Classroom Conflict with 9 Year Old Son

Time to go to the principal since you have already gone to the teacher repeatedly and it is not being handled. No child deserves to be mistreated by another.

Time to escalate the situation to the principal. Also, this kid could be doing this to see if he can get a reaction from your son. Sit down with your son and discuss his reactions to this kid. But definitely inform the principal. Good luck!

Of course you don't leave it alone to let him handle it. He's not handling it. It's your job as his mother to protect him and rectify the situation. He's being bullied and the school ought to have a zero tolerance policy on bullying. The fact is that there is a witness to the bullying and that stands in your favor, so you HAVE TO go to the principal immediately. Don't wait. Make that call NOW.

My son is 9. Our school has a ZERO tollerance for bullying. You need to go to the principal. In the very least, request they be in different classes next year. Also mention filing "harrassment charges" against the other boy and his parents if this doesn't stop IMMEDIATELY. That will kick things into high gear. Also talk to your son. Tell him his other friend is so stressed out that HE'S talking to HIS mom about it and you need to know what's going on so you can help. If he is nearly coming to blows, he is not able to handle it on his own. Good luck.

It is time to step it up and go to the principal and guidance counselor. The guidance counselor works with children to resolve conflicts, explain why bullying is wrong and makes his/her office a "safe" place.

Obviously the teacher is not getting it settled quickly enough.

There is no tolerance around here for fighting in school, even with self defense.

Our daughter has has black belt and knows self control, etc but we have always told her, if you hit back in self defense, it is what you are trained to do and we'll deal with the school. She is 17 now and she used her skill more than once. She trained for about 6 yrs and it is one of her proudest achievements. Martial arts teaches so much. It empowers you, you learn self control, you also learn self defense.

Good luck and be persistant with the school to get this stopped.

As everyone else has said you really need to go to the next level. The other child is smart enough to not get caught and the teacher can't act on something she is not seeing. As far as problems during recess it's hard to monitor a large group of kids as they are playing and going nuts. My son had issues with a girl picking on him during recess. He use to just stick around the recess monitor and since the girl couldn't pick on him with an adult around she gave up after a couple days and moved on.

It sounds like to me your son is learning conflict resolution.

I think you should leave it alone on the surface because if you say something to your son that your heard xyz from his friend's mom, it could cause problems between your son and the friend that the info is coming from. You don't want to "out" your "source."

Whenever I hear things 3rd hand, I keep it to myself and use the information to guide how I am going to respond.

Perhaps you could start a conversation with your son like you were speaking to a friend who has a friend who's son is being bothered at school. Just go on with the story and ask your son's opinion and maybe for suggestions. That way you can feel out where he's at emotionally regarding this issue.

It could be that your son doesn't see it from the same perspective as his friend. You know, two people can witness the same event and both see it differently.

I agree with the advice to talk to YOUR son about it.
Does he feel he needs help with this kid?
Is talking to the teacher an option for him? Can he ask to speak with the teacher privately?
Is talking to the teacher an option for you? Make sure your son knows about that & is "ok" with it.
"Telling" is a huge deal in my third grader's class. No O. wants to be known as "the snitch."

You could suggest the old "good-good-bad" approach for your son to use. Something like "Hey, Jason, you're really good at kickball and I've known you since we were 3, but your behavior is out of line and I want it to stop NOW!"

And truthfully, after that, little bully that's picking on your son might benefit from a knuckle sandwich in the snot locker!

If the teacher is not doing anything about it you need to. Your son probably wont tell you as some kids that age are like that they are tought not to tadle on each other and sometimes get in trouble for it. So when they need to they wont. My oldest is like that. I am still having to teach him to stand up for himself and he's 13. If it's bad enough that his friends is deeply bothered it's bad. And be thankful he's got a friend that cares enough to say something!! I would go to the principle and if needed have your friend and her son talk to them if they wont witnesses. Now if the teacher truly does not see it and no one says anything she can't do anything. But regardless it needs to STOP!!!!!!!!!! Don't make him continue to deal with it on his own!!!

Good luck and God Bless!

While he may think he's handling it on his own like a big kid, and you may feel you don't want to invade his space or make him feel babyish by asking him about it -- you do have to ask him about it. You have to find a way NOT to "rat out" his friend who's telling the mom who's telling you; that kid will get the cold shoulder or worse from your own son if your son knows who has been telling his mom what's going on. It's likely your son, though he may resist at first, would welcome an adult getting involved if this is to the point he can't even have a single recess without nearly getting into a fight.

Also, you must get him to open up, and keep talking, because if he does not learn to come to you with these things now, he will be completely clammed up by the time he's in middle school -- And you want your child to come and talk to you if he has problems, not feel that he must handle things solo all the time. We want our kids to be able to handle things, but we also need them to understand it's OK to tell an adult when someone is bullyiing them. Keeping quiet makes things much, much worse. So don't leave him to handle this on his own.

Tell him you know what goes on at school and you are aware that X is hassling him, including on the playground. Ask if there were any specific incidents lately and what happened. Don't make him feel as if you're grilling him; approach him at a time when things are calm and good and with the attitude of "Son, I know what goes on at school; I really do know. So please talk me through it, and it is NOT tattling. It is never tattling if someone is bullying you."

Then you have to get the principal and teacher involved as others have said. The teacher sounds clueless, frankly. You need to let her know that your son wants to handle this himself but YOU do not want him to, and that this boy needs to be kept away from your son not just in class but in recess, the cafeteria, etc. The principal should know as well, so that the teacher can be held accountable.

IDK maybe I'm a tad oldschool bit I don't see the big deal. Hes getting bothered, has friends on his side and is attempting to take care of it on his own. These are skills that are important. Sure keep an eye on behaviour and if the stories get worse than teasing and if hes getting bullied by a group of kids step in, but this is one kid bbothering him and he seems to not be affected? Have faith in him to handle it. IDK I got bullied a little as did everyone in school and it taught M. how to stick up for myself. I wouldn't have wanted my mom to butt in...sure there were some kids who shouldve had someone step in but those were cases where the whole class bullied one kid

To the other answers here, I say WHOA!! You have 3rd hand knowledge of the situation here and you need 1st hand knowledge. You need to find a way to get your son to open up and talk to you about it. It seems like he's trying to handle it, but he's 9 -- so he's gonna need some guidance from time to time, and this is definitely one of those times. As he heads into pre-teen and teenage years you need to open up the lines of communication so he will talk to you about some of the even more uncomfortable stuff in his life. It may be that the situation is as reported -- something that needs to be escalated up the chain. Or it may be that some details got exaggerated or confused between the other child to his mother to you. What you have right now is hear-say (in legal speak) which is not admissible in court -- in mommy talk, what you have is gossip. Get the facts first. Establish communication lines with your son. Then figure out what to do.
Good luck.

Updated

To the other answers here, I say WHOA!! You have 3rd hand knowledge of the situation here and you need 1st hand knowledge. You need to find a way to get your son to open up and talk to you about it. It seems like he's trying to handle it, but he's 9 -- so he's gonna need some guidance from time to time, and this is definitely one of those times. As he heads into pre-teen and teenage years you need to open up the lines of communication so he will talk to you about some of the even more uncomfortable stuff in his life. It may be that the situation is as reported -- something that needs to be escalated up the chain. Or it may be that some details got exaggerated or confused between the other child to his mother to you. What you have right now is hear-say (in legal speak) which is not admissible in court -- in mommy talk, what you have is gossip. Get the facts first. Establish communication lines with your son. Then figure out what to do.
Good luck.

I think you need to get more specifics from your son. Let him know that you plan to meet with the teacher again and/or principal and that you need actual step by step day by day specific examples of what is happening.

Write everything down, then the school will know this is serious and it needs to be handled. Teachers don't always see what happens at recess. At our school, some recesses are supervised by teacher aides who are not specific to classrooms, so the teachers actually do not see what is going on.

Call the counselor and ask for some suggestions for role playing with your son ways to deal with this. Your son doesn't have to know, and if you're not interested in escalating this up the chain (ie, past your son's teacher) that is okay, too.

Then, talk to your son. Don't give specifics about what you know/have heard. But tell him that you heard that some other friend's kid was being bullied, and you wondered if he had some suggestions of what might work. And also let him that if the situation is not good, or getting worse with his own situation, that you are willing to help him in whatever way you can. Then, introduce some the role playing techniques, to help him deal with it. Practice with dealing with an imagined scenario calmly can help him in the real situation.