Advice for schools

Bullying UK is used as a teaching resource in schools and youth organisations and the schools' section has lots of information for head teachers, teachers, school ancillary workers and youth organisations.

The National Curriculum covers bullying and relationships and we know that Bullying UK is widely used in schools by pupils for project work and by staff preparing lesson plans.

But bullying isn't confined to schools and our emails also reflect the fact that the problem affects college and university students as well as youth clubs, sports clubs and other young peoples' organisations.

General adviceMore work needs to be done in class and in youth organisations, from a very early age, and regularly repeated, so that everyone understands what bullying behaviour is, and that what one person may think is just a joke, may be very upsetting for someone else.

If there has been a complaint from a parent to the class teacher, or if organisation leaders are concerned that one member is being singled out, time could be given to group discussion on bullying, with the target in a different group to the bullies.

The teacher, youth worker, or whoever is leading the session, could ask for words which describe bullying and write them on a chart. Then the group could be asked for words which describe how someone being bullied or doing the bullying might feel, and then finally for ways they think bullying could be stopped in their own school or club.

The discussion could also involve asking people in the groups to suggest what people witnessing bullying should do about it. If it is done like this, there should not be suspicion the target has sneaked about what is going on.

BystandersInvolving bystanders is a very important aspect of tackling bullying because there are always people who know what is going on. Young people regularly tell us that they are not bullied but are afraid of being bullied because they've seen it happening to others.

Schools should make it clear they are "telling schools" where pupils are encouraged to report incidents so that even if the victim is too frightened to say anything the bully will know he/she cannot get away with abusive behaviour.

Contact us on help@bullying.co.uk if you need more help.

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