Bullying Case

November 11, 2011

The purpose of this paper is to reflect and explain the constructed response for Chapter 5; "Societal Context of Middle Level Education (Powell, 2011). Three things Keith might do to address the bullying issues with Andy are: open the door for communication, have a character education theme added to his lesson every week, and get families involves.

First, Keith would need to open the door to communication and build a relationship with Andy (Powell, 2011). He needs to greet and get to know Andy as a person first before Andy would open up and confide in him. As Powell states, you need to look for the students strengths (2011). If you can find strengths in Andy you can focus on them to get him to have confidence in himself and them understand why bullying is not what to do. After he got to know Andy then he could sit down and talk to him about bullying and what he is noticing in the halls and around the school. If this is done from a concerned teacher then Andy will listen.

Second, Build character education in to your lessons. I likes when Powell states, "Teach the whole student" (2011). Schools are so focused on teaching to the test that they forget about the student, the young adolescent, the growing person. We need to remember that these students are growing in many different ways and with the social and economical changes in this world all students do not have role models at home. We as educators need to take a stand a give them a sense of belonging and the skills on how to succeed in this big fierce world.

A Last, if you get the parents involved and teach them the same concepts; we can only be bettering the world. It would be nice if you taught a monthly theme in school and then you had the students present a play or some type of information session to the parents and the community. This would help the students take ownership and responsibility in their further actions.

In conclusion, you can make a difference in the lives of so many children. As educators you need to grasp every day and use every second of the day to use as learning moments. Five the gift of knowledge and the students will feel the love and caring and want to start to please the person they respect.

References

Brown, D.F., & Knowles, T. (2007).What every middle school teacher should know (2nd

ed.). Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann

Feinstein, S. G. (2009). Secrets of the teenage brain: Research-based strategies for

reading and teaching today's adolescents (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.