Tuesday, October 11, 2005

You're Not A Bully, Are You Dear?

Picked up Karina from preschool today and her teacher reported her little "kungfu" moment with a boy smaller size than her. Seems she had one elbow at his neck and the other hand ready to strike. Oh boy! This mother sure has much work to do. So digging into my "bag of tricks", this is what I did:

  1. "Karina, what happened?"
    It's only fair to get the whole story right? But that didn't get me anywhere. She already knew she had done something wrong, so her way out was to say "Nothing." Then she used the distraction technique by talking about what all her other friends did wrong that day.
  2. "Karina, did you fight? Were you angry at that boy?"
    This is my way of saying I know what you did so admit it. Let's try to acknowledge some feelings here. What did I get? Silence. Then more distraction methods as she carries on by telling me how her other friends were fighting and making lots of noise.
  3. "Karina, not matter what, you CANNOT hurt other people ok?"
    This is my attempt to advise and remind her of our rules on proper conduct.
  4. "Daddy, guess what your girl did in school today?"
    Yes, Daddy needs to be aware of what is happening in their children's life. What did he do? Made her write a whole page of "I will not hurt anyone." He would have made her write some more but I vetoed the idea. He believes that by writing pages and pages of the same thing, it will improve her memory. Does this work?
  5. "Karina, is it the good guys or bad guys that hurt other people?
    My attempt at using role models and the power of reasoning. She acknowledged that it was the bad guys that usually hurt other people and they either end up dead or in jail. She also reassured me that she wants to be a good guy.
  6. "Karina, remember yesterday we talked about the Plan of Salvation? Remember at judgement day what will happen? Heavenly Father will open His book and look at all the good things and bad things that we've done. You want which list to be longer, the good list or bad list?
    My attempt to have the "higher law" direct all future conduct.
  7. "So Karina, will you say sorry to the boy tomorrow?"
    My attempt at teaching her about restitution.
  8. This one I have yet to do but will definately do it. Read to her the Joy Berry book about Bullies. That book is pretty good as it takes into consideration the bully and the one being bullied. It also describes what a bully does and highlights the appropriate actions.

That's all I have in my bag of tricks. I don't know what else to do except keep on teaching about Christlike qualities. Hopefully my lessons don't sound like blah, blah, blah to her. We shall see if there is improvement. In the meantime, any other ideas?

4 comments:

  1. It sounds to me like you did everything right. It just might take a bit of time for her to get it all through her head. BTW thanks for stopping by and reading my blog!

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  2. My daughter routinely yell's "Shaolin Showdown" before she begins the butt whuping...I have only seen her do it twice and both times she was being hit by other older kids. Most kids back off when they hear her use those two little words though. It is nice that she warns them first.

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  3. LOL
    Good site, and some really useful techniques.

    Punk Parent - that's brilliant.

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  4. Nice blog, I will book mark and visit you again.

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Don't go without saying something. I would love to read your comments. BUT no junk comments please.