to think that DS has been given dodgy advice at his anti-bullying day?

[LadyBlaBlah]

They have been told that if they are bullied, they must just walk away.

I think that is shite advice and sometimes you need to stick up for yourself and answer or hit back.

It is much more complicated than "just walk away" and indeed that may make the situation worse.

I agree, the bully will take that as a weakness and go for the kill.

I think what they are suggesting is that bullies will be rewarded by seeing how upset they have made their target, if you can try and walk away they won't be getting that satisfaction.
But you are right, it is difficult advice to follow sometimes, especially if the bullying is physical.

walk away to where exactly

the bully and his/her posse are likely to follow and harangue for being "chickenshit" or whatever phrase they use these days..

I dunno

so difficult, isn't it ?

We've always told DS1 to walk away. On the occasions he hasn't walked away he's thrown a punch after prolongued taunting, and got into huge trouble. As you can imagine the nice little girls who had been doing the taunting were given loads of sypathy.

We will continue to tell him to walk away.

Doesn't this totally depend on age??

It's difficult, sometimes it's best to walk away, sometimes it's not.

I tried both when I was at school. And it depended on the situation itself.

IME walking away is usually safest, even if not a stop to the bullying, and should be the first thing to try.

Well, I wouldn't be happy with my 4yo not walking away, or my 6yo, or my 10yo, or indeed my DH.

What about teenagers?

LynetteScavo- ditto.

DS was seen as the bully - at 5- whereas actually he was the one defending himself (I know this as took to hiding at the school and watching it myself).

I have always told my Ds to try & reason/talk through problems he may come across.

If he feels for his safty he has my full backing to defend himself.

However if he were to punch a girl for taunting him I would be (at him).

I think it depends on what kind of school they are in really.We've been fortunate that he has only been in schools where vilonce is not rife.

Yes, they should walk away.

But I've taught dd to be really sarcastic while walking

Just wanted to explain two different scenarios I've been through.

One I was bullied by the class bully, who only left me alone when I stood up to him. I apparently lost my temper enough to make him cry, I was too busy yelling to notice.

Another time I was bullied by a group of girls, answering back made it much much worse. It only stopped when I walked away from bad situations.

Both work, both don't work. Depends on situation. The best advice is to get someone else involved (ie. a responsible adult) before doing anything

Well, the responses do seem to say that it is dodgy advice because it is never so clear cut as to just walk away. Different situations need different responses.

I have told DS that I don't agree with the advice anyway and that sometimes you are within your right to come right back at them !

Oh how I do hate the arseholes that write these curriculum materials - they seem to discard all common sense and life experience and talk as if we live in an imaginary world

My experience of schools dealing with bullying has been appalling, apart from in the case of a few select teachers, to whom I still owe a lot of gratitude. So not suprised by the curriculum.

er no...it is not right to hit someone back. The correct response is to get an adult to sort it out (or the police)

unless you want him to violent to people ?

to be violent to people.

I am not sure Laurie, but I think I am of the view that if someone is violent to them, and probably consistently, then yes be violent back. It is all wound up in self-esteem too - it is not fair to say to a child that they cannot stand up for themselves because we are actually designed to do that - if they feel they can, then I think they should. And in the long run I think it will be more beneficial to them and their esteem /self worth.......bullying can have a devastating effect right into adulthood.

Adults cannot always be trusted to do the right thing either.

I think that as a first response it is quite useful. Bullies are looking for a response and if you calmly walk away, they are not getting the hoped for result.
However, if it doesn't work they need other tactics, or quite possibly adult help.

My parents told me to ignore the bullies and not to let them see their words were hurting me, and I spent 6 years walking away and hiding as much as I could. I have spent over 30 years dealing with the legacy of pain and depression from the bullying.

I wish I had found the courage to stand up to them.

Mum said that sticks and stones would hurt my bones, but calling names couldn't hurt me.

Bollocks, mum.

I remember a meeting we head at DS's school...teh Learning And Behaviour specialts bloke was thre, adn I remember his saying he doesnt' always tell children they should walk away..there are situations when a child might need to stand up for themselves. I agree it's never black and white.

As someone else says, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

I have seen children who are picked on, and long to take them aside and say: if you didn't do X, they wouldn't pick on you so much.

But that would suggest that they were doing something that made them deserve bullying, when of course no one deserves bullying.

Some children are bullied because they are gifted.
Some children are bullied because they have learning difficulties
Some children are bullied because they are shy
Some children are bullied because they are confident
Some children are bullied because when some bullies tried it on the off-chance once, they reacted in an interesting and gratifying fashion.

A one-size-fits-all approach is never going to work where bullying is concerned, as the reasons for it are almost always complex.

The way dcs' schools have always taught this is that if anyone gets hurt or upset, you should get adult help. Not just if it's yourself- they teach that too- but also, if you see it happening to someone else. This has worked very well for them; the children have learnt from infants that you can't get away with bullying because the other children will stick up for the person being bullied, and the potential victims have learnt that you don't have to put up with it; that something can be done.

I have been very impressed by the determined fashion in which their 3 school (infants, juniors and secondary) have dealt with any incidents.

When youngest DS was in year 1 he was getting hit by some other children. My advice was tell the teacher the 1st time they hit you. Tell them the 2nd time they hit you - If they do it a third time hit them as hard as you possibly can. I did tell teacher and she was outraged and said 'oh Mrs upahill, that is not acceptable we don't condone violence' The answer I gave was 'neither do I, If you don't condone violence he won't be hit but I want you to be aware my son is nobodies punchbag' We had abit of a stand off for a moment or two.

That is what I would fear Staying Sunny - it is heart breaking to hear that children are told that they cannot stand up for themselves, it is bound to affect their self esteem. And long term. Why shouldn't ychildren be allowed and encouraged to stand up for themselves??

You never know, it might even make the bullies think twice before they even do it ?

Hitting someone back is not standing up for yourself.

Neither is walking away in itself the only solution - that should be coupled with the bullies being dealt with by the school/their parents/the police.

Having said that I don't believe in hitting children. So encouraging them to hit each other seems somewhat stupid too.

I think it depends on the bullying. I think with physical violence it is sensible to walk away. Also with psychological violence it is good to ignore sometimes but kids need to be taught to be ASSERTIVE. Ie they should say- I don't like it when you do that so I am going to get away from you or something like that. Getting in a slanging match with a bully will exasperate the situation as bullies always have smart retorts up their sleeves.