Smarty and the Second Grade Bullies

Smarty is in first grade this year. And for whatever reason, he has become a target of two bullies in second grade.

The first bully, Cooper, once slammed him up against a wall in the boys bathroom. This was followed shortly thereafter by some incidents of extremely uncharacteristic pants-wetting on Smarty's part, because he was afraid to go in the bathroom when he thought Cooper might be in there. The other bully, Mason, became the terror of the lunchroom and playground for Smarty (though I can't remember what he did initially to build the terror in Smarty).

As these situations escalated, I racked my brain to figure out the best way to handle them. I worried that if we intervened directly, or if Smarty ran to a teacher or stood up to them himself, he would only increase his potential as a target and maybe even inspire some actual violence from his would-be attackers. And yet, I wanted him to be empowered and unafraid at school.

Luckily, my brilliant husband has had experience in this area and knew what to do. He advised Smarty to actually befriend these boys. Honestly, I thought Ben's idea was insane and might still draw some negative attention to Smarty, but since I had no idea about what to do otherwise, and since it would empower Smarty with a positive plan of action, I went along with it.

After that Smarty started being friendly to these guys. He'd wave at them across the lunchroom, and say, "hi," when they passed him in the hall. Turns out, a little confidence was all Smarty needed. Cooper is so freaked out by this positive attention that he has since begun to ignore Smarty (Actually his apprehension at Smarty's positive contact makes me sad for him).

As for Mason, one day, after a couple of weeks of Smarty's friendly overtures, he grabbed Smarty by the shoulders and shook him and said, "Aren't you afraid of me?!" But because Smarty had already made the choice to befriend Mason, he had no idea he was supposed to be intimidated by this show of aggression.

He innocently stated, "No."

And to my knowledge, he's never had a problem with either kid since then. Phew!! Thank heaven for Ben's inspiration. He truly knows how to walk the high road. And I'm glad it worked out this time. I pray we will be so fortunate in the future.