Bullying in perspective

When my eldest started kindergarten, he was bullied by a trio of 3^rd graders playing a game where they encouraged him to chase them, cried when he tagged them and got him punished by the teacher’s aide. Only after observing the behavior directly did my husband catch on and confront the girls while I let the school know what the game was. We also talked with Benjamin about saying no when the girls ask him to play tag. The next day, the game was over and my son went from miserable to elated.

Helicopter parenting or effective intervention? Since he was only 5 and the issue was with 8 year olds, I think we did the right thing. But the specter of bullying shadows every school and camp. In California, we have a zero tolerance policy designed to ensure that every child feels safe at school. But here’s the thing – bullying happens in the world. There are people who are nasty sometimes and our kids need to learn how to deal with both being the recipient of that nastiness and with dealing with their own impulses to be nasty. Is zero tolerance helping them learn how?

I’m not suggesting that we let our kids get pummeled on the playground or that teasing a child to the point where they are depressed, suicidal or generally miserable is at all acceptable. We need to learn how to teach our kids to deal and to recognize and intervene when they are in serious trouble.

I saw an article today in The Costco Connection (long wait to return contact lens solution) about bullying and there were five tips for kids who are bullied that I think are good. Thanks to Izzy Kalman of Bullies2Buddies.

• Be nice to kids when they are mean to you and before long they will stop being mean.
• Don’t tell on kids who upset you. They will hate you and want to beat you up. Talk to them directly and they will respect you much more. Tell an adult only if there is an emergency situation or because you want the adult to teach you how to handle the problem.
• Don’t get angry when kids insult you. They love to see you getting angry. Make it clear that they can insult you all they want and it doesn’t bother you. After a few days, they will stop. (This is very hard for adults to do…great to learn as a child).
• If kids bring you nasty rumors, don’t defend yourself. Just ask the kids “Do you believe it?” If they say they do, answer, “You can believe it if you want”. (Of course, often no one asks you about the rumor, they just snicker and snipe in the background – it can be very lonely to be the subject of the rumor mill).
• If kids hit you and you’re not hurt, act like nothing happened. This way you look tough and cool because you don’t get upset over nonsense. (I agree with this part). If they keep hitting or pushing you, ask them calmly, “Are you mad at me?” If they aren’t, they’ll stop hitting you. If they are angry, they’ll tell you why. You can discuss the matter, apologize if appropriate and they will also stop hitting you. (Personally, if they keep hitting you, it’s time to get help – they’re out of control).

What tips do you have for your children to deal with bullying?

I don’t negotiate with terrorists

We’ve been under assault – a sort of psychological warfare in the house this weekend. On the surface, we have a loving, playful and musical seven-year old. Beneath the surface, an instinctive plotter lurks.

Although the subject of this current dispute is piano practice, it’s not really about the piano. It’s about how he deals with a challenge. His response to a song, book, swim test or other task that is a stretch is to get angry, frustrated and combative. He launches attack after attack on us – giving us a preview of his teenage years. We know we cannot make him something he is not, but we also know that he needs to develop skills to break down a challenge into achievable parts. He needs to learn the merit of practice and hard work to conquer challenges and earn self-esteem.

But what to do when he’s frustrated, enraged and nasty? It’s not as if he’ll go back to the task when he cools off. We’ve tried sitting with him to answer questions as he practices or works on the project. We’ve tried threats and rewards. We’ve questioned our own priorities – how important is piano if he’s more interested in drums right now? It is important – it’s the foundation for music.

In a battle of wills, we lose. If he doesn’t learn to practice/work hard, he’ll lose in life. It seems stupid to battle over piano. And we don’t negotiate when he’s enraged. Today’s 15 minutes of piano practiceEnjoying performance took and hour and half. He claimed he doesn’t like the song he’s assigned. Of course, he hasn’t liked any of them when he first starts, so we cannot put much weight on his protest.

Many hours later, I told him the deal. Once soccer season ends, he can start drum lessons if he practices piano every day without argument. Every argument pushes his drum lessons back another day. We’ll have a large calendar to track this. Someday, I hope he looks back and says that learning to practice piano was a good lesson for life. And hopefully, when he is a teenager, we’ll have one less terrorist attack.

What ideas have worked for you - working with their wiring and still teaching them important life lessons?

Update on Tuesday, August 11, 2009 at 3:20PM by Joelle - a Practical Parent

So far, so good - two days, no fights over piano.  Finger's crossed.

Working with your child's natural wiring

When my first son was 4 weeks old, we attended a talk on how to raise a Jewish child in an assimilated community. The most memorable comment had nothing to do with the actual topic – it was parenting advice so logical and practical, I’ve shared it with everyone I know:

“I’m not a childcare professional or psychologist, but as the father of 9 children from 5-17, I think I am a bit of lay expert in the matter of children – so let me tell you what I’ve learned. They are born wired. Your efforts to re-wire them will lead to misery. You need to understand their wiring and help them make their wiring work for them.”

Kids are born pre-wired for traits, strengths and weaknesses. Lots of things happen in life to change how people interact and understand the world – and change their personalities as a consequence. But often the efforts of parents to mold our child’s personality just results in mutual frustration and disappointment. While molding personalities is a route to failure, wiring their brains to make good choices is something every parent needs to do.

A friend of mine has a troubled teenager and as they work as a family to help him straighten out, they attend group therapy with similar families. My friend mentioned that the one thing all the families had in common was that they didn’t set limits and enforce consequences on their troubled teens when they were young children. While there’s no saying if their child would still be troubled if they had, it was very meaningful to him that all the families had the same regret.

It’s so much easy to set limits and consequences on a 5 year old than on a 15 year old. For example, the kids had a sleepover this Saturday night and elected to watch shows on the TV that we don’t allow (and were very defiant of their babysitter). The consequence is that they have lost TV for the following weekend and they now have a daily reward chart where a sticker is only given by our au pair if they have been respectful of her. We’re trying to wire their brains to follow the rules and treat people with respect. The choices they can make now while they’re young are safe and easy...hopefully they’ll be well practiced in making good ones when the consequences get more dire.

What choices and consequences have worked for you to teach your kids?

Exasperating Eights

The terrible twos don’t come close to comparing with an enraged almost 8 year old. Every Thursday, my boys have a swim class. They’re at the same level but Taylor, the younger, is about to achieve his next “ribbon” and Benjamin is not. Benjamin learned this fact last week. Now showing: "Rage at Swim Lessons".

When I arrived – Benjamin was arguing with the instructor at the front desk about how he hates swimming and it’s stupid and he’s been working on the purple ribbon for over a year and he should have it. Privately, I completely agree with him that a year for a ribbon is too long between positive reinforcement events and I had spoken with the school about the pace. But my son was being disrespectful of his au pair who had asked him to swim and the instructors who were trying to teach him.

My approach was twofold: first, I asked the instructor when Benjamin received his prior ribbon and she confirmed September 2008. I asked Benjamin to tell me the current month and year and then confirm if a year had passed. Not quite. Second, I gave Benjamin a choice – he could sit on the bench next to me and not swim (and I was clearly not going to be warm and cuddly) or he could get in his trunks and go work on his purple ribbon. He chose to swim.

He’s a strong swimmer – he just prefers to play. Taylor, on the other hand, likes to practice sports until he masters skills. Different personalities lead to different outcomes. The instructors watched Benjamin closely this time and determined that he had all the skills – he just had to stop goofing off in order to be tested. It’s hard to be shown up by your younger brother – I understand Benjamin’s frustration.

The Talmud says we must teach our children to swim “Swimming both protects the child physically (from drowning) and also acts as a metaphor regarding independence.” (AllExperts.com). My son is learning that independence (the choice to play rather than practice) is earned and not always fun.

My boy discovers summer and needs sleep

This is the first week of summer in California and the boys have discovered that camp is a lot more fun than school. This week, it’s soccer camp. For Jammer, that’s 9-3 – six hours of soccer camp. Running, kicking, drills and games for 5 hours (time for water, food and bathroom breaks). And we’re still doing jujitsu on Monday and Wednesday, piano on Tuesday and swimming on Thursday.

Taylor is going from 9 – 10:30 and literally cries when he has to leave. Benjamin even held him and told Karlla that Taylor was welcome to stay. It’s great when Jammer wants to share his experiences with Taylor. Taylor loves it too. You cannot teach big brothering, but it’s great to cultivate what’s there naturally.

The smiles are huge and at 7:15 at night, the two boys literally collapse into bed until 6:30 the next morning. Wonder if Camp Galileo will be as exhausting next week!