Is Your Teen a Bully Or
Being Bullied?
Whether
your child is being bullied or whether they are a bully, both are situations
that no parent really wishes their child to be involved in.
Bullying
may occur due to power imbalances with society favouring the strong over the
weak and the popular over the less popular. Bullying in school is often as a
result of this, the more popular and strong children will flaunt their
superiority over those that are not as popular. These children being bullied
are not inferior to the popular children and in fact are not guilty of anything
other than being their normal everyday selves.
What can
you as a parent do to stop your child from being a bully?
- Teach
your child good values and principles from a young age. It is important for
a child to learn that it is not acceptable to be mean or nasty to other
people. If they learn this from a young age then hopefully by the time they
are teenagers they will be kind, friendly young people.
- Teach
your child to have self confidence from a young age. Often people that are
bully’s are people that actually have a low self confidence in themselves.
As a result of their low self confidence they are nasty to other people to
try and make it seam like they are better than they actually feel. They try
to put other people down to make themselves feel better.
- If
your child is a bully or showing signs of becoming a bully, then it is
important to let them know that bullying behaviour will not be tolerated
under any circumstance. Guide them in how behave more socially and try to
teach them how to handle their aggression without harassing others.
- Teach
your child good social behaviours and how to interact with other children.
By attending playgroups and social groups from a young age and continue to
do so while they are growing into their teenage years will teach them to
socialise well without having to be a bully.
It can be
very hard for a parent to know that their child is the victim of a bully. Every
parent wants what is best for their child and never wants to see their child in
either physical or emotional pain.
What can
you as a parent do if your child is being bullied?
- Teach
your child to have self confidence from a young age. Most children that are
the victim of bullying are shy or perhaps ‘different’ children. By teaching
your child self confidence they will overcome their shyness and to display
confidence in themselves will discourage any bullying behaviour toward them.
- If
your child has special needs or has a disability they may be more subjected
to bullying. A bully will find their faults and use them in their bullying
against them. It is important for your child to know that their disability
does not make them a bad or weak person. It is extremely important to teach
them from a very young age to accept their disability and work with it and
not be ashamed of it. If your child has confidence and accepts their
disability they will receive less bullying over it. Realistically there
will always be some bullying and you will need to teach your child how to
deal with it the best way.
Teaching your child how to deal with bullying can be difficult. Teaching
them to stand up for themselves will give them confidence against bullying
and a bully will soon give up if they aren’t getting the results they want.
Standing up for themselves does not necessarily mean fighting, but just to
show that they are not bothered by the bullying can do wonders.
- Teach
your child some self defence techniques by enrolling them in a class such as
karate or judo. This is not to encourage violence but often learning a
skill like these will give your child great confidence and good values which
will make it much easier to deal with any bullying they may come across.
Children
learn by behaviour, they will often mimic the behaviour that they see happening
at home. Aggressive parental behaviour may translate into bullying behaviour in
your child. On the other hand parents who are timid and shy will possibly have
children that are timid and shy. Parents like this need to teach themselves as
well as their children how to be assertive.
So it is
very important to show good behaviour in the home as an example to your
children. Live your life and show behaviour as you would want your children to
live and behave.
