One way of accomplishing this is to think about what it is that you may represent or stand for.  Let’s say you are on the football team and you get a reputation for being mean and short tempered.  Others may think that everyone on the team is like that.  I remember my parents telling me that I represented the family and the family name.  So if I was to mess up in some way it brought dishonor on our family.  You may have something else that you represent.
For me today, I am a martial artist, black belt.  I stand for all that represents.  I do not want anyone to think badly of martial artist and more important I would like everyone to have deep respect for the martial arts based on what they know about martial artist.  I must keep my cool!

You could also bring the problem to the attention of the school administrators. Maybe they could move your locker or switch your schedule so you don’t have to see the bullies as often during the day. Just remember that high school does not last forever (although it may feel like it at times). Soon you will be in college or working and will have plenty of opportunities to meet people with the same interests as you. After high school, people are generally more accepting of others—or at least more willing to choose their friends based on less shallow criteria.

Tips on How to Deal With Bullies

• Don’t be an easy target.—Your body language tells a bully whether you are vulnerable or not. When you stand up straight, talk in a loud, clear voice, and make eye contact with the bully, you show him or her that you are not vulnerable.
• Avoid isolated places.—Bullies are more likely to cause trouble if you are alone in a place where no one can see or hear you.
• Watch for trouble.—At the first sign of bullying, try to deflect it with humor or by changing the subject.
• Find a close group of friends.—The saying that there is safety in numbers is true. If you and your friends stick together and protect each other, bullies are less likely to view you as a target.

This summer Balanced Life Skills will be offering a Bully Prevention program call Verbal Judo.  It is the same information that is taught to police officers so they can keep themselves and others under control in a kind and mannerly way, but taught just for those who want to avoid being bullied.

I always fought for the underdog because I was the underdog myself, and I can’t stand people who abuse other people. When I was younger, I was bullied because I didn’t have the nicest clothes, or the nicest anything; I was shy, and I stuttered. I had countless fights during recess. I thought it was typical young kid stuff, and the only way I knew how to deal with being bullied was to fight back. At school I kept a tough exterior. I held my chin up high and kept moving forward because I was raised that way.

If I saw someone being bullied, I would get in the middle and fight, no matter how bad it was, and attempt to stop it by punching someone, but that didn’t work because then I became the victim of fights, and the people that I was “saving” weren’t really grateful, anyway. A lot of them would get mad at me and say things like, “Why did you do that?” or “I could have handled that myself.”

One time I got in the middle of a fight. There were three 13-year-olds punching this younger kid, who was about 10. I was 11 at the time. I had no idea why these guys were punching this younger kid, but my moral clock went off and said, “That’s not right,” so I got in the middle of the fight, broke it up, and the 10-year-old ran. The three guys started punching me then, and I lost, with a bloody nose and a black eye.

When I started to attend TST BOCES Community School, everything changed. I realized that violence is not the answer. Violence worked for me in order to deal with bullies, but I don’t condone it at all. Bullies are cowards because they know they’re picking on the weak link. They like to insult people about their clothes, their hairstyle, where they live if it’s not such a nice place. Bullies always push another person to his or her limits, both physically and mentally.

Violence is not the answer. It escalates the situation, and there are bullies in this world wherever you go. Even when I thought I was going to help someone, I knew that punching another person wouldn’t mean they would just walk away — they’d just get back up. Today when I see someone bullying another person, I don’t use physical violence; I step in and try to calm both parties down.

I heard about Phoebe Prince, that girl who ended up committing suicide because she was bullied. I think that’s a sad end to her story. If you’re being bullied, never bottle up your feelings; talk to parents, teachers, counselors, anyone who will listen. I didn’t do that. I wish I had because my situations would have been different.

The person being bullied needs to stay strong; don’t let the bully see that his or her actions are affecting you. Eventually the bully will get bored and move on to someone else.

This article was in the Ithaca Journal and is the result of an interview of a 19 year old boy.  I so appreciate the conclusions that he came to that I wanted to share them with you.

“THE number of overweight children is rising, a study has found that obese children under ten are still more likely to be bullied by thinner classmates even if they are popular or smart.”

As parents we must set the example and be aware of our health from all points of view.

15 May 2010, In many cultures fat is synonymous with good fortune and prosperity. You come from a well endowed home.

Which is fine until your body becomes over endowed and starts spilling over. And you are not yet ten. Regrettably, the odds of children growing out of it are slim, if one can play on the word. Parents, in their froth of fondness commit great folly. For years they will endearingly believe that the child, little apple of their eye, is only enjoying puppy fat and it will disappear. Puppy fat has been a good excuse and further compounded by the larger family in which grandparents add to the conspiracy and feed their children’s brood with calories and kindness.

They could not be more unkind. Yet, the awareness level has done little to wake everyone up to this self indulgence and its harmfulness. On the contrary there are more fat children now in wealthy high per capital societies than before. We continue to equate plumpness with success and good breeding.

And if we do not get the fact that we might as well be poisoning our children by the ongoing delusion that they are big boned new research shows that not only are the couch potatoes lazy as drones they also are soft targets.

ALTHOUGH THE number of overweight children is rising, a study has found that obese children under ten are still more likely to be bullied by thinner classmates even if they are popular or smart.

Researchers from the University of Michigan found that obese children are picked on more, regardless of gender, race, social skills, or academic achievement.

Dr. Julie C. Lumeng, who led the study, said she found the study slightly surprising and “disturbing.”

“Unlike in the 1980s so many kids are obese now. In some schools, half the class may be overweight … so I really thought that maybe being obese really doesn’t result in being bullied as much anymore. I was wrong,” she told Reuters Health. A quarter of the children reported being bullied, although their mothers said about 45 per cent of them were bullied.

According to the researchers, the odds of being bullied were 63 per cent higher for an obese child compared to a healthy-weight peer.

Children can be cruel and in their minds nicknames like Fatty, Jumbo, Big Martha, Roundy are par for the course and not hurtful.

One amazing fact is Lumeng also thought she’d find protective factors, like having good social skills and doing well in school.

“I thought maybe this would protect obese kids from being bullied. But no matter how we ran and re-ran the analysis, the link between being obese and being bullied remained,” Lumeng said.

“Parents of obese children rate bullying as their top health concern,” Lumeng and her colleagues note in their report published in Pediatrics. Obese children who are bullied also suffer more depression, anxiety and loneliness. “There is no simple solution to the problem,” Lumeng told Reuters Health. “I think it reflects the general prejudice against obese people,” and children, even at a very young age, pick up on this.

GRONINGEN, Netherlands, March 26 (UPI) — Most bullies are motivated to gain status and affection so they avoid bullying those who are well liked, Dutch researchers found.

Researchers at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, said 15 percent of children are victimized, leading to depression, anxiety, loneliness and other negative outcomes.

Study leader Rene Veenstra and colleagues questioned almost 500 elementary-school children ages 9-12.

The study, published in the journal Child Development, found bullies generally choose to gain status by dominating their victims. However, at the same time, they try to reduce the chances that they’ll end up on the outs with other classmates by choosing victims who are weak and not well-liked by others, the study said.

In short, even bullies care a lot about others’ affection and don’t want to lose it, Veenstra said.

Gender also plays a role. For example, bullies ages 9-12 only care about not losing affection from classmates of their own gender.

So when boys bully boys, it doesn’t matter whether girls approve or disapprove, but boys will bully only those girls that aren’t well liked by other boys, regardless of what girls think. Girls will do the same in their bullying of boys, the study said.

Here are 8 questions to see if you are a victim at work and then we can think about how that effects our other relationships.

1. Does your boss blame you for fabricated “errors”?
2. Are you given unreasonable job demands or goals?
3. Does your boss threaten you with pay cuts or being fired?
4. Does your boss insult you and/or criticize your abilities? Does this happen in front of others?
5. Are you excluded by the bully and his/her “henchmen” or given the silent treatment?
6. Does your boss yell, scream, or curse at you?
7. Does your boss inconsistently enforce rules?
8. Does your boss deny or discount your accomplishments and/or take credit for your success?

Here is a link to an article where these questions came from. Is your boss a bully?

This is an article from a magazine about living with ADD.  I thought you may enjoy it and here is the link to the website.  There are a number of good articles to be found on this site.

Many parents of ADHD children worry about their being bullied. But some children with ADHD are bullies. According to a recent study, a child with ADHD is three times more likely to bully other kids than a child without the condition. Here’s how to stop bullying in its tracks.

Be all ears.

If a teacher calls complaining about your child’s aggressive behavior, you may want to make excuses for his actions. Don’t! Gather information—the who, what, when, and where—so you can help your child and end the call on an up note, says Alan Kazdin, Ph.D., director of the Parenting Center and Child Conduct Clinic at Yale University.
Don’t accuse him.

Avoid the temptation to yell. Instead, calmly say, “That was your teacher on the phone, and she said you were seen pushing Johnny on the playground. What’s your side of the story?” Don’t be surprised if he admits nothing and shows no remorse. “You should remind him of how he felt the last time someone was mean to him,” says Robert Sege, M.D., Ph.D., professor of pediatrics at Tufts University School of Medicine.

Limit opportunities to be a bully.

Ask the teacher where the bullying occurs. If it’s on the school bus, try assigned seating—putting your child near the bus driver and away from his target. If it’s at recess, have your child play only in a well-supervised area.

Play to your child’s strengths.

“Bullies are natural leaders,” says Sege. Talk with the teacher about giving your child a job to do when he usually acts up. Examples: Starting a playground clean-up crew or delivering notes to the office.

Help your child control his emotions.

If your child lashes out when others tease him, use role-playing to help him regulate his feelings. “Say, ‘ I love you and think you’re wonderful, but I’m going to taunt you as part of a game,’” says Kazdin. “‘No matter what I say, ignore me and don’t get aggressive.’ Then you might say, ‘You’re weird.’” If your child doesn’t reply, praise him. Then say, “I’m going to call you more names, and you are going to walk away.” If he does, praise him again.

The more secure your child feels, the less likely he will bully others.

by Ellen Rooney Martin Feb 16th 2010 10:30AM

Friendships can turn on a dime in middle school, as a girl named Jamie learned the hard way.

She was part of a group of friends until one of them casually suggested, “Let’s hate Jamie.” The next thing she knew, her former friends had created an “I Hate Jamie Club.” Other than being a preteen, Jamie had done nothing to deserve such treatment. But it was a horrible feeling nonetheless.

Kids can be cruel, even to their friends. But parents need to know that all of these behaviors — while often mean — are part of the roller coaster development process of early adolescence, Carl Pickhardt, author of “Why Good Kids Act Cruel: The Hidden Truth About the Pre-Teen Years” tells ParentDish. In the book, he uses anecdotes, such as Jamie’s story, as well as his experience as a long time counselor, to help parents coach their children — whether they are handing out some of the cruelty or on the receiving end of it.
Children begin testing their limits somewhere between the ages of 9 and 13, which often leads to strains in the parent/child relationship, Pickhardt says. Your children suddenly realize they don’t want to be treated as children anymore, and while parents may be giving them more independence, they aren’t exactly sure where they fit in. Often, the child’s self esteem takes a hit.

Among their peers, who are struggling to find their own place socially, things that were acceptable at a younger age can become sources for teasing. But when a child is teased, friends may pull away in an attempt to salvage their own social ranking, further unsettling a child’s self esteem.

Parents are often oblivious that any of this happens because they don’t see the other half of their child’s life at school.

“(Kids) keep their parents out of it to get social independence,” Pickhardt says.

Parents and schools have no idea how much energy children this age spend trying to get through the school day without standing out in a negative way, he says.

“Everyone is striving to get a social place,” Pickhardt says. “Even if they aren’t teased, they can see what is happening to other kids and know it could happen to them.”

This affects their behavior and they may begin to pull away from a friend who doesn’t have the social acceptance they want.

“They are worried about their own social survival,” Pickhardt says.

Parents can help by coaching their child before inevitable mean behavior starts. First, parents should work to remain close to their children by talking with them and spending time together even if the child prefers friends more. Explain that middle school will bring all kinds of changes socially, as well as physically and emotionally, and that name calling or teasing happens.

Pickhardt’s book offers a variety of strategies for dealing with teasing, exclusion from a group, bullying and rumors.

• To combat teasing, a child can try comebacks: “You’re right. I do dress strange sometimes.” or “Can you tell me more?” And the classic “Whatever.” Insults are about someone wanting to be mean, not something being wrong with the being teased child.
• When children are excluded from a group, they need to be reminded there are others that will enjoy their company and not to reject themselves. It’s important for parents to provide a variety of social outlets — not just school — at this age.
• Being bullied can be scary, but children can plant their feet, square their shoulders and look the bully in the eye. Often, bullies are looking not for a fight, but just someone to dominate, so appearing strong can move the bully away.
• There are lots of rumors flying in middle school, but teaching a child to not listen or pass them along and remain skeptical about rumors can go a long way to dulling them. Children can only control the truth about themselves, not what people say or think about them.
• When being ganged up on, teach children to remember there are people, like parents, who love them and are on their side no matter what.

Despite the natural instinct to want to protect your child from the woes of middle school, parents should think hard before they move beyond coaching their child, Pickhardt advises. Confronting another parent or arriving at school to talk to teachers can further hurt a child socially.

The best way to approach a situation where parental involvement is necessary is to broach the school with concern about both the bully and the victim, Pickhardt says. Cruel behavior ultimately hurts both sides at this age, he says. The bully never learns to properly interact with peers and continues to throw his weight around without making real friends. The victims continue to close in on themselves, never learning to correctly address teasing, rumoring and ganging up.

The good news is kids feel much more settled socially by the teenage years, says Pickhardt.

Kids who get bullied and snubbed by peers may be more likely to have problems in other parts of their lives, past studies have shown. And now researchers have found at least three factors in a child’s behavior that can lead to social rejection.

The factors involve a child’s inability to pick up on and respond to nonverbal cues from their pals.

In the United States, 10 to 13 percent of school-age kids experience some form of rejection by their peers. In addition to causing mental health problems, bullying and social isolation can increase the likelihood a child will get poor grades, drop out of school, or develop substance abuse problems, the researchers say.

“It really is an under-addressed public health issue,” said lead researcher Clark McKown of the Rush Neurobehavioral Center in Chicago.

And the social skills children gain on the playground or elsewhere could show up later in life, according to Richard Lavoie, an expert in child social behavior who was not involved with the study. Unstructured playtime — that is, when children interact without the guidance of an authority figure — is when children experiment with the relationship styles they will have as adults, he said.

Underlying all of this: “The number one need of any human is to be liked by other humans,” Lavoie told LiveScience. “But our kids are like strangers in their own land.” They don’t understand the basic rules of operating in society and their mistakes are usually unintentional, he said.

Social rejection

In two studies, McKown and colleagues had a total of 284 children, ages 4 to 16 years old, watch movie clips and look at photos before judging the emotions of the actors based on their facial expressions, tones of voice and body postures. Various social situations were also described and the children were questioned about appropriate responses.

The results were then compared to parent/teacher accounts of the participants’ friendships and social behavior.

Kids who had social problems also had problems in at least one of three different areas of nonverbal communication: reading nonverbal cues; understanding their social meaning; and coming up with options for resolving a social conflict.

A child, for example, simply may not notice a person’s scowl of impatience or understand what a tapped foot means. Or she may have trouble reconciling the desires of a friend with her own. “It is important to try to pinpoint the area or areas in a child’s deficits and then build those up,” McKown explained.

Ways to help

When children have prolonged struggles with socializing, “a vicious cycle begins,” Lavoie said. Shunned children have few opportunities to practice social skills, while popular kids are busy perfecting theirs. However, having just one or two friends can be enough to give a child the social practice he or she needs, he said.

Parents, teachers and other adults in a child’s life can help, too. Instead of reacting with anger or embarrassment to a child who, say, asks Aunt Mindy if her new hairdo was a mistake, parents should teach social skills with the same tone they use for teaching long division or proper hygiene. If presented as a learning opportunity, rather than a punishment, children usually appreciate the lesson.

“Most kids are so desperate to have friends, they just jump on board,” Lavoie said.

To teach social skills, Lavoie advises a five-step approach in his book “It’s So Much Work to Be Your Friend: Helping the Child with Learning Disabilities Find Social Success” (Touchstone, 2006). The process works for children with or without learning disabilities and is best conducted immediately after a transgression has been made.

1)     Ask the child what happened and listen without judgment.

2)     Ask the child to identify their mistake. (Often children only know that someone got upset, but don’t understand their own role in the outcome.)

3)     Help the child identify the cue they missed or mistake they made, by asking something like: “How would you feel if Emma was hogging the tire swing?” Instead of lecturing with the word “should,” offer options the child “could” have taken in the moment, such as: “You could have asked Emma to join you or told her you would give her the swing after your turn.”

4)     Create an imaginary but similar scenario where the child can make the right choice. For example, you could say, “If you were playing with a shovel in the sand box and Aiden wanted to use it, what would you do?”

5)     Lastly, give the child “social homework” by asking him to practice this new skill, saying: “Now that you know the importance of sharing, I want to hear about something you share tomorrow.”

The studies are detailed in the current issue of the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology. They were funded by the Dean and Rosemarie Buntrock Foundation and the William T. Grant Foundation.

Here is the link to the article in case you would like to look at some of the other articles.  Live Science article

One downfall to modern advances in communication is the overwhelmingly large audience that school bullies have at their fingertips.

John Halligan, a Vermont resident and the parent of a child who committed suicide at age 13 after being subjected to years of bullying, spent nearly two hours yesterday morning speaking about the dangers of cyberbullying before an auditorium packed full of Melican Middle School students.

The chatter and fidgeting that occurred moments before the start of the assembly came to a dramatic halt when the lights dimmed, the Elton John ballad “The Last Song” played from the speakers, and Halligan began a slide show depicting his son’s life.

After he finished speaking, he said the Melican student body was one of the most attentive he ever addressed.

“Oct. 27, 2003, was the day everything changed, and my life has not been the same since,” he said in a booming voice after the slide show ended. “That was the day my cell phone rang at 6 a.m. and my wife, Linda, told me our son, Ryan, had killed himself.”

From there, Halligan talked about his son’s life – the way he’d experienced developmental challenges and worked hard to overcome them, and how a history of bullying can be traced back to when Ryan attended fifth grade in Essex Junction, Vt.

“I think somewhere around fifth grade a meanness switch turns on accidentally inside a kid’s head,” Halligan said, “and sure enough that’s when it started for Ryan.”

The idea to invite Halligan to speak started when Assistant Principal Michelle Karb received a phone call from her mother, a Vermonter herself.

“We wanted to teach kids the dangers and effects of cyberbullying, and last summer I spent a lot of time researching,” Karb said. “Then my mom said she heard about Halligan’s presentation at a nearby school.

“I thought this would fit perfectly with the message we’re trying to promote about respecting others.”

Karb said that spreading the message of respect began earlier in the school year as an initiative to improve school culture and cut down on bullying. Teachers, Administrators, and Students for Kids was formed in the fall to support those goals.

Karb said parents have been overwhelmingly supportive.

“John (Halligan) spoke last night at a meeting for parents,” she said. “We expected about 60 parents to show up but wound up having to seat 120.

“His message had a powerful effect on them.”

Halligan told students yesterday that he had offered Ryan typical parental advice, telling him to ignore the bully. But over the years, the bullying only got worse. When Ryan made the mistake of telling his sworn enemy private information after the bully told him he wanted to be friends, then things changed from bad to worse.

“Ryan started going online in earnest in the summer of 2003,” said Halligan, choking back tears, “and that’s when he faced a new kind of bullying that has no limits, and I cannot imagine the pain and humiliation he faced in a world where information has limitless boundaries.

“It’s easy to hide behind a computer screen or a cell phone and spread mean rumors because there is no way for anyone to stop it.”

After the presentation, Halligan fielded students’ questions. Seventh-grader Jamie Swartout said she’d never forget the presentation.

“I know people who have been bullied online,” she said. “It hurts a lot.”

To read more about John Halligan’s mission, visit www.ryansstory.org.

As a busy mom or dad we may want to jump right in with the answer we have heard given by so many.  Simple catch phrases like “just ignore the bully”, “just walk away”, or stay in a group or with your friends”, may only complicate things as the child may believe this is a problem that they need to handle themselves, or that it is their own fault that it is happening, or they may have heard from others how mature they are and now they feel like they must show that they are mature.

Asking questions that draw out of them details of their relationships with others may give us the clues that we need.  We though need to stay calm and not be jumping in with a full blown attack on all involved.  Stay calm, carefully weigh your words and not judgmental.  At the same time minimizing the issue or making excuses for the bully is not a good idea either.  Our child who is a target really wants you to validate how they are feeling, and then they will be willing to accept us as a good resource for training them with the skills to help them solve the problem.