Earn the Respect of Your Peers at School

Do you wish your classmates treated you with more respect? Kids can be hard on one another, but there are ways you can change your reputation so that people start looking up to you. Acting intelligent, being confident, and avoiding annoying behaviors are all ways to make people like you more.

Steps

Being your Authentic Self

  1. Stay True to Yourself. Earning the respect of your fellow, peers and classmates doesn't necessarily require popularity and amazing talents. Just be true to yourself and people will realize that you are a person that is not a hypocrite and has nothing to hide.
  2. Share your talents. If you have talents and skills worth sharing, then share these with your fellows and peers. It doesn't mean that you are proving that you are worth respecting but that you want them to encourage sharing their talents too.
  3. Be open to new ideas. Be someone whom people can come to and feel like they are being genuinely heard.
  4. Trust your gut instincts.
  5. Be funny. Make others laugh by telling them a good joke. Find out what types of jokes people like, (knock-knock, physical, riddles, etc.) and use those types of jokes on that person. This makes it easier to get a laugh, and is less frustrating for you.
  6. Be confident. Walk up to someone and socialize with them. It doesn't have to be someone you know. Who knows? They could turn out to be your best friend later! It always helps to make new friends, not just sticking with old ones(Although do try to keep old friends). If you have lots of friends, everyone will respect you as popular.

Showing your Smarts

  1. Be intelligent and wise. There's pretty much no way a closed-minded person can work their way up the classroom social scale and gain the respect of others.
  2. Be an active participant in classes. This a zero-brain-er, since if you are participating, you're letting your voice, or lack thereof, be heard in front of your whole class. Of course, participating is easy for most, but getting the right answer is also extremely important, so don't raise your hand without thinking; raising your hand and finding yourself at a loss for words is quite embarrassing.
  3. Ask questions wisely. If you have an intelligent question, one that won't leave your classmates confused, go ahead and ask it in front of the class. However, don't sound like a show-off while doing it.
  4. Learn to speak well. Not all students can speak well, so learn to talk if you are too quiet or prone to saying boring things. Learn what to talk about by watching the news, looking up cool articles on the internet, or reading Popular Science or Wireless for the latest breakthroughs in technology and science. But no gossiping!
  5. Think before doing anything you know you really shouldn't do. Think about how others will react to your actions. Think how you will appear to others by your actions.
  6. Accept comments graciously. After people see you are a smart girl or guy...chances are that they will compliment you. Learn to return compliments and if you can't find anything good to say back, just say "thanks" or speak truthfully about yourself.
  7. Have confidence. Remember, people respect you when you have the confidence and the authority.

Showing Kindness

  1. Show kindness in every daily activity you do. First impressions always count when you are in school, so try to act nice and be approachable.
  2. Be thoughtful, not boastful. No one likes show-offs, especially if they do it all the time. If you want to brag about something, don't do it for long, and say it the non-smart-aleck way.
  3. Extend a helping hand. If you want to earn the respect of your peers in school, try helping those who are in need.
    • Help others out when they need it; don't make them feel weak.

Curbing Annoying Behaviors

  1. Stop being annoying. Being a classroom joker is no way to get others to respect you. In fact, such people often get criticized and/or gossiped about, so please, don't be that person!
  2. Avoid being a "wanna-be". If you are trying to pretend something you are not just to earn the respect of your peers, then you are doing it all wrong. That just makes you a hypocrite to them.
  3. Do not brag too much about your talents and skills. Always be humble in what you do and appreciate the praises you get.
  4. Don't be disrespectful to others and their property, like the saying of the golden rule: treat others the way you want to be treated. See below for specific dos and don’ts.
  5. Do not attack or offend others (verbally, physically, etc.). Try to be mature and grown up when someone attacks or offends you a and not act like a younger child would. Nod and swallow up their responses, often replying with "No!"; it bothers them more because they expect you to fight back. Back down when needed, but do not sit down to their level.
  6. Do not ask your peers what they got on scores if they seem to want to hide it from you. It's just plain intrusive and rude, and it makes you look uncool. If they want to compare scores, then by all means, it's fine! Also, if others ask you, then it’s totally up to you whether you want to tell. Sharing test scores with good friends is totally okay though.
  7. Don't be nosy. If you don't hear what somebody was telling someone, don't go and ask what happened. That is just annoying!

In Interactions with Others

  1. Respect others. If you can't respect them, they won't respect you. Everyone deserves respect. A bully, an enemy, as hard as it maybe, you have to respect "everyone", not just your friends.
  2. Relate well to people. If you are an asocial person, then honestly you won't get the respect you may feel you want from your fellows and peers. Instead, try meeting people and develop a wide circle of friends.
  3. Be a good conversation starter. If you can start a good conversation, it will help you earn respect in many ways. If you're going to start a conversation, think of something to say first. But don't wait too long, or the people you want to talk to might walk away. Think of something funny that happened to you, or ask about a project. Don't try to jump into a conversation unless asked to. If you do, the people in the conversation will think you're annoying and rude. So, don't do it.
  4. Learn to accept criticism. If you only have a handful of critics, don’t take it too seriously unless it starts to affect your mental state.
  5. Be the bigger person. If someone attacks or pushes you, be mature and handle the situation the right way. Self-defense is not an option; more people respect adult behavior, rather than immature behavior.
  6. Have a loud, commanding voice. You don't need to yell; just sound confident when you talk. Nobody is going to respect a guy/girl with a tiny voice.
  7. Join organizational groups and clubs in school. If people knew you are an "active" person in school, people will appreciate your efforts and may earn your respect.
  8. Don't allow people to be bullied. Stand up for your friends, and even people you don't know. People will respect you for helping out people. The worst thing you can do is stand by when someone is being bullied, and not even do anything. Be brave and stand up!

Tips

  • Don't follow every step of this guide exactly - adapt what you feel does, or doesn't, apply to you. Use your common sense to apply this concept to your school and your community. Sometimes, bullies will pester you to fight if you want respect from them, but they really aren't the people you want to be friends with.
  • Try lifting weights, being buff makes you appear strong but strength is definitely better than defined muscle.
  • If you ever get in a fight, you need to know martial arts, apparently. Also, lifting weights for strength is another key thing to winning a fight; just make sure you don't start the fight.
  • Don't try so hard to bring the spotlight to yourself as long as you are doing a good show the spotlight will find its way to you.
  • Be as smart as you can. If somebody is teasing you, the best answer is "okay." That irritates him/her more. Wise are honored.
  • Elaborating on being a smart aleck: there are many ways a student can be a smart aleck, including the following: bragging about being smart to others, saying others are inferior to you, talking about stuff you know little or nothing about, arguing with the teacher over every little detail in a lesson, bringing up random off topic smart-sounding comments, and many other things ("smart aleck" can be used for a multitude of purposes). Just trust your instinct and you will hopefully avoid the sinkhole of smart-aleckery.
  • Remember the Golden Rule:If you treat others nicely, they will treat you nicely in return.
  • Don't get too caught up in anything. For instance, fashion. If you're obsessed with something, people won't want to be around you.

Warnings

  • Notice that the title of this guide isn't "How to Become a Celebrity". The title means exactly what it means.
  • Inappropriate behavior and actions (getting into trouble, getting suspended, etc.) are really bad for your reputation, so avoid them at all costs.
  • This may take a while...try picking out a few steps at a time to do.
  • Once you have earned the respect of your fellow folks, stop these habits, or your reputation just might crash (though it will often take a few weeks).

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