can be smoothed out, and if it repeats, then you should get to the bottom of the causes of hooliganism:
- Do you think we don't love you?
- Do you like a girl and hurt her?
- You don't respect the teacher?
Questions should contain hints of an emotional attitude to what is happening. Don't let it slip away. Teach children to be responsible for their actions.
Conversation of three parties. The teacher and the child may not have the same view of what is happening. Therefore, it is simply necessary to organize joint meetings of parents, the child and the teacher in order to find out all the nuances, as well as the degree of reliability of the presentation of the facts by the parties. The main thing is to understand the situation in order to take the necessary measures. nine0015
Remember your childhood. Imagine that you were the victim of a class bully, or you yourself were a bully at school. Remember your feelings and emotions and convey them to the child.
Disciplinary actions. If none of the arguments work, then punishment should be applied. Of course, we are by no means talking about physical impact, but punishment measures must be considered. This is unpleasant for the child, but he must learn to respect the feelings of others. You can punish by depriving the child of what he loves: computer games, communication in social networks, etc. Doesn't he like this arrangement? Do you like the constant misconduct of a child? nine0015

Popular wisdom says that up to 3 years of age children are brought up, and then they are re-educated. Behavioral problems at school are the result of mistakes in upbringing at an earlier age. Therefore, responsible behavior must be developed painstakingly and systematically.

Svetlana Sadova

Why does the child not obey you?

Often, for no apparent reason, your child begins to act up and do everything in defiance. What is the reason? The answer to this question will help you learn a new test from I am a Parent

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How to punish the parents of a bully child?

Good evening. The son's class teacher called from the school and said that he was pushed and hit his head against the wall. We came to school, our child was sitting in the teacher's room scared and complaining of a pain in his head. We took him to the hospital where he was examined and released home with a recommendation to apply cold. The child could not describe the situation in detail (a disabled child does not speak very well), but later the eldest son came from school and said that that boy had been teasing our child for a long time and hurting us in every possible way, and the eldest son and the guys from the class stood up for defense, but he did not let up, as a result, our son could not stand it and, after another mockery, he came up and gave the boy a kick, a fight ensued, as a result of which that boy not only pushed him, but took him by the chest and threw him against the wall. In the evening the child's condition worsened, we went to the ambulance and we were taken to the orphanage. traumatology, where the doctor examined us, took pictures, diagnosed a severe bruise, let us go home under the supervision of a local doctor and home regimen. During this period of time, teachers and the principal of the school called us more than once with apologies, except for the parents of the boy who injured us. The next day we met in the director's office, the director wanted to settle the conflict, we were ready to go to a meeting, but even there the boy's parents did not apologize and the fate of the child did not bother them. Honestly, we would like to punish people so that they understand that these are serious things and we will study at this school for another 3 years, and if the situation repeats, we are already on disability. nine0015

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February 07, 2018, 04:11 , Olga, p. Maydakovo

Ilshat Khasanov

Lawyer, Ramenskoye

Hello Olga!

When applying to medical institutions for minors, doctors had to clarify the reason for the child's bodily injuries and transfer the information to the juvenile police department, which should conduct an investigation and make a decision. You may not have reported the cause of the bruise to the hospital, but you (one of the parents) can file a complaint yourself with the police department serving your school. After that, the PDN inspector will interview you, the child and all participants in the incident, it is possible to attach a recording from a video surveillance camera. The boy who caused bodily harm will not bear any responsibility, since he is a minor, and the PDN inspector will issue a decision to refuse to initiate a criminal case. But the boy can be registered, which will negatively characterize him and may in another life situation have a negative impact when making a decision, and will also be taken into account when applying for a job in government agencies. nine0148