In recent years, the facts of psychological violence in educational collectives have become more and more frequent. Unfortunately, teachers and administrations of educational institutions "turn a blind eye" to such situations. Mostly due to a lack of understanding how to work with such phenomena. The efforts of parents without support from the pedagogical collective are in most cases in vain. The most terrible mistake on the part of adults in such a situation is that the child who has become the object of bullying is not only left alone with the problem, but also made out to be the culprit of what is happening. So how to properly respond to the facts of bullying in educational collectives, what should and should not be done by adults.
Before moving on to the essence of the problem, it is important to understand the concept of "bullying". Bullying is the psychological abuse of team members against one or more other members. The simple unpopularity of a child among peers, lack of interest in him, ignorance in communication is not a form of violence. Bullying is precisely an act of aggression that is constantly repeated in different types. Psychological violence in the educational team has been well researched in foreign countries and is called bullying.
Almost any child can become the object of bullying in a team. It will not necessarily be a physically weak "nerd-crammer". In my practice, such objects were children from dysfunctional families and children with disabilities, and even the children of their well-to-do family, but who committed illegal actions and came under investigation because of this.
It is important for teachers and parents to understand: if bullying occurs in a team, then this is not a problem of the person who became its object, it is a problem of the whole team. Therefore, work should be carried out with all members of the team, even with those who are not directly involved in bullying, but silently watching what is happening from the outside.
Transferring a bullying child to another school is, of course, a way out. However, the situation may repeat itself in the new team. Because a bullying victim is a set of behavioral and psychological characteristics that this child possesses. And he will carry all these characteristics to another team.
In addition, having removed the object of bullying from the team, the tendency towards psychological violence against someone by itself will not disappear among the team members. Either such a collective will choose a new victim for itself, or all its members will preserve in their system of values and moral norms those immoral and immoral acts that they committed against the target of persecution for the rest of their lives. At the same time, these immoral and immoral acts will become entrenched in the minds of children as socially approved. And then such behavior can be demonstrated by such children to their parents.
What to do for the parents of a victim of bullying
If your child has become the object of bullying in a school team or in a student group, you cannot leave him alone with the situation. No matter how old the child is, he needs the help of adults and, first of all, close people.
You definitely need to intervene in what is happening. And you should start by visiting school, talking with your child's class teacher. Earlier I wrote that bullying always includes every member of the team, even the one who keeps aloof. Discuss the situation with the teacher, find out what he intends to do to fix the problem. If necessary, involve the school administration and the school psychologist, social teacher in solving the issue. It will not be superfluous to invite a representative of law enforcement agencies to a class hour and a parent meeting for an explanatory conversation.
Parents should not have a “showdown” with the children themselves involved in the bullying. You may not achieve the desired result. On the contrary, you may be the object of persecution for illegal actions against other people's children.
Every evening after school, ask your child about the situation at school to keep abreast of developments. Meet with educators and classmates' parents several times as needed. The main thing in this situation is not to escalate the situation with the parents, but to find a solution to the problem.
Give moral support to your child who is being bullied. Teach him simple techniques of psychological defense against aggressors. For example, teach him to imagine himself as if in a glass jar, from which all the insults that peers throw at the child fly off. Explain that teasing and bullying is only interesting for those who give the bullies a response. If you do not react to their attacks, then the interest in continuing to offend disappears.
Remember that no matter how hard he tries not to react to attacks, your child still has an emotional tough time. The response aggression, emotions accumulated inside, the child needs to be removed. You can use different methods for this. For example, to speak these emotions with the child, or to offer to draw those children who offend him and tear up the drawings. You can inflate balloons, draw the faces of offenders on them, write their names and kick the balloons. Let your child better release his inner emotional stress in this way than on the offenders themselves.
So that a very traumatic situation of bullying does not leave an indelible imprint on the child's psyche, deforming his personality, provoking the development of various psychological complexes, be sure to work out the situation with a child psychologist.
What to do for parents of bullying children
Remember that your child, considering it socially acceptable behavior, the manifestation of aggression against peers over time can turn it on yourself. Therefore, in no case should you ignore the fact that your child is involved in bullying.
If your child took part in the bullying of a classmate or fellow student, you should not ignore this fact. Most often, children "work out" their own psychological trauma at an object that is obviously weaker than it. Such objects can be not only peers, but also animals. The source of your child's psychological trauma can be, and most often is, the family environment. Aggressive attitude of parents or one of the parents towards the child, pressure, overprotection and hypercontrol, a large number of prohibitions and taboos, restrictions, frequent scandals in the family - all this does not pass without leaving a trace for the child's psyche. At the same time, parents' indifference to the child, ignoring his interests, lack of attention and love can also cause anger in the child's soul. Especially in relation to those peers who live in a more favorable atmosphere.
Try to challenge the child to a frank conversation, hear his problems, go to meet the child. It will not be superfluous to work through the problems of your family relationship with a child or family psychologist.
It is important not only to find out the reasons that cultivate aggressive behavior in the child, but also to teach him the skills of self-regulation, stress relief, psychological and emotional discharge, which does not harm others, does not violate their rights and personal integrity. It will not be bad to tell your child about the legal consequences of manifestation of intolerance and aggression towards others.
It is important that this dialogue takes place in a positive, supportive atmosphere so as not to strengthen the child's negativism and aggressiveness even more.
If your child did not take an active part in the bullying of a classmate, but silently watched it from the outside, it is also important to talk to him frankly. Passive behavior in such situations is also not the most correct one. The position of non-interference cultivates in the child an indifferent attitude to the problems of others, forms in him soullessness and cynicism.
What should teachers do
1. How to deal with the situation on your own
It is impossible not to notice bullying in the educational team. The facts of aggression can take place both during lessons, before their beginning in the office, and during recess, after lessons, during extracurricular and extracurricular activities.
Once you find that your students are involved in a bullying situation, you can first try to cope with what is happening on your own. However, the 2 methods proposed by me can be successful only when the persecution in time lasts for a relatively short time.
In my teaching practice, I have always been able to do this without involving other persons: school administration, school psychologist and social teacher, parents of pupils and students. Therefore, I will share my experience with you, as well as describe the algorithm for solving the problem, if the problem cannot be solved with the help of one teacher.
Method 1. It was successfully applied in a group of high school students and in a group of college students. In the absence of the student who was the object of the bullying, I in a harsh manner demanded that the others stop bullying their peer, saying that in my presence they did not dare to insult and beat this student, spoil or hide his things. The children were told that the one whom they humiliate and insult is no worse, and maybe even better than themselves. One such stringent requirement without threats against children turned out to be enough. However, it is worth clarifying that in one of the cases the target of bullying was a disabled boy with limited sanity. To his peers, in addition to the demand to stop bullying him, I said that this boy is unpredictable in his behavior. And if, in response to their aggression, he inflicts injuries on the offenders, then he will not bear any responsibility. But the aggressors themselves can remain disabled for life worse than this guy.
Method 2 has been successfully applied several times, both in school groups and in a technical school. Expressing my disapproval of the bullying that happened in front of my eyes, I asked all the children why their peer is so bad. Apart from offensive epithets to the target of persecution, I have not heard anything from them. Then I asked a question about what they specifically know about this child: what he is passionate about, how he lives, what interests him, what he can do. There was no answer. Then I invited everyone at home to sit and think, write on paper and bring to my next lesson a list of the negative qualities of this child. I suggested that they make the leaflet with this description anonymous if they were embarrassed to identify themselves, offered to put such sheets on the table under the magazine at recess, promising that I would specifically go out into the corridor for the whole recess. Before the next lesson, I reminded the class of my proposal to express on paper my complaints about the target of bullying and left. In each case, not a single sheet of paper was found under the magazine. At the beginning of the lesson, I discussed the situation with the students, saying that no one can say anything bad about a child who has become the object of bullying. Even anonymously. After that, I suggested that the children also write anonymously and also on a piece of paper at home what good they can say about this child. And the next time there was not a single leaf under the magazine. Again, at the beginning of the lesson, I focused the attention of the children on the fact that, as practice showed, none of them know anything - bad or good - about their classmate. And, nevertheless, they offend him, humiliate him, insult him. To my question, what is the reason for such an attitude towards him, I also did not receive an answer from anyone. After that, the facts of bullying stopped. In one such case, a girl who was being bullied had two friends among her classmates who were passively following the bullying. In another case, the most previously aggressive classmates took the girl, whom they had previously offended, under their protection and patronage.
2. How to cope with the situation with the joint efforts of the pedagogical team
If bullying has been going on for a long time, many peers are involved in it, the situation has gone far, it will not be possible to cope with the problem using the methods described in Part 4 alone. More serious and large-scale work with the team will be required. Next, I will describe one of the algorithms for working on a similar class problem.
The first two important steps in resolving bullying are talking to the class and parents.
It is necessary to spend a class hour, at which what has arisen in the educational team will be called by its name. Pupils need to be made aware that they are committing psychological abuse against their classmate. They should also be told that this behavior is unacceptable. It does not indicate any strength, superiority of the aggressors over the victim. It testifies to the moral degradation of the aggressors and the unlawfulness of their actions. At such a class hour, it is important not to expose the object of bullying in front of the class as a victim, not to press on pity, not to demand sympathy and compassion for him, but to invite the children, each individually, to express what they feel, what they are experiencing, what their victim is experiencing. Also, each student needs to set the task for himself to evaluate, say, on a 5-point scale, the degree of his participation in the bullying, his personal contribution to the illness of the collective. For example, 1 - I never participate in this, 2 - I sometimes participate in this, but then I am ashamed, 3 - I sometimes participate in this and then I am not ashamed, 4 - I participate in this quite often and do not regret it, 5 - I am one of the main active participants in the bullying.
For a start, such a conversation can be led by one teacher. If it does not give a result, then a second class hour on this topic should be carried out with the participation of a psychologist and a representative of law enforcement agencies.
The meeting and discussion of the situation that has developed in the classroom should also be held with the parents of the students. At the parent meeting, it is also necessary to describe in detail what is happening, name the participants in the bullying, name the bullying by your own name and invite parents to conduct educational conversations with their children. The same specialists can be invited to the parent meeting as to the class hour. It is important for parents to make it clear that the problem of bullying is not a problem of the direct participants in bullying, it is a disease of the whole class that needs to be treated precisely as a collective disease.
The second step will be to identify among the students those who are ready to take on the functions of supporting and protecting the victim of bullying from aggressors. Such, however, may not be found. But you should still try.
The third step should be the work of a school psychologist with a team of students. The most effective will be training for group rallying, as well as individual work of a psychologist with active participants in bullying to work out psychological problems that push children to show aggression. The work of the psychologist should also be aimed at the victim of bullying in order to work out the consequences of the traumatic situation.
At this stage, you can use the method of forming moral and ethical qualities on the principle of realizing your own wrongness and imitating the positive example of others. For this purpose, you can periodically arrange for the children to watch films about friendship. You can find a lot of such films in the USSR film fund. Having shown such a film to children, you can immediately discuss it with the children and offer to write an essay or essay on the topic of friendship, as well as something from the category of a review of the film. This is best done in class to ensure that everyone sees the movie. With collective viewing, it is more convenient to organize its discussion.
The fourth step should be to develop with students the rules of interpersonal communication, rules of communication and interaction between students. The rules should include both prohibitions on negative action and affirmative action between students. It is important to consolidate the developed rules of behavior between students as a kind of code. It should be printed and posted in a prominent place in the classroom. In addition, it will be useful to print them out and hand them out to each student. Each subsequent class hour or lesson with the class teacher, it is important to begin with a question to the class about how successfully they manage to adhere to the developed rules of communication. You can ask those who are not very good at adhering to the rules to raise their hand first. Then those who rarely violate them, then those who practically do not violate them. At the end of those who have not violated them even once since the last poll. Those who do commit violations must be confident that if they try, they will definitely succeed. Those who do not break the rules should be publicly praised and set as an example for others. In other words, positive changes in the nature of the interaction of children in the classroom should be encouraged and supported.
In order to raise the authority of the victim of bullying in a peer group, it is important to entrust him with some responsible task, in which he will be given somewhat greater rights and powers than other classmates. However, at the same time, it is important to ensure that this child does not begin to recoup his offenders.
