Information for Parents
Research (Olweus, 1993; Charach, Pepler, and Zeigler, 1995) indicates that children have very negative views regarding telling adults about bullying. A major aim of the Steps to Respect program is to help children counteract these feelings and help train adults to recognize bullying and respond effectively to children’s reports. The Steps to Respect program offers information on What Families Should Know to help their own children handle bullying incidences.
Although children are good at hiding their feelings at first and are often slow to report incidents parents may start to recognize some of the following signs of children who are bullied:
Learning that your child is being bullied can be a stressful time. Feelings of anger, frustration, and guilt are common. However, the worst thing a parent can do is over-react and burst into the school full of rage and blame. Parents are encouraged to remember that if they didn’t know their child was being bullied, the school probably didn’t know either. Although the classroom teacher and other staff members see your child daily in the classroom, on the playground, and in the lunchroom, they are often unaware of the indirect bullying that is so common. As a parent if you think your child is being bullied you can ask a few simple questions:
Remember that the staff of Holy Cross School has a goal of providing a safe, bullying free environment for all students. The staff is committed to working as a team with families to identify and decrease the number of bullying incidences in schools. An Open House will be held at Holy Cross School on Tuesday, September 18th, 2007 and the Steps to Respect program will be formally introduced at this time.
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