[overflow] Re: GHHS

["Kay Shapero" <kayshapero@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

26 Mar 01 05:16, Bill Sutton iirc wrote to All:

 U> and get through it. Life itself is not fair, nor does it get out of
 U> your way when you ask it to. I think we intervene too much in an
 U> effort to protect children from anything and everything "bad" and then
 U> wonder why we end up with teens and young adults who can't handle
 U> adversity.

Adversity is one thing; physical attack is another.  One thing I *do*
recommend
(and those stepkids of yours might consider it) is martial arts classes.
Not
for the combat techniques; for the far more important associated teaching of
how to AVOID a fight.  There was a girl at Vicky's school who tried
everything
she could think of to pick a fight with her to no avail.  Vicky simply
avoided
her when she could, and used her training the rest of the time - it's hard
to
shove someone who knows how to give with the push, or hit someone who knows
how
to dodge and disengage from people considerably *larger* than she is, let
alone
her own size (they train those kids to escape *grownups*.)  When the girl
went
too far (cut some of Vicky's hair with a pair of scissors while sitting
behind
her in class), Vicky reported her to the vice principal, and she was
counseled,
and transferred to a different school. I still wonder if I did the right
thing
there, by not pressing charges, but on a 13 year old?  That kid needed HELP,
not jail time.  I just hope she got it.

And there's the ultimate problem - schools with too little of everything but
kids.  There's no *time* to watch them carefully and kids fall through the
cracks.  I'm not worried about Vicky - while not part of any one school
group,
she's friends with them all, and she's got a true peer group to hang out
with at the LASFS.  But what about the others?