Good self-esteem helps children try new things, take healthy risks and solve problems.

It gives them a solid foundation for their learning and development.

What this means is that, you must do your best to help your child identify develop self-confident.

To help you do this, consider the following:

Communicate with children

Parents must find time to speak and get to know their kids. Talk to them every day about anything. Tell them how your day went and ask how they did.

Tell them your problems and try to get them to offer suggestions to you. This way, you can also get them to open up and tell you their problems too.

Most importantly, talk about bullying and the need to report it as soon as they identify one.

Raise children to be respectful and helpful

Right at an early age, parents must stress the importance of good values.

Teach them to respect their peers, be kind, resilient, and responsible for themselves and others, to know how their actions can affect others and so on.

Help them to appreciate that personal success is not everything, but the ability to care for, help, contribute and make a positive impact in society is more important.

Teach kids how to respond to bullying

Parents must listen to their kids.

Get them to be calm to tell the whole story.

Let them know you are concerned.

Try to develop a plan with them.

Do not be too quick to jump into the school or confront the perpetrator’s parents.

Offer simple solutions that will encourage him to work on the problem.

Most importantly, keep a close eye on them and learn more about how they are improving or overcoming the problem.

Work with your child’s school

The idea of discussing bullying with school authorities can be overwhelming. But not working with them is worse.

Try to be present at Parent–Teacher meetings to raise your concerns.

Find out what the school policies are, and if there is anger, stress and emotional management classes for kids.

Ask about how these classes are done. Ask about some ways that support staff (e.g.. bus drivers and janitors) can help.

Ask about how you can also help them to make the environment safe for every kid in the school.

Encourage resilience

Develop protective behaviours and resilient social skills in your child, such as speaking assertively, negotiating, expressing their own opinion, using a confident voice and using firm eye contact.

Practice regularly using dinner conversations and social encounters with acquaintances and new people.

Deal with fear and anger

Assist them to develop effective ways of dealing with fear and anger instead of internalising their feelings, taking them out on others or losing face in front of the peer group by allowing them to spill over.

Make your home “bully free”

Children learn behavior through their parents.

Being exposed to aggressive behavior or an overly strict environment at home makes kids more prone to bully at school.

Parents/caregivers should model positive examples for your child in your relationships with other people and with them.

Look for issues

Children with low self-esteem often bully to feel better about themselves.

Even children who seem popular and well-liked can have mean tendencies.

Mean behavior should be addressed by parents and disciplined.

Observe your child

Children may not always be vocal about being bullied.

Signs include: ripped clothing, hesitation about going to school, decreased appetite, nightmares, crying, or general depression and anxiety.

If you discover your child is being bullied, don’t tell them to “let it go” or “suck it up”.

Instead, have open-ended conversations where you can learn what is really going on at school so that you can take the appropriate steps to rectify the situation.

Most importantly, let your child know you will help him/her and that they should try not to fight back.

Set boundaries

Educate your children and yourself about cyberbullying and teach your children not to respond or forward threatening emails. “Friend” your child on Facebook or Myspace and set up proper filters on your child’s computer.

Make the family computer the only computer for children, and have it in a public place in the home where it is visible and can be monitored.

If you decide to give your child a cell phone think carefully before allowing them to have a camera option.

Let them know you will be monitoring their text messages.

As a parent, you can insist that phones are stored in a public area, such as the kitchen, by a certain time at night to eliminate night-time bullying and inappropriate messaging.

Conclusion

Parents should report bullying to the school, and follow up with a letter that is copied to the school superintendent if their initial inquiry receives no response.

About The Author

Emmanuel Asiedu is a Content Writer and a Home Tuition Analyst at Excellent Home Classes.

He helps parents and students connect with tutors all over country. His new report The Ultimate Guide To Better Grade is gaining huge readership.

Feel free to connect with him at www.excellenthomeclasses.com