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Make sure your kids understand that you will not tolerate bullying at home or anywhere else. Set rules about bullying and stick to them. If your child acts aggressively at home, with siblings or others, put a stop to it. Teach more appropriate ways to react, like walking away.
Teach your child that it is wrong to ridicule differences like race, religion, appearance, special needs, gender, economic status. Try to instil a sense of empathy for those who are different. Consider getting involved together in a community group where your child can interact with kids who are different.
Look for insight into what may be influencing your child’s behaviour at school (or wherever the bullying happens). Talk with parents of your child’s friends and peers, teachers, guidance counsellors, and the school principal. Do other kids bully? What about your child’s friends? What kinds of pressures do the kids face at school? Talk to your kids about those relationships and about the pressures to fit in. Get them involved in activities outside of school so that they meet and develop friendships with other kids.
Positive reinforcement can be more powerful than negative discipline. Catch your kids being good. When they handle situations in positive ways, take notice and praise them for it.
And keep your own behaviour in check too. Sometimes unknowingly our own behaviour goes unnoticed by us but children catch it very fast. For example, how you treat house helps, how you treat people with a different appearance, race, colour and ore. Think about how you talk around your kids and how you handle conflict and problems. Kids who live with yelling, name-calling, harsh criticism or physical anger from a sibling or parent/caregiver may act that out in other settings
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