Developing an inclusive and respectful school environment by addressing School Bullying

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Developing an inclusive and respectful school
environment by addressing School Bullying

• Mark Cleary
• William Colenso College
• Napier

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Addressing bullying is a proven and effective way
of empowering pupils, enhancing leadership and
creating a motivated and purposeful learning
community.
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Bullying Information

• International studies show that school bullying
  is evident in all school types at similar levels.
• There is more bullying in primary than secondary
  schools, though the intensity of the behaviour
  increases with age.
• Bullying usually is a public humiliation followed
  up by private torment.
• Victims will become isolated, humiliated and
  suffer from self-doubt.
• Secrecy and fear ensure that bullying victims do
  not seek help from adults.
• Unless challenged bullies will fail to develop
  good relationship skills and are much more likely
  to be involved in criminal activities in later
  years.
• Bullying thrives in schools that deny its
  existence and who do not have clear guidelines
  and policies to deal with.
• School-wide intervention strategies will reduce
  the levels of bullying by around 50 if carefully
  managed.

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• International studies show that school bullying
  is evident in all school types at similar levels.
• There is more bullying in primary than secondary
  schools, though the intensity of the behaviour
  increases with age.
• Bullying usually is a public humiliation followed
  up by private torment.
• Victims will become isolated, humiliated and
  suffer from self-doubt.
• Secrecy and fear ensure that bullying victims do
  not seek help from adults.
• Unless challenged bullies will fail to develop
  good relationship skills and are much more likely
  to be involved in criminal activities in later
  years.
• Bullying thrives in schools that deny its
  existence and who do not have clear guidelines
  and policies to deal with.
• School-wide intervention strategies will reduce
  the levels of bullying by around 50 if carefully
  managed

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International View

• This is a global behaviour
• (Slide adapted from Prof. OMooras presentation
  at OECD conference 2004)

Pesten
Mobbing
Wang-ta
Bullying
Ijime
Faits de Violence
Il bullismo
Violenca na escola
Victimisation
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What is Bullying?

• Three main types
• Physical hitting, kicking, taking belongings
• Verbal name-calling, insulting, racist remarks
• Indirect spreading nasty stories, excluding from
  groups, text email messages, publishing photos
  of others etc.

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Types of violence and bullying

• Direct physical attack
• Indirect physical attack e.g. on belongings,
  property
• Direct verbal attack oral, letter, text, email
• Indirect verbal attack spread rumours, websites,
  blogs
• Social exclusion from normal group activities
• these last two being relational
• Institutional aggression/manipulation
• e.g. setting totally unrealistic goals

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(No Transcript)
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Spreading nasty rumours
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Social exclusion
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Who are the key players?

• The Bully
• A person behaving in a way which might meet
  needs for excitement, status, material gain or
  group process

and does not recognise or meet the needs and
rights of the other people/person who are harmed
by the behaviour. Maines and Robinson
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Who are the key players?

• The victim
• A person or group that is harmed by the
  behaviour of others and who does not have the
  resources, status or ability to counteract or
  stop the harmful behaviour.
• Maines and Robinson

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Numbers

• Violence and bullying can be
• One-to-one
• By a small group or gang against one, or against
  another group or gang
• By a whole class or school wang-ta and jun-ta in
  Korean schools
• and beyond the school setting
• By a large group crowd, mob village
• By organisations Greg Dyke the BBC was
  bullied by the Government
• By a state or nation or alliance of nations

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Sex differences Age trends

• Males relatively do more physical kinds of
  attacks
• Females relatively do more relational kinds of
  attacks usual findings
• Frequency tends to increase then decrease with
  age, but dependent on type and mode
• Physical aggression peaks earlier than verbal,
  relational, institutional

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INCIDENCE of Violence and Bullying Example 4
cross-national study

• Morita et al. (2001) report to Monbusho on
  cross-national study of bullying (or ijime) using
  same self-report questionnaire, on 10 to 14 year
  olds in Japan, England, Netherlands and Norway.
• Samples of several thousand in each country.

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Percentages of pupils who reported being bullied,
more than just once or twice in the last 6 months
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Bullying in New Zealand
Recent University of Auckland Research

• Quantitative Results
• 75 students had been bullied in the past year.
• 10 students bullied daily
• 81 had witnessed bullying.
• Fewer than 20-bullied students told a teacher.

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The Sheffield Project Key Findings

• There was a direct correlation between the
  time and quality effort spent in developing a
  whole school policy and the reduction in the
  levels of bullying.

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Sheffield Project Key Findings.

• ...the process of developing a common
  understanding of the issues was as important as
  any other factor.

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Sheffield Project Key Findings.

• Curriculum interventions were useful in
  raising awareness and promoting discussion, but
  on their own were not important.

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Sheffield Project Key Findings.

• In schools that adopted a wide range of
  interventions there was a marked increase in the
  willingness of victims to tell. The creation of
  this telling environment was seen by the
  schools as a major success.

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Sheffield Project Key Findings.

• Work with individuals, both victims and
  bullies was successful but there was a need for
  specialised training and back up.

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Bullying in New Zealand
Recent University of Auckland Research

• Qualitative Results
• Students made decisions about whether or not to
  intervene when they witnessed bullying
• They are quite happy to decide not to intervene
  because they dont want to be involved.they
  believe themselves to be powerless.
• (Adair, 1999)

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The impact of Bullying

• Bullying is most often hurtful, not because
  of the bruised and cuts, but because of the
  emotional impact. Being punched, kicked, beaten
  or hit could cause emotional as well as physical
  harm. Teasing and exclusion from the group
  sometimes caused deep hurts. And watching others
  being bullied can be even more frightening at
  times. The result is that some children live out
  their school lives feeling lonely, rejected and
  fearful without any sense that things can change
  for them

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The impact of Bullying

• "I believe that schoolshave a positive duty to
  be vigilant...to guard against bullying and to
  deal with it and stamp it out if it occurs. The
  consequences of a failure to do that can be very
  profound."

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The impact of Bullying

• I am not wanted. I hate myself for it being me.
• I want to kill myself, but that would be just as
  bad.
• Why cant I just choose?
• I cant eat properly, drink, sleep.
• Im just too scared. Too scared.
• I dont know why Im writing.
• The people in Bosnia are killing each other
• People all over the world are starving.
• BUT IM SCARED! Just leave me alone.

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The impact of Bullying

• I feel hurt and upset because they do things and
  say things to hurt me and I havent done anything
  to them.
• I feel frustrated that I cant do anything to
  stop it.
• Im annoyed that they treat me like that.
• I am angry and want to hit back. But Im too
  scared of what the rest of the group will do.
• I want to leave the school and go somewhere else.
  When things get really bad I dont want to be
  alive.

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Abuse-isms

• child abuse
• sexual harassment
• rape
• racism
• bullying
• domestic violence

What have they in common?
Abuse-isms
Abuse-isms

• child abuse
• sexual harassment
• rape
• racism
• bullying
• domestic violence

• child abuse
• sexual harassment
• rape
• racism
• bullying
• domestic violence

What have they in common?
What have they in common?
MARK CLEARY ADELAIDE JUNE 1999
MARK CLEARY ADELAIDE JUNE 1999
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Abuse-isms

• Some common features of abuse are

• Hard to prove/believe.
• Suffered in/supported by silence.
• Thrives on secrecy and fear.
• Under estimated/reported.
• Dominance/abuse of power.
• Isolating stigmatising.
• Cuts across social class.
• Rationalised/lack of guilt.
• Most people get away with it

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The types of teachers

• Authoritarian
• Authoritative
• Permissive

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Authoritative teachers

• Recognises the need not only to be effective in
  their teaching but also are committed to the
  values that underpin inclusive education.
• Have very high expectations.
• Provide safe, structure and challenging
  classrooms.
• Are in control and are vigilant for anti-social
  acts.
• Actively support the vulnerable and consciously
  prop up the weak to increase their mana and
  develop their skills

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Accepting
Rejecting
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Active
Passive
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Accepting
ASSERTIVE
SUBMISSIVE
AGGRESSIVE
Rejecting
Passive
Active
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Accepting
ASSERTIVE
SUBMISSIVE
Bullies
AGGRESSIVE
Rejecting
Passive
Active
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Accepting
ASSERTIVE
85
5
SUBMISSIVE
5
AGGRESSIVE
Rejecting
Passive
Active
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• You have to learn how to stand up for
• yourself,
• said my mother.
• Dont let them push you around.
• Dont be spineless.
• You have to have more backbone.
• I think of sardines and their backbones.
• You can eat their backbones.
• The bones crumble between your teeth in one touch
  and they fall apart.
• This must be what my own backbone is like
• hardly there at all.
• What is happening to me is my own fault,
• for not having more backbone.
• Margaret Attwood Cats Eye

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Why is it so hard to tell?

• The following are reasons given by pupils for
  not telling an adult about a bullying episode.
  These pupils had been bullied, but had not sought
  help.
• Source Strathclyde LEA Building Better
  Relationships bully proof your School

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• Fear of them getting back 42
• Not wanting to be a tell tale 41
• Not wanting to worry parents 34
• Shame at not being able to stick up for self 31
• Fear of losing friends 29
• Hard to prove 29
• No confidence in adults keeping name out of it 25
• Fear of what parents might say 25
• Mixed up and confused 25
• Something I cant change 24
• Unable to put feelings into words 23
• Parents dont understand school life 23
• Accept as something to put up with 22
• Feel no-one will believe me 20
• Not wanting to get them into trouble 19
• Not wanting to show not popular 16
• Not seeing it as bullying 16
• Blame myself 15
• I deserve it 7

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Successfully intervening in cases of bullying

• Any intervention must recognise that victims
• Worry they wont be believed.
• Are scared that adult involvement will make it
  worse.
• Are isolated and lack allies and friends.
• Feel vulnerable often blaming themselves.
• Have tried unsuccessfully to stop the behaviour.
• Victims are not able to stop bullying behaviour

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Strategies need to

• Emphasise the responsibility of the whole school
  community to support targets of bullying
  behaviour.
• Recognise that the problem is the bullying
  behaviour.
• Target those who bully aiming to change the
  behaviour.
• Put in place long term, sustainable solutions.

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Strategies must avoid

• Imposing solutions.
• Reinforcing the bullying behaviour by using
  coercive and or dominating approaches.
• Apportioning blame.
• Making commitments that cant be kept.

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So, what works?

• The whole school approach is the essential start
  and the most effective intervention strategy.
• The adoption of a problem solving approach.
• The involvement of those who have an ability to
  make a difference and change the behaviour.
• Ive found a three step approach effective
• Request to the main protagonist that the
  behaviour stops.
• Use the No-Blame approach.
• Remove the recidivist from the school community.

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The No-Blame Approach

• Developed in the 1990s by George Robinson
  (Academic) /Barbara Maines (Educational
  Psychologist) Bristol, UK.
• Their approach is popular with practitioners, but
  receives little support from the mainstream
  anti-bullying academics.
• Reviews support its effectiveness

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How No-Blame Works

• The process involves six steps
• Interview the victim.
• Consult with teachers who know the peer group.
• Convene a meeting
• Explain that there is a problem in the
  class/group.
• Gain individual commitment to a positive action.
• Reconvene one week later.