Apr

15

Students with learning difficulties or AD/HD are more at risk of being bullied

Filed Under "At-risk" students, Bullying, Special Education 

sd-face.jpgIn an earlier post, I talked here about relational aggression and cyber-bullying. Today I’m going to focus on the issue of bullying and kids with learning difficulties and attentional problems. I teach these kids and see what a problem bullying is. I spend a lot of my time teaching kids, bullies and victims, the appropriate way to behave. First, let’s look the nature of kids who get bullied.

Typical victims are children who can be overpowered (physically, mentally, or emotionally) by the bully. They are usually more anxious and unsure of themselves than other students. These children often have a negative attitude toward violence and the use of violence in dealing with others. Victims usually suffer from low self-esteem and view themselves negatively. They often consider themselves failures and feel stupid, ashamed, and unattractive. They may come to believe that they “deserve” to be bullied.They are often lonely, friendless, and abandoned at school. (SchwabLearning)

This description fits many of my learning disabled students. Students who have learning difficulties or attentional problems are more at risk of being bullied than kids who don’t have these challenges. It makes perfect sense when you think about it. Kids who have language processing difficulties can have a tough time understanding what other kids are saying or what other kids mean, or they themselves can have a difficult time saying what they mean. I see this all the time in my classroom, in the hallways and in the cafeteria at school. There are all kinds of interpersonal misunderstandings because of language processioning difficulties.

Interpersonal misunderstandings are also common among students who have attentional difficulties. Those kids who have difficulty with attention and can’t maintain their focus on what someone is saying because they’re easily distracted , will often miss parts of the conversation and consequently won’t fully understand what’s going on and act on incomplete information, much to everyone’s frustration. Similarly, kids who are impulsive and have difficulty waiting their turn, jump in before everything is said and done also miss part of the message. Kids aren’t understanding each other or maybe more accurately said are misunderstanding each other. They get frustrated, tempers flare and fits fly. It all can happen in a matter of seconds. Believe me, it’s amazing how quickly things happen.

Of course, not quite getting what people are saying and not being able to articulate what you want to say is bound to affect your self-esteem. It’s not surprising that these kids conclude that there’s something wrong with them,that they are stupid, even though there not. The majority of kids with learning disabilities have average or above average intelligence. It’s just that they learn differently and need certain accommodations to help them be successful in and out of the classroom. It’s not surprising though that they feel that they “deserve” to be treated badly. They don’t respect themselves. I work hard with my students to improve their self-esteem so that they will respect themselves and expect others to respect them as well.

I have done a fair bit of reading about bullying and have attended numerous conferences and workshops over the years. Although I’ve learned a lot from attending these, I’ve have found there are excellent resources on-line about the topic. I especially like Schwablearning.org . It has excellent information about the topic of bullying. I encourage you to check out their site. Bullying is so common it’s important for all of us to know as much as possible about the topic so that we can help kids who are bullied or who are bullies themselves. SchwabLearning.org’s tag line is: a parent’s guide to helping kids with learning difficulties. Although my own kids didn’t have learning or attentional difficulties, other family members did and of course I teach students who have these challenges and over the years I have found Schwab’s site useful and have learned much by reading their newsletters. Anyone can sign up to get them, and they are free. The site is very user friendly, as well. I encourage you to check it out.

OK, what can we do to help these kids. Schwablearning has an excellent article by Marlene Synder suggesting what parents can do to help kids who are the victims of bullying and kids who are bullies. It’s well written and easy to understand- just the what I like. Today, I’ll use her article to support my examination about bullying from the victim’s point of view. Next time I’ll discuss bullying from the bully’s point of view.

First, we need to look for signs of bullying because kids are reluctant to report incidence of bullying. Some of the signs are obvious; some are not. Obviously if a child comes home with clothing that’s torn or in disarray, or with damaged books or has cut and bruises that he can’t explain, we should be suspicious. But other signs of bullying are not as obvious. Repeated complaints of headaches and stomach aches, bad dreams and not wanting to go to school may indicate bullying problems. Sudden mood shifts, irritability or outbursts of temper may also be signs. But if you have teenagers, the sudden mood shifts and temper outburst could appear to be just part of being a teenager. It’s hard to tell. Bullies often try to shake down their victims so if your child is asking for more money than usual or money is stating to disappear around the house, take note. Your child could be a victim of bullying. Pay attention if your child suddenly starts to isolates himself from others and doesn’t seem to have many friends. But don’t panic, not all kids are gregarious by nature so it’d difficult to tell. Some kids like their own company and don’t want to be around a crowd of kids. They are content to have one or two friends.

Once we suspect that a child has been bullied what should we do? Well, first we shouldn’t overreact or under react. We need to be sympathetic and take the problem seriously and listen carefully to what the child has to say about the incident. Most importantly, we shouldn’t blame the victim. Asking the child what he did to bring on the attack is definitely not helpful. Home is supposed to be a refuge for children who have been victimized. They need our support and perhaps support from a professional, if we think it appropriate. We want to keep the lines of communication open and not shut down. As well as giving emotional support, teaching children some safety rules for dealing with bullies is an excellent idea. For example, hitting the bully back is not the right thing to do. It could get them suspended or even expelled given the “zero tolerance” policy for aggression in schools. Arrange for your child to have someone to talk to and a safe place to go to if he feels threatened at school or on the way to school or on the way home. We need to teach our children to report an incidence in an effective way so that it doesn’t seem as if it’s tattling. The report could be as simple as describing what was being done, by whom, when, and where. It’s important to work together with the school to resolve the problem.

Remember earlier I talked about how many kids who are victims of bullying have low self-esteem? It makes sense then to help these kids improve their self esteem. How can we do this? One way is by helping them not take the attack personally. We need to help them understand that it’s a power trip for the bully. We need to help them be more confident. Teach them how to walk confidently. Pay particular attention to grooming and social skills. If they believe they look and act right, they will be more confident. It ’s all perception. At our school, there are workshops for kids to help them build self-esteem and appropriate social skills. Determining a child’s strengths and talents and fostering them will also develop self-esteem. Sometimes even a change in environment will help kids make new friends and give them a fresh start with new classmates who won’t victimize them. No one said it was easy , but it is possible.

So far I’ve been talking about what parents and other care givers at home can do. I haven’t really said anything about the school’s responsibility in this. Parents and the school need to work together. If the bullying happens at school, then the school has the main responsibility to see that the problem is dealt with appropriately and the victim and the bully given the support they need. Even if the bullying doesn’t happen at school, I believe that the school needs to get involved because what happens outside of school affects what happens inside of school. So, it is in everyone’s best interest for us to work together to resolve issues and give support.

So you’re ready to get in touch with the school about an incident of bullying. What steps should you take before doing this? First, write down the pertinent details such as what happened, who was involved , the time the incident took place, and the location . Insist on reporting the incident to the school even though your child might not want you to. Children need to know that sometimes adults need to intervene on their behalf. After all that’s why there are adults around. Incidents of bullying are one of these occasions. Talk to the child’s teacher and principal. A letter requesting that the principal stop the bullying is also in order. Whatever you do, don’t get in contact with the bully or the bully’s family directly. Let the school do that. Believe me, it works better that way.

Let’s just review what I’ve talked about so far. I’ve talked about the victim’s profile, the signs of bullying, what to do and what not to do when giving emotional support to victims, what not to do when dealing with bullies and the their families, and suggested getting the Principal and child’s teacher involved. It’s not a pleasant business. That’s for sure, but calmer heads need to prevail when dealing with incidents of bullying. Next time, I am going examine the issue of bullying from perspective of the bully much in the same manner as I did for the victim of bullying. I hope this has been helpful. If you are listening to this as a podcast, please come to my website to get the inks to Schwablearning.org. SchwabLearning is an organization that gives support around all sorts of issues for kids who have learning disabilities or behaviour issues. I encourage you to check it out.

Here are some other articles I wrote about bullying that you might find useful

Cyber-Bullying:Relational Aggression-Part 1

911 for kids who bully

How effective are anti-bullying programs?

Fear Not- a new role playing game to help stop bullying

Bullying is a cry for help. We’d better listen.

Cyber-Bullying- Educating Kids is Better than Incarcerating them

 
icon for podpress  Special Ed. kids are more likely to be bullied [12:40m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (437)

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