Students at Wadesboro Primary School were treated to a special speaker on Feb. 11.
Phyllis Brooks-Pugh read her book, “Brandon the Bully Meets Nina-No More” to a room full of second-graders at the school.
Through the story, the author teaches bullies why their behavior is hurtful and helps kids who are being bullied and the children’ parents to know how to react in a situation involving bullies.
The children learn how to BEGIN, which stands for Believe in yourself, Empower, Get up,, Initiate and Never give up.
Brooks-Pugh started the book three years ago and set it aside, then worked on it again and published it earlier this year.
“This is all about me motivating kids,” she said. “It’s about bullying and how it can stop you from wanting to do a lot of things and make you depressed or go into a shell.”
The author has been a speech pathologist at the primary school for two years and is also a motivational speaker. She said she wrote the story because she was getting questions from children on how to succeed when they were being bullied.
“I felt like I needed to to teach kids about bullying so that they can push themselves to the next level,” Brooks-Pugh said.
When Brooks-Pugh asked the children if they had any questions, the ones who responded said that they’ve been bullied.
Brooks-Pugh told them she was sorry they’ve been bullied and encouraged them to tell their teacher and parents to try to solve the problem.
The story is the same when she speaks to other kids. The author said it is not unusual for children to come forward and say that they’ve been dealing with bullying. She’s heard from so many children that it pushed her to write the book.
Anything in her books — including bullying — is something that Brooks-Pugh herself has dealt with, she said.
She decided to make BEGIN her platform when she realized that the steps were what had helped push her through to different levels of success.
“My platform is the things I live by in my life,” she said. “I grew up in a poor and rural area and put myself through undergraduate and graduate school. These are what got me through.”
Brooks-Pugh is currently in the editing phase of her next book, a teenage suspense novel.
Reach reporter Imari Scarbrough at 704-994-5471 and follow her on Twitter @ImariScarbrough.
