{"id":5560,"date":"2020-01-31T23:30:12","date_gmt":"2020-02-01T04:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/?p=5560"},"modified":"2022-05-29T08:14:31","modified_gmt":"2022-05-29T13:14:31","slug":"5560","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/2020\/01\/31\/5560\/","title":{"rendered":"#1163 The Inner Workings of a Bully (or a Shooter)…"},"content":{"rendered":"
Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n

What would make you:
Punch someone?
Explode in a rage?
Go on a shooting rampage?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m fascinated by what makes people tick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so an article caught my attention exploring the inner workings of an ‘almost’ mass shooter<\/a> \u2013 \u201cTrunk\u201d (short for “Trunk full of guns”) was thankfully stopped before any shooting could happen. And he subsequently spent years in prison for what he had planned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the article, Trunk shares what was going on in his life at the time he was planning to cause destruction.

Illuminating.
He was a good kid. He was shy (or \u2018bashful.\u2019) He felt alone. He didn\u2019t feel heard. This boy was the invisible child in the class that was often overlooked or asked to be quiet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I see this often at schools:
\u2022 Two years ago I wrote a blog post with a story of a Grade Six good student who exploded at recess one day<\/a> \u2013 hurling a discarded bag of dog feces across the school yard. 
\u2022 One of my kind students uncharacteristically hit a classmate. Where did that come from? It took some investigating to find out.
\u2022 In another school, a gentle boy punched a classmate. Hard. Why? It seems he had been quietly internalizing taunts for a long time from a vocal boy with behavioural challenges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the article, ‘Trunk<\/em>‘ expands on the idea of feeling like an outcast: \u201cIf you\u2019ve ever been on the side of the fence where you are an outcast, it hurts. Why me? Why do they get to have all the fun? \u2026 He wanted so much to be accepted, he was willing to kill other people.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The article bluntly summarizes: \u201cA threat-assessment team could have intervened before [Trunk] had to begin his life as \u2018Trunk Full of Guns.\u2019 But no one came near him\u2014no teacher, no school psychologist, no parent. The threat that he presented remained un-assessed.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there lies a clue to avoiding further explosions in the classrooms, schools or workplaces:
\u2022 Listen. 
\u2022 Take time to notice little things. 
\u2022 Connect with all individuals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One teacher made this connection<\/a> and she spends time each week looking for patterns in behaviour to support her students needs.

How? <\/em>
She asks her students to write 4 names with whom they would like to sit  to develop  the weekly seating plan. Why? It helps her define social patterns in class \u2013 who is left out\u2026 who wants to be included and who is being excluded. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her process is time consuming in an already busy schedule but helps ensure students are heard, included and supported. The benefit is huge. Societal well-being supports the whole community. If people feel included and worthwhile their need for destructive attention seeking activities is minimized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When governments cut resources \u2013 including teachers and support workers \u2013 the true cost is often hidden. Missing the needs of the overlooked, lonely, disgruntled or \u201cquiet\u201d student has enormous costs down the road, as Trunk\u2019s story suggests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Supporting people (and students), properly, costs money. The cost of not supporting people properly is greater, by far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tweet What would make you:Punch someone?Explode in a rage?Go on a shooting rampage? I\u2019m fascinated by what makes people tick. And so an article caught my attention exploring the inner workings of an ‘almost’ mass shooter \u2013 \u201cTrunk\u201d (short for Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10,304,282,8,301,283],"tags":[318,325,323,324,33],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5560"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5560"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5565,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5560\/revisions\/5565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.harrynowell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}