Parent’s Guide
“Dealing with Bullying”
2022-2023
(Kindergarten to High school)
Sabah Al-Salem, block 2, building 94, street 3
Tel. #: 1804818
P.O.Box 44230 – Kuwait 32057
www.alruya.edu.kw
1 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
Introduction
The Parent's Guide is an important part of the “Bullying-free School” program. This
program is adopted by Al Ru’ya Bilingual School to create a positive school
environment, free of bullying. The program is based on scientific research and
behavioral experiments that have been proven successful in antibullying. Therefore,
this guide will provide all the necessary information to identify bullying, its effects,
causes and the proper response, at home and at school.
Parents’ collaboration is considered crucial for the successful implementation of the
“School Free of Bullying” program. When a child is victimized at school, it is important
to have a bullying-aware and supportive home environment to help fight bullying.
Parents must be able to provide the necessary support at home when needed.
The Goal
The goal of this program is:
• Introducing parents to the concept of bullying and how to avoid it and treat it.
• Educating bystander students how to support the "victims" by not remaining silent
and how to discourage the bully’s actions.
• Create a safe, conscious, and responsible school environment by providing students
with correct information that would encourage them to positively intervene to stop
bullying.
Definition of Bullying: What is Bullying?
Bullying is an aggressive behavior that occurs repeatedly, over a period of time,
between two parties of unequal strength, that deliberately causes psychological and
physical harm.
Explanation of the definition of bullying:
Actions are recognized as bullying when the student constantly and deliberately harm
another student of a weaker power. The bully aims to deliberately harass and harm
the victim student. The two parties have inequal powers, as the victim may be
physically weaker, shy, or simply a new student in class and did not develop any
friendships yet.
The three elements in any bullying event:
1- the bully
2- the victim 3- the witness
2 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
Forms of bullying
Verbal bullying: Using words that are offensive to the other student, to call him/her
bad names and nicknames that they don’t like, or to ridicule and threat them.
• Physical bullying: physical actions that are harmful to the weaker or younger
student. This includes severe beating, kicking, slapping and stealing personal
property.
• Social bullying: indirect, using unobservable methods such as social exclusion,
refusing to participate/cooperate with the victim, spreading rumors about him/her,
and destroying his/her relationship with other students.
• Cyber bullying: spreading abusive rumors via social media, by writing offensive
words or publishing pictures that are offensive to the victim.
Causes of bullying
The reasons that lead to bullying varies. Previous studies have shown that there are
different reasons why a child becomes a bully, and they are as follows:
• Misunderstanding of the concept of power.
• Weak social skills that prevent proper social interaction with the other party.
• Ignorance and lack of knowledge of the consequences of actions.
• Character disorders and lack of self-esteem.
• Exposure to violence on social media.
• Family disintegration, as both parents are occupied by life and not fulfilling their
parenting responsibilities.
• Exposure to violence while playing electronic game.
• Poor religious awareness and moral values.
• Desire to gain admiration: some students resort to bullying to make others laugh to
gain their admiration and friendship. Bullies may suffer from loneliness and
negligence, and by bullying they compensate and/or cure their emotional deprivation.
• Jealousy: the bully may feel jealous of the victim, and this encourages the bully to
belittle the victim in order to feel superior.
• Differences, whether in appearance, opinions, interests, etc., may drive the bully to
ridicule the victim because the former does not accept this difference.
* Note: There are other causes for bullying, depending on the situation.
3 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
Bullying Effects
• How do you know that a student may be a victim of bullying?
Change of behavior
The symptoms that will be mentioned here are not necessarily due merely to bullying.
They may be the results of other problems in the life of the child or teen, such as a
sudden illness of a family member, divorce of parents, or constant disputes between
parents and children. Accordingly, it is the parents themselves who know the main
reason for the change in the behavior of their child, i.e. whether is because being
bullied or not.
Some of the signs that signals a student is being bullied:
• The student refuses to go to school, although he/she loves school.
• Repeated absence from school without a clear excuse.
• The student constantly feels fatigue or complains from being unwell, during
school hours.
• The student comes home with his/her clothes or bag torn or scattered.
• The student becomes very quiet and withdrawn, as if he/she has lost selfconfidence.
• The student looks stressed and anxious.
• The student loses appetite for food.
• The student cries in bed and complains of disturbing dreams.
• The student constantly loses personal belongings (pens, books, notebooks,
colors...etc).
• The student might steal money (to give it to the bully).
• The student has unexplainable bruises.
• The student looks nervous and becomes difficult to deal with.
• The student has no friends or does not invite friends to house.
• The student refuses to talk about the problem and gives illogical justifications.
Misconceptions about bullying
• Quarrels and disagreements are not considered bullying
Quarrels and disputes are normal and expected in relationships. Children and
adolescents’ differing views are not a serious matter, although they sometimes lead to
adults feeling upset. The role of the adults in such situations is to teach children how
to deal with these disagreements.
The difference between quarrels and bullying is: that quarrels are temporary, while
bullying is continuous.
4 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Violent play is not bullying
Sometimes students’ interaction is aggressive, but usually they do not intend to harm
others. Sometimes their words and actions may annoy others, by they tend to
immediately apologize to those whom they have offended. Furthermore, they do not
purposely repeat such offensive behavior. Where the bully on the hand knows that
certain behaviors and actions upset and offend to the victim, nevertheless, he/she
purposely repeats the same actions.
Sometimes we hear students say, 'we were just playing'. How should you respond if
this was the case?
You must make sure and check if everyone feels that this was just play. If you are
not sure of that, you should talk to the students and investigate. If you still have
doubts, you can talk to them about the difference between playing and bullying and
make it clear that playing should be fun for everyone and not to cause physical injury
or emotional harm.
Identifying the phenomenon of bullying
• At school:
Al-Ru'ya School has a Bullying Awareness and Prevention Team that has been
trained and equipped with the necessary information to deal with bullying cases. In
this program. Students will also be made aware of their role in dealing with bullying
and in supporting the "victim" instead of keeping silent and, thus; encouraging the
bully to continue harassing the victim. Fighting and eliminating bullying becomes
possible when everyone's sense of responsibility is strong.
• At home:
Parents should constantly ask the child, "How was your day at school?" to find out
how the school day went, the child’s thoughts and feelings on this day and what kind
of relationships he/she has in school. Your questions will make your child feel that
you are interested in what is happening with him/her at school, and this will
encourage him/her to be more open about the issues that he/she may have in his/her
life.
Parents should not be satisfied with short answers such as "It was a good day." Take
more time to discuss it in more detail. It is important to pay attention to feelings
indicated in the child's words, tone of voice and facial expressions. We advise parents
to ask open questions that cannot be answered with "yes" or "no".
Some questions that parents can ask:
• What is the best thing that happened to you today, and what is the worst thing that
happened to you today?
5 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Who were you playing with today?
• What group activities have you participated in? Was it fun?
Parents' role with a child being bullied:
My child is being bullied: what can parents do?
• Talk to your child. Be prepared for his/her negative response and unwellness
to talk.
• Encourage your child to talk to you and assure him/her that you will help
him/her no matter how difficult the problem seems to be and that you will
always be supportive.
• Constantly and clearly say that being bullied is never the victim’s fault.
• Do not treat your child as a victim. Always encourage him/her to seek help
and defend him/herself.
• Never promise your child that what he/she will say will be kept a secret,
because in this case you will not be able to intervene. Promise that you will not
take any action without your child’ knowledge first. This way will help you
gain your child’s trust and will encourage an open dialogue.
• Discuss what your child can do to stop the bully. The “bully” wants the
"victim" to react in a certain way like; crying, be afraid and/or become
impatient and violently burst. When appropriate, encourage your child to react
differently, such as firmly saying "no to bullying" or to withdraw from the
situation as quickly as possible. It is difficult for the bully to continue
harassing the victim if the latter is not reacting or withdrawing from the
situation. You can also have your child practice saying certain words that
would stop the bully. Words like "No", "Stop", "Don't bully".
• Discuss with your child how to avoid situations in which he/she becomes a
victim of bullying. For example: your son avoids being the last one to leave the
classroom, whenever possible, not to take valuable personal belongings to
school, not to stand far from the teacher or friends’ sight. It is best to always
be around other people, even if they were a group of strangers.
• Think about how to boost your child's self-confidence. For example, chose a
group picture showing him/her smiling, stick it on a piece of paper and write
supportive and encouraging comments that others have made about him/her,
and write statements about how strong he/she is and then hang that picture in a
visible place at home where your child can see.
• The "victim" may become shy and withdrawn, so think of different ways that
would help him/her gain sustainable friendships.
6 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Encourage your child to invite friends to the house. To have only one friend at
first, so that to gain social skills in a safe environment, and then invite a group
of friends.
• Encourage your child to practice different hobbies and participate in activities
through which he/she can build friendships.
Coach your child to say “No” to bullying
It is particularly important to ask the bullied child: Can you say “no” or “stop” to the
bully?
Parents can train their child to say “no” or “stop,” in the following ways:
• Let your child practice saying “no” in front of a mirror. Let him/her stand
straight with his/her head held high, take a deep breath, and say “no” clearly
and firmly, then say it again in a louder, deeper and affirmative voice.
• Note that it is possible to practice this in front of a family member as well.
• Let your child look at you and say "no" in a firm and clear voice. Advise
him/her not to look angry or upset, just to sound firm and clear.
• Make up different scenarios where your child can say no to bullying. Advise
your child to tell the teacher if he/she being repeatedly targeted by a bully.
Pay attention to your comments while conversing with your bullied child
When the "bullied" child talks about the topic, it is normal for the parent to feel
responsible for protecting the child and tries to assure full support. Unfortunately,
sometimes the comments of the parent could do the opposite, as illustrated here
under:
• “I was also bullied when I was a kid in school, but that did not affect me”
If so, your child will think that you are diminishing the problem, which is a big deal
to him/her.
• “You must learn to stand up for yourself.”
The bully is harming a student of inequal strength and, therefore; self-defense in this
case is very difficult or almost impossible. When the “victim” is asked to defend
him/herself, the responsibility falls entirely on him/her to solve the problem, and
when seeking help, this means that the child has the courage to speak up,
nevertheless; you as a parent, did not provide the proper guidance of what to do to
solve the problem.
• "Bullying builds character and gives you the ability to deal with difficult
situations in life"
7 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
Research shows that one of the devastating effects of bullying is that it diminishes the
victim's ability to deal with difficult life situations. Bullying has a negative impact on
the child’s self-esteem and trust in others. Building a well-balanced personality is
based on mutual trust and respect.
• "Words can't hurt me"
One may forget the offending words that were once said to harm him, but bullying,
which is a recurring negative behavior, as we mentioned previously, will leave a deep
scar by time. The impact of offending words will constantly affect self-esteem, and;
thus, the emotional health of the “victim”.
• "This is not bullying, it's just playing, don't bother"
As mentioned earlier, playing is different from bullying. Bullying is bad for two
reasons. First, it is a reoccurring, harmful behavior that may continue over a long
period of time. The second: it happen in the classroom/school, where classmates are
watching.
The parents' role with a "bully" child
What do I do if my child is a bully?
• Get a clear picture of what exactly happened. Is it bullying, or merely a
disagreement or conflict between two students? Disagreements and disputes
must also be resolved by asking your child not to criticize, not to throw
accusations, or not to judge.
• Know how and why your child bullies others. What is your child’s role in
bullying? Did your child partner with the bully? offered help to the bully? Or is
he/she the bully? Keep in mind that children may deny what happened and/or
underestimate what they did.
• Don't accept excuses such as: “We were just playing, we weren't serious.”
Make it very clear that bullying is not acceptable and illustrate the difference
between playing and bullying.
• Discuss how bullying is frightening to the victim and unfair, and stress that
there is no justified reason whatsoever for bullying.
• Discuss why is it important to refrain and stop this harmful act. Explain that
things will only get worse for both, the bully and the victim.
• Be precise when expressing your disapproval of bullying and assure your child
that you are willing to provide all the support needed to help him/her stop.
8 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Consider if your child needs more supervision and guidance. Set clear rules for
leisure time and hanging out with friends, and always be aware of how your
child spends his/her time? and with whom?
• Teach your child to show respect to others and to accept those who are
different. Difference is acceptable and is not a subject for ridicule and
mocking.
• Instill good values like empathy and the good use of power in the right way.
• Encourage your child to adopt commended behaviors such as helping the
weak, removing harm from the road, and supporting the oppressed.
• Tell your child that you are sure that he/she is able to change and that you are
positive that he/she did not intend to harm or hurt the feelings of others.
Enhance your child’s self-confidence and ability to change to be a better
person by stopping such harmful actions.
• Change is possible, for example: developing better social skills, making friends
who do not accept bullying and practicing new hobbies. Discuss with your
child what he/she can do to build good friendships and the proper ways to earn
their affection and respect.
• Illustrate the advantages of refraining from bullying and taking small steps to
do that.
• Explain to your child the consequences that will be assigned at home and at
school if he/she continues to bully.
• If forcing consequences is deemed necessary to modify the behavior, be
moderate in that, and never resort to beating, as this will have a bad effect on
good behavior. Once again, make it clear that you love him/her and that you
do not accept this behavior in any way.
• You can speak with the social counselor at the school to help you further with
the matter.
9 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Review with your child the school’s “Bullying Consequences” guide
Violation #
First violation
Second
violation
Kindergarten
Elementary
Advice, guidance and Advice, guidance and
encouragement by
encouragement
teacher, social counselor
Verbal warning and
and management
reminder of future
consequences
MHS – Girls
MHS – Boys
Social counselor
guidance and verbal
warning.
Social counselor
guidance and verbal
warning.
Parents are informed of Parents are informed
the above procedure. of the above
procedure.
student signs a promise
letter
Parents are informed of
the above procedures
Summoning parent(s) to The VP summons
The student signs a
discuss their child’s
parent(s) to discuss the promise letter.
misbehavior
student’s behavior with
the counselor.
The VP informs the
The parent will have to parents of the incident.
sign a pledge that the
misbehavior will not be
repeated.
A one PE class and
school fun activities
detention
Third violation Summoning parent(s) to Assign one-day internal VP summons parent(s)
discuss the most
suspension
appropriate behaviorOR
modification plan
One-fieldtrip
suspension
Fourth
Discuss with the parent a One-day external
One-day external
violation
behavior-modification suspension
suspension.
plan
The parent signs a at
the pledge in the
principal’s office.
Fifth violation If behavior was not
Student's next-year's
Two-day external
positively modified, the registration will be re- suspension.
parent will have to sign considered
a pledge promising to
The student’s file will
move the child to
be submitted to the
another school.
Private Education
Division.
Next year's reregistration application
will not be accepted
10 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
The student signs a
promise letter.
The VP informs the
parents of the
incident.
VP summons
parent(s)
One-day external
suspension.
The parent signs a
pledge in the
principal’s office.
Two-day external
suspension.
The student’s file will
be submitted to the
Private Education
Division.
Next year's reregistration application
will not be accepted
Other tips on how parents can help their bully child to stop
• Always keep calm and be clear when discussing the matter.
• Clearly explain that you do not approve the bullying behavior.
• Express how petty you feel for the victim, and how afraid and distressed
he/she might be.
• Stress the fact that nothing justifies bullying.
• Promise your child to offer him/her the required assistance that help
him/her stop the bad behavior of bullying.
• Discuss with your child the ways in which he/she can have control over
him/herself, how to manage anger and how to properly respond to annoying
situations.
• Discuss with your child the way in which he/she can be of support to the
victim (shake hands, warm greeting, smile on the face).
How parents can make their kids help fight bullying
The role of the “witness” in bullying incidents
• Kids are usually vigilant about what is going on around them. In situations
where bullying happens, several students might witness the action but
unfortunately, some of them befriend with the bully and thus, support the
bully. On the other hand, many others feel for the “victim”, but they do not
intervene and keep silent, and by this negative attitude, they tacitly accept the
bully’s actions. Therefore, we request that you encourage your child to report
any bullying incidents he/she has witness.
Why do students not always back up the “witness” or the “victim”?
• This could be because the witness is not as strong as the bully and maybe
afraid of him/her or does not know how to help the victim.
How can the “witness” help the “victim”?
• Students witnessing the bullying incident are vital in the fight against such
diminishing behavior.
• Students must know that bullying could be stopped if an adult intervention is
sought.
• Discuss with your child how he/she feels when witnessing an incident where
bullying takes place?
11 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying
• Suggest to your child to talk about bullying with other classmates and how
they can collaborate to stop it. Students’ role is vital in anti-bullying, as this
behavior will continue if allowed by passive attitudes.
• Encourage your child to inform an adult about ongoing bullying. Explain that
this is not considered “backbiting” or “snitching”, but rather a necessary help
offered to the victim.
• Teach your child how to report bullying incidents in school by reaching to a
nearby teacher and narrating what happened or, by visiting the social
counselor’s office. The school will investigate the incident in complete
confidentiality.
************************
Dear Parents/Students
Kindly communicate with the school counselor if you happen to know about an
identified bullying case. The school will apply the proper anti-bullying procedures
and will handle your names with extreme confidentiality. The following is the contact
information of our counselors:
Kindergarten
Elementary
MHS – girls
MHS – boys
Ms. Manal
Ms. Shorouq AlMs. Maha Mazhar Mr. Mohammad
Mahmoud
Hudaib (boys
Tel: 67080548
Moqbel
school)
E-mail:
Tel: 66205031
Tel: 92242853
Tel: 94700107
mahama@alruya.ed E-mail:
E-mail:
E-mail:
u.kw
Mohamedmo@alruya.e
Manalsa@alruya.ed Shurouqal@alruya.e
du.kw
u.kw
du.kw
Ms. Sara Maher
(girls school)
Tel: 50913891
E-mail:
sarama@alruya.edu.
kw
NB: Our counselors are available from 9:00am to 1:00pm.
You will receive a reply to your e-mail/phone call message within 24 hours.
12 | Parents’ Guide – Dealing with Bullying