One Minute Guide on Understanding Bullying - Support for schools and settings

It is important that those working with children and young people understand bullying. Children tell us that bullying happens in all schools and settings.

Understanding Bullying

More than 1 in 4 children report they have experienced bullying within 12 months, with 41% of these children saying they have experienced bullying within the last month. Children spending 10 hours or more on social media a week can double the likelihood of 12-15 year-olds being targets of cyberbullying.¹

There are various definitions of bullying but in essence, all definitions include three core elements:

unwanted aggressive behaviour
observed or perceived power imbalance
repetition or high likelihood of repetition of bullying behaviours

There are four main types of bullying:

Physical – including spitting, tripping, physical harm, making hand gestures and pinching.
Verbal bullying – including, teasing, name-calling, inappropriate sexual comments, and taunting.
Social – excluding, spreading rumours and lies, embarrassing someone in public and telling others to not be friends with individuals.
Cyber – sending texts, messages, videos, and emails, making online threats, posting inappropriate things about others, imitating others when online and excluding.

Studies show that there are groups of children more at risk of bullying in schools:

Prevention

Prevention strategies to reduce the number of bullying incidents are key to improving the welfare of the children in your care.

Have a clear policy and a zero-tolerance approach to bullying. Ensure that all children and staff in your school know this policy, with a particular focus on new arrivals, including supply staff.
Ensure that children and staff understand that incidents of bullying will be reported to the local authority (LA).
Have a clear accessible complaints policy and ensure you take all reports of bullying seriously.
Provide CPD opportunities for staff. The Anti-bullying Alliance has various free training opportunities, that cover a wide range of bullying topics and areas.
Develop your communities understanding of bullying through newsletters and the Anti-bullying Alliance’s Information Tool.
Ensure you monitor the levels of bullying in your setting. Many children won’t freely come forward to report bullying, so having ‘pupil voice’ surveys is key to understanding how prevalent bullying is in your setting.
Raise the profile of anti-bullying by celebrating anti-bullying week, which is in the middle of November.
Develop co-operative learning projects that encourage teamwork and reduce isolation. Planning these projects across year groups will also promote healthy relationships across all ages.
Teach conflict-resolution strategies by developing, listening skills, problem-solving, and skills to identify the actual problem.
Ensure your curriculum develops emotional literacy, as this equips children with important skills.
Develop workshops that include role play. This will help children to understand other perspectives, as well as providing real-life examples.
When delivering assemblies on bullying, ensure children are involved in its planning and delivery.
Teach children the dynamics of bullying. Often we think of bullying as having a ‘target’ and an ‘assailant’. However, teaching children the powerful influence that bystanders have on what happens next will help incidents to not escalate.
Have an Upstander ethos, teaching children how to safely be Upstanders and thus not encouraging bullying from afar.

Managing incidents

21% of children who experienced bullying have avoided school in the last 12 months. This is three times higher than those who haven’t experienced bullying.²

Managing incidents effectively will support the targets and reduce the recurrence of any future incidents.

Ensure children know how to report incidents. Having an anonymous and confidential option will support those who are less likely to report, to report.
Outline to any targets of bullying what the process will be for dealing with the incident. From the LA’s own ‘Pupil voice forums’ children have told us that the whole process and what they can expect should be clearer.
Review the needs of the target. Putting in the appropriate support where necessary through a safety plan will help the target feel comfortable. This can be a time-out card, key worker, counselling, class changes (if they wish), toilet card, a plan for entering and leaving the school, and a safe quiet space for breaks and lunch times.
Investigate incidents sensitively, involving the parents/guardians of the assailants. Arrange for education around bullying, its impacts and the incident to be delivered through intervention with the assailant. This has more impact than a sanction alone.
Check in with the target through the process and for a few weeks after the incident, to monitor their well-being.
Make sure you ask if the target is ‘okay’ more than once. Particularly teenagers will often say they are ‘fine’ the first time you ask. Having this approach will demonstrate to the child that you are there to listen.
Provide a mentor for the assailant. Often bullying behaviour is a symptom of a child’s need for positive attention. Providing them with a mentor will help them build a positive relationship.

Reporting

Bullying is repetitive behaviour. It is important that school staff are recording ‘one-off’ incidents and bullying incidents correctly on your school system.

If an assailant has targeted an individual on two or more occasions, this would be classed as bullying and must be reported to the LA.

You should familiarise yourself with the Bullying, prejudice, and racism incident (BPRI) resource, as we know that BPRIs impact children’s well-being, attendance and attainment.

It is important to understand that stand-alone bullying, which doesn’t include prejudice or racism must also be reported to the LA.

Accessing Support

Equality, diversity and inclusion consultancy packages
The Anti-Bullying Alliance has a wealth of resources.
The LA’s bullying webpage has links to resources and support.

Document resources

If an assailant has targeted an individual on two or more occasions, this would be classed as bullying and must be reported to the LA.