Action against Bullying
Dear parents, it’s my duty as the leader of the Stop Bullying campaign in our town to address a few issues that are significant to the growth of our children. Most of us have been bullied at one time or another when we were young. However, do we realize that there are adverse effects associated with bullying? A majority of you have children aged between eight and seventeen years. Do we take time to talk to them about their days at school and how they should treat each other? If you haven’t done this then, you are ignoring a very vital part of your child’s growth. One that might shape who your child becomes in the future (Frisen, Hasselblad and Holmqvist, 2013).
First of all, let me define the word bullying so that we are all in a common understanding of this term. Bullying means any aggressive and unwanted behavior among school going children that brings about a perceived or real power imbalance. Usually, the behavior occurs regularly, and both the child that is bullied and the bully may have long term problems (Frisén, Jonsson, and Persson, 2007). Therefore, bullying might be verbal, social or physical. Verbal bullying may involve name-calling, sexual comments, teasing, and taunting. Social bullying takes the form of hurting other people’s reputation such as spreading rumors, embarrassment in public and even telling other children to ignore someone. Most of us are aware of this last form which is physical bullying. Olweus, (2013) says that it may involve hurting other children through hitting, punching, taking their stuff and even mean and rude gestures. Bullying will take place during school hours and sometimes your child will not report to you or the teacher about what happened. Even worse your child might be the one bullying other kids at school.
At this point in know, you are wondering what parents should do. Some of you might think “well that’s normal child play, they will get over it.” However this is not the case, we need to take action for the sake of our children. A study in psychology recently determined that the psychological effect that children experience is too much. The study was on a group of adults who were bullied at an early age, and they were compared with those who never experienced bullying. These adults were less likely to maintain employment and even had financial problems (Crawford, 2002). There are also proven cases of problems with social relationships which meant that bullied children had a hard time maintaining long term relationship. Is this something that we want our children to experience? Do you imagine your Child now a grown Male and cannot form a good adult relationship because of what you ignored today? I know that all of us love our children and will always want the best for them at all time. We don’t want our children to be bullies and even victims of bullying, and that’s why we must take action.
According to Hicks (2000), action comes in various ways that we as parents can enforce in our relationships with our kids. First of all learn always to talk to your kids about how their day has been. You will most likely notice a change in mood if something is happening at school. Let them learn to be open with you and tell you anything because most often the victims will never speak out. According to Veenstra (2014) we must also ensure there is collaborative effort between parents and teachers so that we are well aware of what problems our children are facing. Thanks your time and let us stop bullying.
References
Frisén, A., Jonsson, A. K., & Persson, C. (2007). Adolescents'perception of bullying: who is the victim? Who is the bully? What can be done to stop bullying?. Adolescence, 42(168), 749.
Crawford, N. (2002). New ways to stop bullying. Monitor on psychology, 33(9), 64.
Hicks, B. (2000). Time to stop bullying and intimidation. Hospital medicine (London, England: 1998), 61(6), 428-431.
Frisen, A., Hasselblad, T., & Holmqvist, K. (2013). Journal of Adolescence: What actually makes bullying stop? Reports from former victims. Youth Studies Australia, 32(1), 63-64.
Veenstra, R., Lindenberg, S., Huitsing, G., Sainio, M., & Salmivalli, C. (2014). The role of teachers in bullying: The relation between antibullying attitudes, efficacy, and efforts to reduce bullying. Journal of Educational Psychology, 106(4), 1135.
Olweus, D. (2013). School bullying: Development and some important challenges. Annual review of clinical psychology, 9, 751-780.
