This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.
This material reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.
This material reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein
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Case Studies
Μary is leaving school
The following took place during the previous school year, 2010-2011, at a technical school in Greece.
Maria is 18 years old suffering from dyslexia and studying beauty care and aesthetics. Because of her specificity Maria faced some problems during lab hours, since she needed much more time than the rest of the students. Additionally the results of her work were not as good as those of her colleagues. All the above resulted in a situation where Maria was teased and ridiculed from a group of five (5) students.
It was around midseason when Maria started receiving threatening messages in her mobile phone. In these messages Maria was asked to leave school, and she thought that the messages originated from the group of five. As a result Maria initially stopped participating in classes and consequently dropped out of school.
All the above lasted for about five months, and Maria kept them a secret from her teachers and the school headmaster.
She only confided her story to one teacher and only after that teacher contacted her at home trying to find out what happened and Maria stopped attending school.
As Mary made the professor promise her that she wouldn’t say the real reason she left school to anyone, the incident was unknown, so there were not organized coping strategies. Nevertheless, the specific teacher made some steps to limit the phenomenon in her class, after having observed that there were other children who had been accepting strong reviews from these 5 students. So she told her fellow teachers about the bad behavior of the 5 children against their other classmates, spoke personally to the 5 children to stop that behavior and at some moment during her course she talked to the children about the phenomenon of school bullying and how they can handle it.
As a result of the attacks that Mary was accepting from her peers, was for Mary to blame herself for being different. She began to lose her interest in lessons and the only thing she was thinking about was how to avoid being commented from her classmates. She stopped participating in the lesson in order not to be commented and began to make absences in the laboratories so not to be laughed. She was feeling low self-esteem and eventually opted to leave school to escape. The children who were frightening Mary, had never been punished for their actions and continued to behave badly in other children in their class. At the same time children who were viewers didn’t react of fear to be in the place of Mary but also because they didn’t know how to help their classmates. Some children were even laughing at the comments sawing in that way that they support them, admiring their action of power on Maria. In the classroom, therefore, there was a negative climate for learning as children were unable to work and become a team. The purpose of the technical high schools is to prepare children to go out to the labor market by cultivating their moral values and technical skills. Values such as democracy, respect, justice must be learned to the students inside the school because only in that way children will properly become useful members of society. Also the school should deal with the prevention and treatment of aberrant behavior of the students to protect them from future consequences. In this specific class, these values had never been cultivated to the students. Dominated by fear, disrespect, and insecurity among students. So we can’t speak of an effective school that protected students.
The "different" children such as Maria became victims of their classmates who were trying to assert their authority on them regardless of the consequences their actions would have. But the perpetrators are victims of their actions. Both perpetrators and
victims of bullying need help and support so much from the family, as from school and specialist. We believe that a school to be effective must provide security to students, to cultivate the values and in cooperation with other agencies to deal with these phenomena.
But for this to happen we need to have accurate information from senior institutions to teachers and school managers. The phenomenon of school bullying should be recognized as a frequent and severe problem that needs solution to our schools and not as a phenomenon that occurs only in other countries, as the most Greek teachers believe.
Moreover, there should be noticed that the punishment is the last sentence that should be imposed on child abusers of bullying because it doesn’t give incentives for development of proper behavior.
Maria told her teacher that she was only going to talk to her if she would keep their conversation private.
“They started at the beginning of the school year”, Maria confessed. “Every time I was asking something or expressing my opinion, they were laughing at me. I know that I was not the best student but I was really trying hard. That was really bad, so gradually I stopped participating in the class, in order not to become target for one more time.”
Maria added that “I also started to be deliberately absent from lab classes, in order not to be constantly commented on”.
“When I received the first threatening messages in my mobile phone” Maria continued, “I realized that those five students were responsible for the nightmare I was living. That was the time I decided to drop out from school. I was afraid to talk to my fellow students, I was feeling useless and blaming myself for having dyslexia.”
“I didn’t want to talk to my fellow students and teachers since I believed that no one would help me. Besides my lab teachers were often witnesses of these attacks towards me and they did nothing. I told my parents and a few of my fellow students that asked me, that the reason for stopping school was the serious health problem that my dad was facing at that time. I felt that if I would talk about the situation I was facing, I would relive it for a second time. You are the first person that knows my true story” said Maria to me, “and I’m only talking to you because I was feeling that you’ve been the only teacher trying to protect me. I’m not going to come back to school but please don’t let other students suffer such a thing, because I know that there are other students like me”.
The group of students responsible for that situation composed of five adult girls. Their behaviour was quite provocative towards every student that was different due to their appearance, class performance or some other specificity.
Every time they were snubbed by teachers, they just said that it was a joke but they didn’t really change their behaviour.
We never found out their view for Maria’s case.
Some of Maria’s fellow students, whose behaviour also changed during the school year, initially chose not to answer when asked by their teacher if they faced problems in class. A little time later one student confessed that she constantly faced comments like “nerd or geek” because of her good school performance, refused however to notify the Headmaster.
The teacher noticed that lots of students were facing the negative comments and behavior of those 5 students but no one wanted to talk about it. Their response to the ironic comments of the team was to either laugh or pretend they didn’t hear to avoid facing Maria’s situation.
Many teachers realized that Maria was isolated from the rest of the class during the lessons but as they commented that was Maria’s way. What they noticed to be strange was her aggressive response to insignificant events which they attributed to personal problems. They reprehended the students for their comments towards her “but it’s not easy to watch and hear everything when there are 27 students in a classroom” they added. The teacher that visited Maria at home in order to convince to return to school was actually the first one to know what had happened. The teacher said that she had many times asked Maria during the breaks if everything was ok and Maria always said everything was all right and walked away. She had however noticed that Maria’s as well as other students’ behavior had changed. “I asked my students but I never got any answers. I never allowed derisive comments in my class so I never had the full picture. I tried to convince Maria to talk to our Headmaster about her problem but she was negative, she wanted to have nothing to do with those students and she did not want anyone to know why she actually quit school. The only thing I could do was to be more careful and observant in my class in order to protect the rest of my students. At some point I started a conversation in class about bullying trying to make my students understand that it does not only have to do with physical violence. I referred to what it involves, its results and ways to face it.”
Almost two months after Mary left the school, 3 of the 5 children were led by a professor at the principal's office because a classmate was verbally harassed by them. All 3 girls said that they did that for fun while they were shouting at their classmate who accused them. The director, without discussing the problem with the other teachers or ask their opinion about these kids decided to give one day excretion to the 3 students to comply themselves.
Essentially, the director of the school addressed the problem by punishing the children without understanding that these children had needed the help of a specialist and without discussing with the other kids of the class to see whether these phenomena were repeated in the past. He considered as an isolated incident.
Mary’s parents hadn’t been informed about it the fact from her, but only after the teacher visited them. During the events, Mary's father was facing a serious health problem they attributed to that her refusal for the school and they didn’t persuade her to return. When Mary’s mother learned about the pressure that Mary had been accepting she said she does not need to go back and Mary agreed to that.
"I do not want to pressure her, because I’m afraid if anything happens to my child and because she is adult she decides. Besides, I do not know how to help her. But I would like these kids to be punished ", mother said.
Parents of the 5 students who were teasing Mary, had never been informed about that as the fact stayed unknown to the school‘s area, moreover they were adults.
There was no counselor in the school to deal with such incidents.
Counselor, who was informed about the incident later, commented as follow:
The lack of extra curricular care of the students as well as the lack of care for relationships among students is evident in Greek schools. The teacher who spoke to Mary reacted inefficiently as she had not the appropriate training to deal with incidents of school bullying. Once the teacher informed about the incident he should inform the Director and through the Youth Advisory Station to address Mary with a specialist.
The school bullying with basic actors the five girls led Mary to drop out school. This maybe is a result of the insufficient assistance of the teacher. Her intervention in the group of the five girls as well her trial to inform other colleagues about the incident made her good intentions obvious but they could not improve the Maria’s situation.
Most incidents of bulling don’t get known out of the school community so teachers and students have insufficient information about the phenomenon of bullying.
This incident was also not known to people outside the school community but relating to education. Therefore people who may be able to help are not given an opportunity to do so. A teacher advisor who was informed shortly after the incident indicated these tactic of non-relevant information.
She found incomplete and ineffective the intervention by the teacher and the school community and emphasized that the failure to inform and educate teachers, parents and students on issues of learning difficulties, acceptance of differences and dealing with bulling is obvious.
The Youth Advisory Station should be informed about the incident in order to the treatment of the victim and the perpetrator as well to be appropriate and documented and to avoid Mary’s drop out from school.
Maria, a student in technical school with dyslexia, during the school year 2010-2011 was the subject of ridicule and threatening messages over the phone from some classmates with a result of that to leave the school. She said that the reason she stopped was personal and never asked for help. Children who were responsible had never been punished for those actions or even frightening other children in the same class. Mary confided the problem to a teacher of her who visited her at home to persuade her to go back to school. Then her mother learned the real cause expulsion from the school, which admitted that she didn’t know how to help her child so it was better for her not to go back to school. Maria did not want to discuss the problem she was facing because 1) in that way she was experiencing again her problem and she wanted to forget, 2) did not believe that solution would be given by teachers and school management, 3) had come to blame herself because of not doing so well as the other kids and 4) did not know what to do. So the children who teased her never learned the consequences of their actions to Mary. The rest of the children of the class knew about the bad behavior of their classmates and sometimes were laughing sometimes didn’t react so not to become their goal. Some of Mary’s professors did not give any attention to the teasing of children while others made their comments. Surely no teacher believed that this behavior would lead Mary to leave the school. As it is from the above there is no information about the phenomenon of bullying forms and its effects on teachers, students and parents with a result of that many facts never be learned and never be faced. Experts need to give accurate information so as prevention as at the level of supports for victims and perpetrators of such incidents so the phenomenon to be limited.
Comments about this Case Study
Date: 24.05.2012
Posted by: JACQUEMIN Joël
Type of school: Member of Mobile team - Ministry of Education
Country: Belgium
Common elements :
The situations that we face daily in the mobile team service are similar and concern school truancy and school dropping out due to some factors such as the bullying or the racket experienced by Maria.
Elements not in common :
Our service only intervenes in the framework of compulsory education. As soon as the youth reaches his/her majority, we must stop our interventions. I do not notice any difference between our educational systems in this single situation.
Where I would have found the main support and/or difficulties to deal with this bullying scenario :
The PMS centres existing in the Belgian schools can take in charge the affective aspect of the situation experienced, if the youth is interested. A work of prevention can also be set up within the classes.
Services such as the school mediation and the mobile teams are definitely a plus amongst the different supports given to the schools in the Wallonia-Brussels community in order to try to find solutions to these situations when they are detected.
What can I learn from this case study?
The lack of teachers’ training on the one hand does not allow them to act efficiently. On the other hand, bullying facts are so insidious that it is very difficult to detect them and thus to deal with them efficiently in overcrowded classrooms.
Recommendations :
In this type of situation, I try first to win the victim’s confidence. Then I work with him on the feelings that things produce in order to allow him to clearly express things. Then I propose an individual psychological support in order to allow him to regain self-confidence.
It seems also essential to work with the bullies to make them aware of the extent of their acts.
Relevance :
I think that an in-depth teachers’ or future teachers’ training to conflicts management, to non-violent communication, to positive thinking, to active listening… would be welcome. The problem is that the overcrowded classes and the limited team remain a break on the use of these tools.
Date: 23.04.2012
Posted by: MULDER FRANCIS
Type of school: School mediation service - Liège
Country: Belgium
Analysis :
The case of Maria is a typical situation of harassment: It is thus a repeated, verbal and emotional violence, perpetrated by several students against her. The victim is unable to defend herself, is in a position of weakness because she has a disability (dyslexia) and the aggressors act with intent to harm the victim. Incidents happen mainly during the laboratory classes, because Maria needs much more time than other students, whence mockery and ridicule. This continues through messages on her phone asking her to leave school. Maria gets to the point of blaming herself for being dyslexic. Maria locks herself in this solitude, which devalues, feels guilty.
Another feature is Maria's withdrawal position, who avoids talking about what happens, except to a teacher whom she trusts and talks with about her situation. Nevertheless, this teacher tries to sensitize other teachers to the reality of what happens and Maria herself deals with her mates the problem of harassment. Unfortunately, it is not enough to make Maria back to school.
It is clear that Maria has difficulty trusting adults, whom she does not believe capable of helping her.
The reaction of the Director, following another incident that does not concern Maria, consists in excluding three of the five students aggressors for a day, nothing more. No meeting with the parents, no decoding of behaviour with students aggressors, no repair, no strategic plan to end such practices of harassment. The sense of impunity may develop.
Maria is twice the victim: of his harassers but also of the failure in protecting on the part of the school. This double punishment is well expressed in French by this word: the scapegoat.
Recommendations :
The first thing to do is to make a "freeze frame" of this type of bullying, to call the students who committed bullying and to make possible for them to abandon the logic of the law of the strongest so they can develop effective social skills which value them differently.
Moreover, if the assault was characterized they should be able to "fix" with their victim in a constructive and creative way. It is not a question of humiliating them but to allow them to break free of conditionings in which they are locked.
Then, it is essential to break the solitude of the victim precisely to avoid this double punishment she can feel. Psychological support is needed which will allow to work on her self-esteem and her ability to assert herself.
Finally, I think it is important to educate the whole school community (students, teachers, parents) to the law of respect and empathy.
Relevance of teachers' training to cope with bullying/cyberbullying events :
In addition to the initial basic training of education staff, the issue is about learning to recognize the phenomena of bullying, being able to listen, being aware of the duty to intervene when the pupil is in danger. Furthermore, to the extent that bullying is a group phenomenon, teachers and education staff will be led throughout the entire career to work with groups of children and adolescents, and, therefore, it is important for them to learn to decode behaviour and intervene appropriately, especially developing interpersonal skills that allow to value themselves in a constructive way.
Date: 02.04.2012
Posted by: Claude PRIGNON
Type of school: Coordinator of School mediators in the Region of Brussels Capital
Country: Belgium
Comparison :
This situation could have happened in a school of Brussels :
- it concerns the themes planned by the decree that organizes school mediation (conflict/violence, school dropping out),
- the actors (pupils, teachers, headmaster’s office) are the same,
- confidentiality is also a common element. The school mediator keeps the secret confided to him,
- finally, as in this situation, the mediator is not a specialist neither an expert. He will hand over if necessary.
Elements not in common :
No particular difference regarding the educational system or the culture.
Recommendation :
See comments on «A racist controversy »
The mediator’s objective will not be to « make cease », but maybe the mediator’s work will lead to the stop of bullying. If it is not an objective, it is a matter of possible, even probable solution. Working that way is prevention : the mediator’s work can show other possibilities of relationships.
If the teacher who has met Maria could have been the mediator, some precesions are essential
The mediator’s neutrality reqquires that he does not promote any value. A work on the values is therefore impossible.
In the same way, the mediator will not be searching for a « solution » : he will proposes a place for communication to both parties, so that they can make themselves their own solutions emerge.
The mediator takes care to distinguish himself from the sanction imposed by the school. Sanction and mediation are not necessarily exclusive, but the mediator is neutral and does not search for Justice. Finally, he does not give any advice, he will not try to convince a pupil to come back to school.
Contrariwise, he will make sure that the pupil is aware of the consequences of his acts and decisions (legal obligation to provide an education for children)
Date: 30.03.2012
Posted by: Joël JACQUEMIN
Type of school: Member of Mobile team - Ministry of Education
Country: Belgium
Comparison :
Elements in common - The situations that we face daily in the mobile team service are similar and concern school truancy and school dropping out due to some factors such as the bullying or the racket experienced by Maria.
Elements not in common - Our service only intervenes in the framework of compulsory education. As soon as the youth reaches his/her majority, we must stop our interventions. I do not notice any difference between our educational systems in this single situation.
where I would have found the main support and/or difficulties to deal with this bullying scenario - The PMS centres existing in the Belgian schools can take in charge the affective aspect of the situation experienced, if the youth is interested. A work of prevention can also be set up within the classes.
Services such as the school mediation and the mobile teams are definitely a plus amongst the different supports given to the schools in the Wallonia-Brussels community in order to try to find solutions to these situations when they are detected.
What I can learn from this case study - The lack of teachers’ training on the one hand does not allow them to act efficiently. On the other hand, bullying facts are so insidious that it is very difficult to detect them and thus to deal with them efficiently in overcrowded classrooms.
Recommendations :
In this type of situation, I try first to win the victim’s confidence. Then I work with him on the feelings that things produce in order to allow him to clearly express things. Then I propose an individual psychological support in order to allow him to regain self-confidence.
It seems also essential to work with the bullies to make them aware of the extent of their acts.
Relevance of teachers'traning :
I think that an in-depth teachers’ or future teachers’ training to conflicts management, to non-violent communication, to positive thinking, to active listening… would be welcome. The problem is that the overcrowded classes and the limited team remain a break on the use of these tools.
Date: 19.03.2012
Posted by: CISLARU MANUELA
Type of school: Nicolina High School IASI
Country: ROMANIA
Before being a victim of the 5 colleague, Mary is a victim of her family and school context. Mary predicts her disease, accept it, but have no courage to face it. Instead of seeking solutions to overcome the problems she retreats into solitude. Personal problems combined with the family problems prevent it to communicate with others and when she communicates it seems that appeal to lie. Lying is generated by fear, fear of her colleagues who tease / threat her, fear of further burdening of his family or not to be further humiliated by others. It assumes the guilt of being sick and thinks that running away from any confrontation protects her. If she would had the courage to communicate with her aggressors, trying to clarify their relationship, would not have been necessary to drop the courses.
It may have had the courage if she has received advice from a specialist. The specialist might have explained to her that dyslexics do not have a lower level of intelligence and that they do not have difficulties in learning other things. In this situation part of young complexes could be at least dimmed.
As a teacher if you only capture sequential the behaviours listed below, you tend to label the student as being demotivated for learning / lazy or careless.
Pupils with dyslexia can:
- Read slowly and inaccuracy;
- Have spelling mistakes and write the same word differently on the same page;
- Avoid tests that involve writing or reading. Avoid or delay to read homework or writing;
- Have trouble preparing summaries or main ideas for hours;
- Have an inadequate vocabulary or be unable to store information in reading.
From my point of view in such cases you risk to provide a negative influence (intentionally or not) on the labeled student colleagues. Class teachers should discuss more with the students on these kinds of issues. This way it would be easier to discover their problems and eventually to adjust their attitude, individual potential as learners. The Mary’s case is the perfect argument.
If teachers would have accepted and be aware of the pupil problems could adapt the class or only their work tasks to its potential. This way would have reduced her disadvantage compared with colleagues and the teasing situations should be avoided.
The structure of two educational systems is different: the system in Greece is 6-3-3 while in Romania is 5-5-3. Although in Romania the years of working as a group, in this case – for the secondary education, is longer we still confront with similar situations.
My personal experience showed me that the most effective ways to prevent / deal with this situation to stimulate the student-student and student-teacher communication. Lack of communication easily leads to conflicts. Starting from the idea of my school project “student lawyer”, in the school has been formed a group intervention with conflict mediation role. Students involved in this group have won their colleagues thrust enough to prevent escalation of tensions. They are mandated by other students to request the support of the school management or counsellors whenever it is needed.
What steps I think weren’t effectively in the Mary’s case:
• the Director consider that this case is isolated. Punishment should have been established following consultation of a group formed by teachers, coulsellors, specialized person and the solution shouldn’t consist of deprivation of her rights on attending classes.
• lack of the involvement of the families of the aggressors pupils.
• the involvement and the fight of only a teacher to eradicate the phenomenon discovered.
• Mary’s mom does not try to help her to overcome the complex and even more encouraging her to quit school.
• the attempting of the young girl to say what was happening to her was minimized, although it seems that both colleagues and teachers have noticed what is happening. In the class there is no team spirit and perhaps that's because there has been no concern on identify potential binders. It has been said that: is not so easy to watch and listen each thing when there are 27 students in a classroom. It is not easy but can be possible!
A training program to support teachers in dealing with any cases of this type, should include specific modules for school age groups, types of conflicts that can lead to violence. I haven’t attended any kind of training in the field but I have studied some documents that relate to school conflicts and the role of mediation in solving them. I think it's very important to work with a counsellor teacher or a specialist (psychologist, mediator) to identify more effective and individualized solutions for each case.
Date: 13.03.2012
Posted by: THERESE LUCAS - coordinator of SMSW
Type of school: SMSW - School mediation service in Wallonia
Country: Belgium
Elements in common :
In this story, the author seems to say that the « bullies » also need help. I also think so : One day in my school, pupils who were staying in a younger pupils’ class for a course, torn and soiled the school things that were in the desks. After an investigation, the culprits could be identified : it was a group of three pupils who had never had problems. When they were interrogated about their motivations, they answered : « we were victims of the same bullying last year and nobody reacted… ». These pupils had simply reproducted a behaviour they had been victim of. I was struck by this event and my conclusion was that each mark of violence or of non-respect should be noticed and sanctioned in a « educative way », that is to say in a way that can modify the behaviour.
Elements not in common :
The teachers are either blind, they don’t see what happen or they are unskilled to react to this type of situation, and their silence give free rein to bullying.
The main support and/or difficulties to deal with this bullying scenario :
In Wallonia, the teacher who has heard the pupil’s confidences could have asked for the school mediation service’s support. This one could have carried out a support to the victim as wel as a work on the group dynamic, in collaboration with the CPMS
Recommendations :
Indeed, it would be a good thing that the teachers benefit from a basic training allowing them to better manage the bullying situations, or at least to detect them ore quickly and to get help from qualified services (CPMS, or school mediation service).
What training you would like to receive to improve the way you deal with this kind of episode :
A theotical training regarding the bullying mechanisms is not enough. « Methods » or tools allowing to broach the theme with the pupils without intensifying the problem should be at the disposal of the teacher. Furthermore, the bullying between pupils is more frequent in the classes where the teachers themselves feel contempt for some pupils, giving that way a kind of permission to bully… So, it is important that the teachers’s training leads them to become aware of the communication mode that they have induced in their class.
Date: 07.03.2012
Posted by: Giovanni Antonio Addis
Type of school: Tecnical School
Country: Italia
In my school we have similar cases, children who are victims of other children or the class group and who meditate to leave or move to get rid of the situation no longer bearable. A typical case is when the person suffers exaggerated jokes and ridicule by other students to the point of creating a seriously uncomfortable in your daily activities.
Often, no one has any fear because what happens is not done in the presence of teachers and the same victim, tends to minimize fear of not being up to the other. In the class you tend not to see the facts in their severity and to justify the actions back to their joke, although heavy, saying that the victim is still available at the joke.
The different situations are almost always the light at random: the parent sees the changes in the child, the boy confides in him, gets him talking, and then communicates to the whole school, or the teacher who glimpsed something abnormal is suspicious , alert other teachers, intervenes to prevent or bring the situation back to normal by means of the class because everybody must be aware of how the normal relationships between pupils, and if necessary, proceed by activating the sanctions procedures.
Unfortunately, as can be seen in the case study, the victims are the weakest and least able to defend themselves and who acts almost always tends to minimize its action, that is explained when the situation is often so corrupt that no longer able to recover.
We had guys who were uncomfortable and that at the end of the year have preferred to change schools and other children who have come from other schools for the same reason, or others who have left and only after time we have understood the motivation.
The problem is difficult to solve, because it often remains hidden, until it emerges and you can not intervene. We try to work mainly on prevention, with targeted interventions aimed at law, to civil society and respect for others and rules both within the same faculty of classes, with the intervention of outsiders through regular meetings. But despite the facts that occur and to try to identify cases as soon as we have both the door to listen, to which each student can be accessed anonymously, and the ombudsman.
And 'an ongoing effort that the school does, but sometimes proves insufficient.
Date: 07.03.2012
Posted by: Domenica Crupi
Type of school: Secondary school
Country: Italia
Comparing my personal experience with regard to my school I have to say that a class has been a similar case, though not as severe. A seventh grade boy who suffers from dyslexia, has never meant anything to his class because of his problem and felt different compared with the others and felt that his performances were not adequate. Obviously, the class has a hunch, but it was never confirmed either by the partner, or by teachers an so we cannot know what would have been any reactions. The class teachers have talked repeatedly during the class councils, have tried to convince the student and his mother to approach the subject in class, but the responses were always negative. However I have noticed that over the years, incidents of bullying have increased, not only in my school, but generally in other schools and on national level. Therefore I consider absolutely necessary to inform and train teachers about to this matter with the help of specialists, such as psychologists, psychotherapists and sociologists.
Date: 07.03.2012
Posted by: Diana Nikolova
Type of school: Specialized school
Country: Bulgaria
The described case is not related to the practices we have shared, but it concerns our target groups - children with special education needs. Dyslexia is a condition, which makes learning a bit harder for the child, but which does not mark her or him as incapable or failure. Here we have a girl, which needs support in order to succeed in her studies, and which instead is pushed out of school (this is the ultimate effect) by the main group of 5 bullies. The victim proves unable to return to this environment, but it is honorable of her to share the problem with one of her teachers in order to prevent the same thing happening again to others. Creating peer-support groups and providing regular consultations to children with special education needs in mixed classes is a must. Training for proper support provision and handling of tricky situations, potentially harmful to such children, should be provided to the school staff.
Date: 07.03.2012
Posted by: Mercedes Rodríguez
Type of school: Concerted
Country: Spain
Especially teenage girls often take these cases, several students come together to harass another partner. First unite around one of them by the need to be leading to them that you can handle, others are left to handle the need that they have with them, are usually students with low esteem and low personal criteria.
They usually choose a partner whose circumstances are in weak position both because of a physical, psychological or is having a hard time in social relations (this case is the most do) and you are alone or away from the group.
In the educational centos every student should be directed and supervised by a tutor who is the one that combines all the circumstances as they occur with respect to any student of his mentoring. In addition each student must be sure that there is a guardian watching over them. each teacher if you see an act against a student or a student perceives what is going wrong knows that he must turn to the mentor to report that fact and the tutor will go and go for comments being taken as they evolve according to the facts.
The tutor can work together with the entire school so that at no time these students to feel free in their crimes and parents of bullied students should be notified of the attitude they have taken their children with respect to that partner
The tutor should talk to the student, bullies and peer impassive those attending harassment, this can be done at first individually, then if feasible can meet the bully with the embattled to see if you can go ATTITUDES controlling .
If you see again the harassment, can help in any classroom or discipline of living there in the middle. must notify families to handle the situation and that no further increase in the harassment that can become unpredictable events, as well as school management and the scope of the solution is being extended to the families.
In none of the ways educators can let a student because of harassment in front of us can feel so bad I stopped going to the center.
We continued to track changing attitudes of bullies and reinforce the attitude of the harassed, working weekly with these students until they are deemed to have been a radical change
If after this time harassing students still do not take other attitudes may be ejected from the center and when incorporated back to work to change attitudes but with the parents of each student who does not change.
In these cases where we have to work with parents to ask for help parent representative as part of the living classroom or discipline can meet with parents and make children intermediary between them and the center.
In any case the aid should pay administracciones for extreme cases that can not be settled after having been through a serious protocol in a school (students often change of center)
For teachers need ongoing training of new technical assistance and perception associated with conflict, but especially administracciones would ask the serious and continuing aid for families but from Children and families already are overwhelmed by the work schedules, changes in
VALUES, the dissatisfaction with responsibilities, which are passed the age of your children old enough to educate and when they realize are now teenagers and uneducated ...
I Am Not Scared Project
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