A good example: how the teacher explained that bullying is bad

A pain that is not visible. How to explain to children what happens? After all, when you hit a person, he cries, he has a bruise, blood - in general, the consequences are immediately visible. And if you hurt someone with a word? Neither a bruise nor an abrasion. The words “you hurt me”, “you hurt me” are just words. Understanding that all these abstract arguments that words hurt too, do not work very well, one ordinary American teacher decided to resort to a good example. and explain to children everything literally on. The fact that she succeeded, the woman told in a social network. The success was deafening: 240 thousand reposts, 200 thousand likes, 25 thousand comments. And we decided to share her story with you.A photo: GettyImages “Today in class I decided to acquaint children with apples. They were perfect - red, juicy. Apples looked exactly the same in size and shape. - Same? Absolutely, - we decided with the children. And then I took one apple and told the children how I did not like it. - I think it is disgusting. The color is terrible, and the stalk is too short, - and threw the apple on the floor. The children, of course, looked at me as if they were insane. But I don’t argue against the teachers' authority. “I don’t like this apple. I want you to dislike it. Tell us why you do not like him, and gave the apple to the class. The task turned out to be quite simple. Children are inventive people. They found a lot of reasons to hate an apple. “Smelly apple, I hate you”, “Why did you buy it at all”, “You must be wormy”. And each time they threw the unfortunate apple on the floor. I even felt sorry for him. So, everyone insulted the apple, and it returned to his fellow man on the table. And it was the turn of the second apple. We did not throw him on the floor. On the contrary, everyone stroked it and said how wonderful it is: “What a smooth skin”, “Such a beautiful color”, “I love apples”. And again the apple returned to the table. In appearance it was impossible to distinguish which of them were thrown on the floor, and which one was praised. It was only possible to feel the difference by touch: soft spots appeared on the “offended” apple under the skin. Then came the final part of the experiment. I cut both apples. One of them was bright white inside, strong, crunchy even in appearance. The second - in brown spots, completely unsympathetic. It was immediately clear which one was beaten and offended. After all, it left bruises and abrasions - they just can not see the outside. But inside it was badly damaged.Photo:@RelaxKidsTamworthThe children were very impressed. They understood what happens inside each of us when we are offended. But many of them did not even suspect how much suffering can be caused by offensive words.And then the results of the experiment were consolidated - with practice, as it should be.- I told how I was offended last week. I said that I did not show how unpleasant it was for me, that I smiled, but in fact it hurt me a lot, - says the teacher.Then the children themselves recalled various unpleasant incidents and insults.- We can teach children to understand that it is not normal to hurt someone, to say offensive things to each other. We can teach them to protect the weak, to stop bullying. One girl did just that - she refused to offend an apple, - said the woman. - It is in our power to raise a generation of people who will be kinder than us.