Today's post will deal with a topic that, unfortunately, sooner or later every teacher will have to deal with. I actually hoped that there wouldn't be a need for me to post on bullying, but today I must.As an elementary and middle school student I have been bullied. Not in a spectacular way, but classmates did make me feel different. I can relate to the feelings of bullied students from experience. During teacher training, I promised myself that whenever I would witness bullying in my classroom, I would stand up for the bullied student and make it stop. Now I know that the thought of being able to stop bullying just like that was naïve.
I have a student in my class who is being bullied. There are a few reasons that I don't know what to do about it:
1. The student can be nasty to other students as well. During the three hours a week I teach him, I can't see whether this is only a response to the bullying, or a misbehaviour in and of itself.
2. I don't know who the bullies are. I do have suspections, but I never caught them on the spot.
3. I realised something that I didn't think of during teacher training: if I stand up for the student during class, this will probably make the bullying worse. It will isolate him even more.
I am very concerned about the situation. Recently I found out that racial issues are involved. Although all bullying is abjectionable, racial motives take the bullying to an entirely different level. As as a social science and history teacher, I don't care if my students remember in what year the Conferention of Munich took place, not even whether they can name the presidents of the SU in the correct order. What I want them to know is to what horrible situations racism and prejudice can lead. I want them to understand that, in the end, there is no difference between the propaganda of Nazi-Germany, the ethnic cleansing of the Balkans, and racism in the classroom.
This morning, after discovering graffiti about this student that one of the bullies wrote on a table, I went to the mentor of this class. I told him that we need to take action. It turned out that last night, after school, the student already took action and attacked one of his bullies. I am so afraid that the school will only punish this act of defence, and not the months of bullying that lead to it. I offered the mentor to design a program together to combat bullying and racism in our school.
Yet I feel hopeless. Hopeless for witnessing senseless hatred in my classroom, hopeless because apparently the system did not provide the bullied student with enough care and support, leading him to think that he needed to solve the problem with his fists.
How can teachers protect the bullied student, and combat bullying, without setting the student even more apart and without causing the bullying to shift from the classroom to the schoolyard, or the streets?
15 comments:
The schools that both of my boys attend have regular sessions regarding bullying and how to deal with it. The school has a no tolerance rule for bully's. It's a scary situation to feel helpless in a situation you so badly want to help on. Keeping you in my thoughts and prayers.
Peace.. Wow. this is a heavy post. What to do, what to do....? I am dealing with my own conflict in the classroom where we are trying to look at the media to find stereotypical images that can negatively effect children, and my students don't seem to be concerned with the subtle, yet poignant racism in the media...
but anyway, maybe that will be the topic of my next post!
but back to your post, yea, thats problematic. i think what you said, "I want them to understand that, in the end, there is no difference between the propaganda of Nazi-Germany, the ethnic cleansing of the Balkans, and racism in the classroom" speaks volumes of you as a teacher. that should be the goal of ALL teachers, in my eyes..
but what to do, what to do remains the question.
i hate bullies and bullying.. what i can only suggest is to look at outside resources and organizations that come into schools to lead workshops, because yo- bullying is a monster.. check out www.challengeday.org.. very, very powerful work is done at that organization inside schools..
respect to you..
No easy answers. There is a stated no-tolerance policy at my school, but there are no perfect ways to enforce. ELA curriculum offers some opportunities, such as characterization lessons tie in with character education, short stories (like "Run Sheep Run"), novels (like HOOT, FREAK THE MIGHTY), etc.
"I want them to understand that, in the end, there is no difference between the propaganda of Nazi-Germany, the ethnic cleansing of the Balkans, and racism in the classroom"
Bullying is bad, racism is bad, but can't you make a statement about it without equating it to an international, multi-decade development in Europe where a nation was hijacked by an agenda that led to the mass-murder of millions of people?
TnT~ I am glad to hear that your sons' school has a good policy against bullying. It should be the priority of every school.
NYC tf~ I can't wait to hear more about that project you are undertaking, and the way you students react to it. Thanks for your advice, I will look into those organisations and see what they could do to help.
RC teacher~ You are so right, it's the implementation of school rules that is so hard to realize. I will check out the ELA curriculum
James~ You are right that the way I put it seems as though I am equating them. What I mean of course, and I am serious about this, is that racism can lead to events such as occurred in Nazi-Germany. It was the same feeling of superiority and excluding others that lead to those events, and that we still see in our world today, unfortunately. I want my students to internalize that idea, without equating the impact of the Shoah to bullying in the classroom.
Thank you for dropping by!
Yikes.
I don't have anything helpful to add, really - I just wanted you to know that I'm reading and vibing for you.
Is there any way that you can incorporate tolerance in your lesson plans?
Golly, James, why do you object to Frumteacher's reference to large-scale bullying to make a point about individual bullying?
Seems reasonable to me. Care to explain your point?
Hugh aka Repairman
Hugh, it's about as reasonable as suggesting that giving children Kool-Aid is equivalent to the introduction of crack cocaine.
Kool-Aid is unhealthy and people can become addicted to sugary drinks, but it is infinite orders of magnitude below giving someone their first hit on a crackpipe.
I just don't see the point in interlacing an important issue with hyperbole, it taints the message and distracts from the solution. I haven't seen a response yet that belittles race-based bullying. But to equate that serious issue to unparalleled, unprecedented, systematic murder is incredibly irresponsible and offensive.
James, you have a point about relative scale, but analogies always suffer from imperfection. Still, they may serve.
And what is terrible to one person is no less terrible because it's not shared by a million others, is it? (A mirror image of the "free goods" concept in macro-economics.)
I seriously doubt Frumteacher minimizes to her classes the horror of Nazi domination both before and during WWII.
Read some more of her stuff.
You have an agile mind and a great vocabulary. (I checked you blog.) Let's build on that.
So tragic that children, and adults, can not realize that we are all human, all the same in so many ways, and all deserve to be treated equally and with respect.
I teach lower grades and deal with bullying on a much smaller level. We have classroom discussions and I try to stop things like that early on. I do have the same kids all day and know them inside and out by the end of the year. That does help me, help them build character.
I feel for you FT and I hope this situation works out for the best.
Mrs Chili~ I will definately have to do that, I just have to consider in which way the message will actually reach them!
James~ I will respond to your comment in a new post.
Repairman~ Thanks for your comment, that's exactly the point I wanted to make!
Simply sublime~ I guess it helps to teach one class the entire day. Three hours a week doesn't give me sufficient time to really get to know them and to see who does what to whom.
Repairman~
I am both a parent and a teacher and actually work near the area I live in. Today, my son, who's a middle school student, came home and told us that a kid he knew since elementary school was picking on him. We are secular Jews; the kid was being overtly anti semitic in both word and action. My son went to school personnel and reported what was said and done. I will be following this up with a phone call to the principal about this incident and others. My son just said he was "fed up", but doesn't want to fight unless he has to, which has not come to pass. I will ask what is being done about this; I will not be fading into the woodwork about this matter any time soon.
Have you sent this student to the guidance counselor? Maybe that would help. We have also had mentors (teachers who don't teach that child) take the child under their wing for the year. This has helped some kids at our school. Maybe you could have a guest speaker (counselor or administrator) to talk about the bullying issue.
Check out the research by Dan Olweus-- other countries, unlike the U.S., have been motivated by teen suicide related to bullying, and really put money and research into looking at what is truly effective. The Olweus process (not a canned curriculum) is just catching on in the U.S., and it is one of only 11 programs that is considered a Blueprint for Violence Prevention. http://www.colorado.edu/cspv/blueprints/model/programs/BPP.html
Olweus wrote a book-- Bullying: What We Know and What We Can Do-- Understanding Children's Worlds. It is a powerful book. You are right-- the best way to address bullying is to empower the bystander students, which is a schoolwide culture change, and a classroom culture change that takes time, accomplished by monthly classroom meetings, consistent enforcement of rules in the classroom and school, and individualized interventions with students. An anonymous survey can be given yearly, and the results can be used to monitor hot spots in the school and classroom. It also measures whether students feel strong enough to stick up for one another. If this victim of bullying also bullies students himself, not just defensively, he might be what the research tells us is a "provocative victim." There are special interventions necessary for students with these behavior issues, and the school counselor needs to be involved. You can also talk to him about the "hotspots"-- when does the bullying most often occur? Even if he won't tell you who is doing it, he might tell you when it happens, or where. Then, you can brainstorm ways for him to change his routine, or walk with people he can trust, etc. Check in with him regularly-- is he doing okay? Does he want to talk? Watch him around students. Does he have a friend-- even one? Sometimes, students say they have friends, but they don't. If he doesn't have even one friend, then immediate intervention with the school counselor and family is important. He's at risk for suicide, and most studies show around 9% of students contemplate harming themselves. Suicide in the U.S. is now measured from age 10 and up. If he's been bullied using racial slurs and he retaliated, then even if he is punished for his behavior, the possiblity that he was racially harassed has to be investigated by leaders in the school, and responded to. If it is found that there is a pattern of racial harassment-- so much so that it is pervasive, then the school has a legal obligation to address it. That can mean splitting up the student aggressors, disciplining them, monitoring how the victim student gets to and from school and to and from each class, etc. He has a right to a safe learning environment. The good news is that a schoolwide implementation of antibullying measures can reduce bullying by as much as 50% in two years, and the survey provides an opportunity to measure your school's results! Good luck to you, and best wishes to your student.
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