I'm glad you've contacted the school social worker and teacher. Often, the social exclusion is happening away from the eyes of the adults, so they don't even know it's happening. I also want to remind people that bullying is not restricted to physical violence. In girls, it is predominantly social in nature (everyone's seen Mean Girls?), and starts as young as three years old. Bullies are often highly regarded by both peers and adults, as they can be very astute at hiding their manipulation and control of peers. Plus peers would rather be on the popular girl bandwagon than the target of her harassment or ostracism, and will join in bullying or watch it passively in order to avoid becoming the next victim. This may have been what happened to the former friend.
Oh, and I've seen a lot of children breathe a sigh of relief when they moved up to the secondary level, because it is often a bigger school, with a wider range of kids, allowing them to find their "peeps".
Last edited by aeh; 05/14/14 07:12 PM.
