3Atlantic Union Conference Teacher Bulletin www.teacherbulletin.org

Teaching Tips

Keeping the Peace at Schoolby Ann Svensen

Kids are bullying each other, assaulting teachers, and bring-ing guns to school. What are schools doing to stop youth violence? A growing number are turning to conflict-resolution programs.

Violence prevention comes in a variety of shapes and sizes: It can be peer mediation, life-skills training, or anger manage-ment. But at its core, each program attempts to teach children one thing: how to resolve their conflicts peacefully.

One success storyThe staff at Kenwood Heights Elementary School in urban Springfield, OH, has found a way to keep the peace. Its top-notch Kenwood Peace Program is a model for other schools. Principal Marni Gochenour began the program out of desperation: “Many of our children come from violent neighborhoods. We had a lot of assaults on teach-ers and other children. We literally had first-graders being led out of school in handcuffs. We were not able to teach.”

Today, a peace flag flies over Kenwood Heights. In nearly every nook and cranny are reminders of the program’s mission: Peace banners hang in the hallways; a scoreboard in the cafeteria records each peaceful day; and students, teachers, custodians and parents all work together to maintain the school’s award-winning gardens. Gochenour starts each day by announcing over the PA a hypothetical problem for students and teachers to solve. And classrooms are equipped with “peace tables” where students go to resolve their disagreements.

A unique approachThey tend to do things a little differently at Kenwood Heights. Most schools that adopt violence-prevention programs target fourth or fifth graders because that’s often the age when behavior problems become unmanageable. “We chose initially to implement our program in the kindergarten and first grade,” says Gochenour. “We wanted to reach kids before the problems began.” Kenwood Heights also chose not to use “peer mediation,” a common violence-prevention method that involves training a few students to diffuse conflicts among their peers. Instead the faculty’s goal is to teach all students to be mediators. The results have been impressive: dramatic drops in fights and emergency removals; increased attendance, and more students making honor roll.

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Teaching Tips

What it takes to be greatNot all violence-prevention programs are as effective as Kenwood’s. According to the Drug Strategies’ Safe Schools, Safe Students study, high-quality violence-prevention programs do make a difference. But the majority of programs studied did not make the grade. Only 10 out of the 84 reviewed received an A. The study states that, to be successful, a violence-prevention program must:

Encourage school attitudes against violence, aggression, and bullying.Provide teacher training.Create a positive school climate.Include families, peers, media and the community.

To find out more about school violence-prevention programs, order a copy of the study Safe Schools Safe Students ($12.95). To learn more about preventing youth violence, pick up a copy of Before Push Comes to Shove: Building Conflict Resolution Skills with Children by Nancy Carlsson-Paige and Diane Levin.

Courtesy Of:www.familyeducation.com/article/0,1120,1-2571,00.html

5Atlantic Union Conference Teacher Bulletin www.teacherbulletin.org

Teaching Tips

Bullied Kids: Suffering in Silenceby Carleton Kendrick

Bobby St. Pierre tormented me. Every school recess he taunted me (“Momma’s little boy won’t fight back?”), roughed me up, and made my life on the playground a living hell.I was nine and the tallest kid in Cold Spring School’s fourth grade. Bobby had just turned thirteen and was warehoused in Mrs. Cavi’s “spe-cial class.” It was the dumping ground for incor-rigible kids aged 8 through 14.

I was the latest in the long line of Bobby’s vic-tims. He’d been bullying me for two months, since school began. I dreaded going to school. My stomach was in knots every day. I couldn’t concentrate in class. Most nights I woke up with nightmares.

My mom could see I hadn’t been my usual cheery self for some time but couldn’t figure out what was wrong. I wanted to tell her about Bobby, but I’d have been a “momma’s boy” if I did. Mrs. Peterson, my teacher, had written my mom a note stating I’d seemed “frequently preoccupied in class.” I was preoccupied all right! All I could think about was Bobby and his bullying. When would it ever stop?

In desperation I turned to my father. “You’ve got to stand up to him,” he insisted. “I’ll show you how.” He taught me how to use Bobby’s next shove to hip-flip him to the ground. We practiced the move. My father pronounced me battle-ready. I was terrified.

Monday’s recess began with Bobby’s usual “sissy-boy” taunts. This time, however, I turned and faced him. He pushed me. I fell back but then stepped toward him. His next shove was met with the hip-flip. Bobby was airborne and then landed hard on his back–stunned, hurt, and humiliated. I put my finger in his face and screamed “Don’t you ever touch me again!” He never did.

I’ve never recommended using retaliatory force to any of the bullied kids I’ve counseled. It’s dangerous advice. I was lucky that day. But adults must take bullying more seriously. We can’t simply reply “I can’t do anything about it unless I see it.” Bullies usually wreak their damage well out of sight of adults.

I’ve treated bullied kids who were close to suicide because they couldn’t see a way out of their chronic pain and depression. In despair, many kids have killed themselves rather than face endless hurt from their tormentors. I understand that hopelessness.

6Atlantic Union Conference Teacher Bulletin www.teacherbulletin.org

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BullyproofingBullying should not be tolerated in our schools. In addition to caring for the victims, we must also focus on teaching our children how to stand up against unprovoked harassment and ag-gression. The bullies need to be shown alternative paths to achieve self-esteem. They often come from families where bullying behavior is a way of life. The Wellesley College Center for Research on Women addresses all these issues in their superior fourth and fifth grade curriculum called “Bullyproof.”

Bullying isn’t harmless child’s play. It can be debilitating and life-threatening. Children need us to defend them from its ravages.

9Atlantic Union Conference Teacher Bulletin www.teacherbulletin.org

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Bully-Proof Your Kids

Bullies. Every school has them. They taunt, tease, shove, and beat up other kids. Indirect bullying, where kids are ignored or excluded, can be just as devastating as a physi-cal assault, say experts.

To Ronald Stephens, executive director of the National School Safety Center, bullying is “one of the most under-rated but enduring problems in schools today.” In the U.S., surveys show that as many as one in four kids say they’ve been bullied recently in school.

Kids may be afraid or ashamed to tell adults about a bully. Some parents don’t intervene because they think kids should work it out on their own. What can you do to help your kids protect themselves from a bully?

Encourage your kids to tell you, a teacher, or another adult when they’re having a problem. It’s important for them to let someone know early, before the situation escalates.

Explain the difference between tattling and telling. Tattling is when you report something just to get someone in trouble. Telling is when you report that you or someone else is in danger.

Insist on the buddy system to and from school and in the neighborhood. Children give each other support, and a child who has friends is less of a target. “This can be hard to do when kids don’t have a lot of friends,” says Jeannette Collins of the New Jersey Center for As-sault Prevention. “Parents should encourage their kids to reach out to other kids. That way they can watch out for one another.”

Consider enrolling your child in a self-defense course. “People think the training will escalate the violence,” says a mother whose son was bullied. “But it’s just the opposite. It stresses self-discipline, self-control, and self-esteem, not aggression.”

Turn off the TV. Too many shows reinforce the idea that aggression is the only way to deal with conflicts.

Let your school know your safety worries. Suggest closer supervision in hallways, bathrooms, lunchrooms, under stairways, and on the playground. Your kids have the right to feel safe at school, so find out what your school’s policies on bullies are.

10Atlantic Union Conference Teacher Bulletin www.teacherbulletin.org

Teaching Tips

Ask the school or home and school association to sponsor safety training workshops and to initiate a peer mediation program, in which staff and students are trained in nonviolent conflict resolution. For more information, contact the National Center for Assault Preven-tion, 609-582-7000, or the National School Safety Center, 805-373-9977.

Studies have shown that children are also bullied online, via instant messaging or email. Parents are often unaware of this problem, since many children do not report it to their parents. Bullies may find the anonymous nature of email and instant messaging an attrac-tive means of threatening their victims. To help your child avoid cyber bullying, monitor his Internet use by keeping the computer in the family room, or another common room in your house, and teach your child never to open email or accept instant messages from an unknown sender. If your child does receive a harassing message, teach him not to reply and to let you know right away. You can contact your Internet service provider to block the sender from your email, or use the “block” or “ban” feature on your instant messaging program to deter the cyber bully.