Running the moment through

The activity

On a calm day, you play the other child and your child tries out what they might say. Keep it short and light, and do it once or twice at most.

What it is for. Adults usually hand a worried child the words to say. Running the moment through lets the child find their own, without you stepping in for them.

• The first step. Choose a calm time, and avoid the hour after school. The next morning or the weekend is often better.
• If your child is being targeted (the same child or group, again and again, on purpose), stop there. The rehearsal is not the response: tell your child you are going to talk to the school, and what you will say, before you do it.

Safety. If it is happening in a group chat, rehearse nothing to send, and send nothing tonight. If it keeps happening, it goes to the school.

When to get help. If it sounds like bullying, contact your child’s class teacher or form tutor this week, saying what you have noticed rather than what you have concluded. If your child has hurt themselves, or talks about not wanting to be alive, stay calm, thank them if they have told you, don’t promise to keep it secret, and act that day: help them ask the surgery for an urgent appointment, and if it is closed, use the routes under “If you need help right now”, at the foot of every page. If your child tells you that someone is hurting them, stay calm, thank them for telling you, don’t promise to keep it secret, and act that day, using those routes; if the person hurting your child lives in your home or your child’s other home, go straight to children’s social care or the police. If your child is badly hurt, or may have taken too much of a medicine, get medical help straight away, even if they seem well.

The other three steps, and your part in it, are in the library.

The sheet that goes with it comes with a subscription: My words for that moment.

It goes with

• When the Best Friend Moves On. For parents whose child’s best friend has drifted away, with no falling-out to explain it.
• When Your Child Is Being Bullied. For parents whose child has just told them about being bullied.

The first chapter you open here is free to read in full.

Free on this subject

• Friendships. What to do first, what helps, and who else can help. Free to read and to print.
• Bullying. What to do first, what helps, and who else can help. Free to read and to print.