This is probably going to get long, sorry.

I'm just wondering what you tell your kids with regards other kids being violent towards them.  I've always told Joe and Bel that if someone is hurting them or even threatening to hurt them they should make as much noise and fuss as possible so that it gets the attention of the people around them and hopefully whoever is hurting them would leave them alone.  Then a few months ago I had to deal with a phase between Joe and Bel where he would overreact over something teeny that she did, like touching one of his toys or something and he would either hit her or get right in her face and shake his fists at her.  I'm not sure if I did the right thing but I told her that if something like that happened and I wasn't right there that she should do whatever it took to get him away from her.  As in if he hit her it was ok with me if she hit him back just so that he would stop (I didn't want him thinking that he could do that to her and she would just take it).   You also have to remember that Bel is a tiny thing, like a good 6 inches shorter than all of the other kids in her class, even though she is one of the oldest and I wanted her to be able to stick up for herself and for that to be her reflex reaction. I told her that if she had gotten into a situation where she needed to get someone away from her that she would never get in trouble with me or dh for pushing or even kicking them away from her.  Me telling her this has really worked well in terms of getting Joe to leave her alone, he doesn't hit her anymore cause he knows well that she will hurt him back instantly.  I also told Joe that if he hit her in return for her defending herself he would get into such big trouble with me. 

Jump to yesterday, Joe got off the school bus and comes over and says can he just sit down for a minute cause his forehead is hurting as a boy on the bus punched him.  I say why did he hit him, he said he doesn't know. I said did he tell the bus driver, he said no and he doesn't want to talk about it or for me to send an email because he doesn't want to get pulled into a mediation meeting with teachers like he did a couple of months ago when a boy in his class hit him when they were in class.  I said well what did you do when he hit you, did he push him away or block it or hit him back or do anything to let the boy know you wouldn't stand for that.  He said he blocked the first punch but the second punch got him.  Joe has been doing karate for 18 months now and they are always working on self defense techniques.  I think my message got mixed with him though cause when I said did you hit him back he said that I had told him that when Bel hits him he shouldn't hit back or he would get into big trouble.  I said that that is when it's Bel and she is just defending herself, not when it's some kid on the bus that is attacking you. 

So now I'm wondering what to do.  Do I send an email to Joe's teacher (the other boy is in his class too) even though he asked me not to?  Do I ask the bus driver to keep them separate, even though the boy doesn't get the bus regularly? - this has worked before when a 2nd grade girl threatened to 'kick his head in' (incidentally she is a teeny thing that started going to Joe's karate class insert me rolling my eyes cause the last thing I need is her learning some new techniques, oh and the other boy that he got pulled into mediation with is in his karate class now too).  Do I just start picking Joe up from school and not let him get the bus?  I'll end up doing that next year anyway cause Bel will be going to preK there and she can't get the bus , so I will be dropping off and picking up every day. 

So anyway I guess my big questions are how do you tell your kids to deal with other kids being violent towrds them and what would you do about this thing from yesterday?