Goodbye and thanks for all the fish...

It is with mixed emotions that I sit down to write this. After ten years as Director of respectme, Scotland’s Anti-Bullying Service, I am moving onto a new challenge. I am returning to the Looked After Sector for an exciting new opportunity with Care Visions.

Ten years is a reasonable amount of time to reflect on, in any role. When I started at respectme (or Better Futures to give it its working title) it was a tender document and an ambitious idea formulated by Fergus McMillan at LGBT Youth Scotland – and Charlie McMillan, formerly of SAMH. 

Ten years ago the policy landscape across schools and Local Authorities was, frankly, very poor. It was as patchy with no coherent approach in place. People used bits of models form Scandinavia and Canada, so it was a real challenge to try to get all of Scotland’s 32 Local Authorities pulling in the same direction. This required a considered approach; a way of thinking about things rather than a fixed model for intervention and policy.

People like having a model to work to, although, ‘just tell me what to do/what to say’ is an understandable and common request. I have always preferred to be encouraged and supported to think about situations in terms of what was happening, and what I could do about it. This helped to focus on developing pragmatic materials and resources that were designed to help someone, whatever their situation - on a Tuesday morning in school or on a Friday back shift in a residential unit.

Our approach to anti-bullying in Scotland is different.  We define bullying differently and we want to build the capacity and confidence of all adults to recognise and respond to bullying effectively.

I am proud of this approach, which addresses what someone did and the impact it had. We have not focused on labeling or stereotyping those involved or making assumptions about why. We ask adults to consider the following; What was the behaviour? What impact did it have? What  do I need to do about it? While also considering,  ‘what does the child or young person want to happen?’.  This is designed to let people respond to each individual incident and the people involved, to focus on a response that’s appropriate for them.

I am very proud to have helped change the conversation about labelling children, that we can achieve more by talking about what they did not how that then labels them for life.

My research showed that children and young people who are being bullied want options.  They want to consider things that help them feel better as well as things that make bullying stop. Adults need to help them explore these options. They know that what worked for them won’t necessarily work for someone else.  They are not convinced by assemblies or lessons on bullying or detailed recording systems or playground monitors – they genuinely prefer the ‘whole school’ things we do.

Our combination of policy, training and resources and campaigns, has been designed to help colleagues change the culture and ethos in their organisation.   This approach has been well evaluated, with respectme being cited as a ’catalyst for change ‘and a ‘credible and robust’ service. Crucially all 32 Local Authorities in Scotland now have an anti-bullying policy, and I’m proud that respectme has worked with, and directly influenced, 31 of these. We have trained around 7,000 adults who play a role in children and young people’s lives and our materials and campaigns have reached millions.

What has been even more pleasing though, is seeing schools where their attitude to bullying has changed; where they are inclusive and ask children and parents what they want to happen, and what they think relationships should be like in their school. This happens every day – it doesn’t make the news but it does happen. Children, for the most part, enjoy very positive and supportive relationships in school.

Yes, there are areas where schools still feel they’ know best’. But in my view policy and practice is far more consistent than it has ever been.  Schools have a national policy framework to work within – they have a local authority policy that reflects this, and access to free tools and training that reflects the values of respectme’s approach to develop local policy and practice. In places where they acknowledge and utilise this, you will find better practice.

I have seen first-hand the confidence and commitment from teachers who have attended our training, or worked with us on policy, champion change locally. I have also seen teachers and senior teachers who still refuse to accept bullying is an issue. While some still feel that if it happens out of school it is not something they can deal with. Bullying happens ‘to’ someone – where it happens is not really the issue. It impacts on them – on their agency. Our role is to respond to that, to focus on ‘what’ happened, less on ‘where’ it happened.

We have focused on getting it right with Local Authorities so that they can cascade their expectations to individual schools; an approach that works more effectively. To help address the gap between authorities and schools, respectme has developed new materials to take individual schools through a process of self-evaluation and local policy development.

We do need to improve on other things that will have a greater impact on anti-bullying work, but which anti-bullying itself cannot and should not be expected to achieve. We do need more inclusive education, one that reflects the lives and experiences of our LGBTI pupils and families.  We need better mainstreaming for children with a disability, if indeed that is the right step for them, more inventive and realistic resources on inclusion, racism and diversity. We need to address gender-based issues more openly; the pressure on girls to behave a certain way, and for boys too, is as strong as ever. The impact of these gender norms and expectations reaches way beyond bullying. Addressing these issues will help create environments that are more inclusive and respectful; things which also make dealing with bullying easier.

I am proud of the fact that, since day one, respectme has ensured that the Protected Characteristics and prejudice -based bullying is included in every policy it works on and in every single training session it has delivered - as well as being included in the National Approach. This explicit commitment to equalities has been one that has helped define us as a service and will remain a key focus moving forward.  I am proud that every single resource we have developed has been influenced by the views and experiences of children and young people. They are the ones who helped us stick by our messages when others were going in a different direction. I am thinking mainly about cyberbullying. ‘Cyber’ is not is not really a word young people like or use, they  see bullying online as, well bullying, it is just were it happens that is different. It is the same behaviour – mainly name calling and rumours – and it is still less prevalent than face to face bullying but is more visible.

I am proud of the research and the published work undertaken over the last ten years.  We have trained colleagues across Europe and in the USA, and our materials are used and accessed across the globe. Our Scottish Approach is influencing and is contributing to how bullying is viewed and discussed far beyond our own shores.

I want to thank all of the people I have worked with in the last ten years; and I want to thank the TESS for stating back when we started, that we had ‘an impressive boldness’ about us. I never ever wanted to lose that. I will miss this.

Brian Donnelly

Cyberbullying - a clearer focus

I felt it was time to update some of the advice and information I have previously shared about online bullying. – As  Safer Internet Day approaches there are many articles appearing online about ‘cyberbullying’ and conferences and events taking place, dedicated only to this type of bullying.

Bullying is behaviour that makes people feel frightened, hurt, threatened and left out. It impacts on a person’s ability to feel in control of themselves (their ‘agency’) and to respond effectively. This behaviour can harm physically and emotionally and the threat is typically sustained. This behaviour takes place in a variety of places, including online.

The research I undertook in late 2014 provided a picture of what types of behaviour children were experiencing and where it was taking place. The findings confirmed what many already thought while continuing to surprise many others.

Face to face bullying accounted for the majority of bullying incidents. The three most common behaviours experienced when being bullied face to face were:

Name calling

Hurtful Comments

Rumours

8,000 children and young people from across the country took part in the research. 30% of them said they had experienced bullying in the last 12 months. Of the incidents they experienced:

60% took place in person

21% took place both in person and online

19% tool place online only

They also told us that only 6% of bullying started online – and it was usually related to something that happened in school or face to face. The behaviour  can then continue online, face to face and sometimes both.

The three most common behaviour experienced online were:

                Name Calling

                Hurtful Comments

                Verbal Abuse

This shows that there is little difference between the behaviours experienced – only where they took place.

This has helped us work with colleagues to develop local surveys and questionnaires that ask the right questions, not ‘Were you bullied’ and ‘were you cyberbullied?’ But ask ‘Were you bullied?’ ‘What was the behaviour and where did this happen?’ Children and young people were able to tell us very clearly things like ‘I was called names and this happened on the bus and on Facebook’.

There should be little focus on where it took place – it was still bullying.

The findings from the research show that online bullying is more public and more visible. This is what contributes to the notion that it is a ‘bigger’ or ‘increasing’ problem. Bullying behaviour is not always seen by lots of people – threats and manipulative behaviour still takes place largely in private – away form everyone else.  This is still the most common type of bullying; sneaky, under the radar behaviour, carried out in places where there is little or no supervision.

So what are the risks with this?

The main risk is that we have, and often still do, focus heavily on online or cyber bullying and  have almost started to ignore the less public types of bullying.  I even get asked about what has happened to ‘traditional’ bullying. We seem to have developed this notion that the only thing to be concerned about is the stuff that happens online. This is not to say what is happening online isn’t concerning, of course it is, but so is the behaviour our children and young people continue to experience face to face – and sometimes both face to face and online.

We do not need to develop specific polices for online bullying, but we need to ensure that  all of our anti-bullying policies and practices reflect that things happen both face to face and online. This approach is in line with international research and best practice. When we talk about bullying we mean bullying that happens face to face and online.

When talking to children and young people recently about new national policy they told me they found it strange that people still talked about ‘cyber’ bullying as ‘cyber’ is just not a word they use for anything.  The distinction between online and offline isn’t as straightforward as some adults may think. Relationships play out online and in person – whether chatting face to face or  on Twitter or Snapchat – it’s all talking to friends.

Young people told us some very interesting things about their lives online. The majority of young people (81%) consider their online friends to be all or mostly the same as in real life. Only 4% of the 8,000 surveyed said they did not know the people they were ‘friends’ with online.

Crucially, 92% of children who experienced bullying online knew the person bullying them. This goes some way to challenge the ever present line that anonymity is one of the driving factors behind bullying online. Young people interact and socialise with an extended network of other people they are connected to through school, family communities and friendships as well as similar interests in music or sport.

They also use social media  to communicate –the purpose of using smart phones, consoles or laptops is primarily about staying in-touch with friends, something which is as important for young people today as it was 40 years ago. They have different means at their disposal but the principle is the same.

On of the challenges we still face is the belief that if something happens onlineit did not take place in school and the school or teacher cannot do anything about it. Our advice on this has been consistent – we respond to what happened to someone – not where it happened. If a child or young person decides to inform their teacher – they are investing in them as an adult they trust to help them – that last thing we should be doing is sending them away.

I was talking to a teacher about this earlier this week and she feels frustrated that an incident that happened at a swing park between two pupils in the same class is being ignored by some colleagues because of where it took place. The school here is in a great position to help resolve this – they don’t need to do all the work but could lead on helping the children they know feel safer or behave more respectfully. It is the same if it happens on Facebook. Respond to what happened not where or when. Respond to how someone feels – that way you can role model effective ways of dealing with relationship and interpersonal difficulties.

Bullying is also about relationships – not technology.  We must focus on equipping young people with the skills to conduct themselves online in a more respectful manner; the skills to manage their environments safely, and to develop their confidence and abilities to negotiate relationships and problems. This is built on promoting and developing resilience. But we also have to equip parents with the knowledge and understanding about how social media and the other places children and young people go online work; how to make them safe and, most importantly, how to talk to their children about using them. respectme offers free training for parents on this.

‘Cyberbullying’ is bullying; it is about relationships that are not healthy or being managed or role modelled well. It is behaviour done by someone to someone else, it is the ‘where’ this is taking place that is new. The behaviour appears to be migrating, as children spend more time online, the behaviour they have always exhibited and experienced goes with them.

Adult fear and anxiety  has long been the biggest hurdle in dealing with bullying online. It has had a very high media profile at times and it appears ’new’.  For parents or adults who do not use social media or connect with their friends using the internet, this can be a challenging and, at times, bewildering experience.

Lots of colleagues have said they are ‘technophobes’ or are not ‘tech savvy’ and have voiced how much they dislike Facebook or twitter. We have maintained that if you work with children and young people or if you are a parent or carer, that is no longer good enough. You need to know! For some that will require a real effort to spend time and utilise their relationships to learn. We cannot abdicate responsibility for this to software. We need to connect and learn about how young people use the internet and the phones or laptops they access it from.

Many adults have experience of managing risk when working with children and young people, and this is a new place for us to consider. We need to be as imaginative and creative with the internet as we have been in other places.

What is not bullying?

One other phenomenon that has emerged is the conflating of all online behaviours and risks under one heading. Sexting is not bullying, it is largely a consensual thing, part of adolescents exploring relationships and attraction. Forcing someone to take a naked picture of themself or part of their body naked is not bullying, it is abusive and coercive behaviour. Threatening someone to do something sexually is not bullying - it is sexually aggressive behaviour. Some guidance in the UK had stated that grabbing a girl’s chest or putting your hand up her skirt is a type of bullying.  We  do not agree with this.  That behaviour is a type of sexual assault. We must not dilute abusive behaviour. This is not an attempt to demonise children and young people, but to address the fact that if we dilute sexually aggressive behaviour we run the risk of normalising it. People are still of the opinion that ‘bullying is a normal part of growing up’ or ‘It’s just bullying’. This is why we work closely with colleagues who work in areas of violence against women and girls particularly, to make sure we give a consistent message that sexually aggressive behaviour is never acceptable and, while bullying and abusive behaviour can be linked, they are not the same thing.

There have been high profile examples of blackmail, extortion and threatening behaviour online that have been referred to in the media as cyberbullying.  We need to be clear about what we are talking about.  If someone is targeted, and forced to hand over money under the threat that someone will release pictures of them, they are being criminally extorted - not bullied. Using the term ‘cyberbullying’  to describe a host of other abusive behaviours only adds to the fear and confusion on how to respond.

As we move forward we must ensure that we focus on the fact that when we talk about bullying, we are talking about behaviour that happens online and face to face.

Brian

Prejudice-based Bullying and promoting equality

This has been the subject of discussion, policy development and conferences in recent months so I thought I would take some time to reflect on what was being asked and what was being said on these issues. I was genuinely surprised at the lack of knowledge on the Equality Act and on Protected Characteristics – but more on them later!

Probably the best place to start would be with prejudice – to ‘pre-judge’

Noun

1. An unfavourable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason.

2. Any preconceived opinion or feeling, either favourable or unfavourable.

So, everyone can be and is likely to have some prejudices – some things we have favourable views towards and some less so. When we act on this prejudice and treat people less favourably, we are discriminating.

Bullying, as has been covered in many of these blogs, is a mixture of behaviour and impact that affect a person’s capacity to feel in control of themselves. This is what we term as their sense of ‘agency’. Bullying takes place in the context of relationships; it is behaviour that can make people feel hurt, threatened, frightened and left out.

When this behaviour is motivated by prejudice, we are talking about prejudice-based bullying.

Prejudice will be based on a personal characteristic or a group that someone either belongs to or people believe they belong to or identify with.  So what might these characteristics be? Their gender?  Are they gay? Is it their religion? Do they have a disability? Or is it how they look or what they wear? It can be any of these and more.

So why are some personal characteristics mentioned more than others?

Some personal characteristics are protected within the law – the reason for this is to address the imbalance – to address the years of unfavourable treatment experienced by some groups over the years

The experience of women, of LGBT people, of black people or of people with a disability, has shown that they have received less favourable treatment in many ways over the years – in terms of being picked on, excluded and not having equal access to employment  and education. This was initially responded to through legislation such the Race Relations Act 1976, that ‘outlawed discrimination’ or the Equal Pay Act 1970, that was intended to address the less favourable treatment of women in the workplace. Legislation such as the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, was also intended to address discrimination on gender and married status. These Acts were needed specifically because of the imbalance and  the unfair treatment these groups were clearly receiving.

This has evolved and led to the Equality Act 2010 which is designed to protect people from discrimination in the workplace and the wider community such as in Education or as a consumer. This Act sets out that it is unlawful to discriminate against a person due to the following personal characteristics -

• age
• being or becoming a transsexual person
• being married or in a civil partnership
• being pregnant or having a child
• disability
• race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin
• religion, belief or lack of religion/belief
• sex
• sexual orientation

Based on the historical prejudice and discrimination experienced by people who have these, or are perceived to have these characteristics, they now warrant special protection under the law to address the inequality they experienced. These characteristics are protected and as such are referred to as The Protected Characteristics. Age and being married do not apply in Education.

Public examples of this have been highlighted in the media such as cases where people who refuse a service like a hotel room to same sex couples or build new schools that are inaccessible to wheelchairs, will be in breach of the Equality Act.

I get asked a lot why red hair, wearing glasses or being tall or overweight isn’t a protected characteristic too, people experience bullying for these reasons also.  One of the most common reasons young people cite for bullying is personal appearance –that could be related to the music they like or the income of their parents.

The answer to this is that while people do get picked on and excluded for a variety of reasons, the groups protected under law have clear historical evidence of societal and cultural exclusion and less favourable treatment. It may sound a little glib – but once all of the tall people get together and can reflect on and evidence years of collective exclusion, not getting work, missing out on promotion, being made to take only certain lessons at school like home economics, receiving abuse or suffering violence and intimidation on a collective basis ; then that too may become a legally protected characteristic.

This does not in any way mean that the bullying of a person because of the way they look is less serious or not as important as bullying based on a protected characteristic. The protected characteristics are not designed to create a hierarchy but to help address the imbalance experienced by certain groups. We know from our work that children and young people who are disabled, who are or are perceived to be LGB or T can experience bullying more frequently than other groups – this just means we need to be aware of and be able to challenge what values and prejudice lies behind this behaviour.

We also know that children and young people bully others because they don’t get on or they don’t like each other – we sometimes forget the interpersonal elements of bullying situations. You might not like a person who is gay or a different faith from you but that is not the reason you dislike them – a person is cable of disliking someone and being mean about them without using a personal characteristic, protected or not, as the topic for their insult or behaviour. There is a difference between ‘I can’t stand him he is a pain and he talks rubbish’ and ‘I can’t stand him, he’s a black (insert whatever word/insult here)’.  The latter is a clear example of a prejudice-based statement based on someone’s race or ethnicity.

Research has informed us that where polices are explicit about what they mean by prejudice-based bullying, where we name specific behaviour they find unacceptable – adults and young people feel more confident to challenge these prejudices and behaviour .

Policies that don’t mention things like homophobia, disability, race or even socio economic status are linked to environments where adults are unsure about challenging certain behaviour and language. This explicit commitment to equality and challenging inequality is clearly linked to better practice in dealing with and preventing prejudiced-based bullying.

Schools, services or clubs that are clear that they will challenge homophobia, that they will challenge bullying based on disability, race or ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, transgender status, religion and belief, socio economic status, appearance, if children are Looked After, are young carers or are refugees or their families are asylum seekers, will be creating environments that value difference and set out clear expectations about what behaviour is acceptable and what is not. Adults can then be held accountable to this as can children and young people.

This though presents a further challenge for the grown-ups. Are you confident to challenge prejudice? All prejudices or just the ones you object to? Confidently challenging some prejudice will be easy for many people – our own values and those of our chosen profession are compatible and we have the knowledge and passion to challenge and educate. Some of us need to get better informed on some areas – help is available form a range of agencies if you want to learn more about asylum seekers or migrants, about transgender people or a particular disability.

We normally learn more about things when we need to. When we are presented with behaviour or attitudes we don’t know much about, we go and find out about the issue to be better informed – the desire to do this is underpinned by values of fairness and equality. So what about the people whose personal values are perhaps not as ‘in-step’ as others?

You may well work or have worked beside someone who is misogynistic, who says racist things, is sectarian perhaps and this only appears on nights out or in the staff room or on social media.

I do find myself saying to colleagues that we are not the thought police – we cannot tell people what to think or that they are not allowed an opinion – what we can do is hold people accountable to the legal and ethical boundaries of their role or profession.  The reality is if a person is even a little prejudiced towards things like equal marriage, Syrian Refugees or women being as good as men at their job - this will be evident in how they challenge these prejudices.   If adults have these prejudices they will not effectively challenge behaviour because it conflicts with their values.

Our values underpin what we do and they will always make themselves evident – some people are good at telling you what their values are at interviews but not so good at showing these when they hear certain language.  They will say thing like ‘You are not allowed to say things like that here’ or ‘someone might find that offensive’ or actually say and do nothing because they agree with what is being said. When prejudiced language or bullying challenges your values – you will challenge it with passion and clarity, and people will believe you.

Inequality is a huge issue for society – we are addressing historical and cultural issues and responsibility for this rests with people at all levels – not just those who work with our children and young people.

So what can I do?

While these are huge cultural issues we can, as individuals and organisations, give children and young people a better experience, a different experience that values them, one that challenges inequality and involves them in setting the culture and ethos in places they go. When some of us talk about equality; we talk about treating everyone the same or the need to. For me, as a practitioner equality has always meant that I have a duty to challenge inequality.

The training I received helped me view my role as someone who is, for example, anti-racist – not simply ‘not racist’. I commit to challenging racism and racist language. I will challenge homophobia or practices that promote gender inequality and so on. This is what we can all do. On my shift, in my classroom, I will challenge prejudice and value individuals. The walls in our club or class, the activities we do, will clearly value diversity and we will learn about difference and respect. 

We won’t achieve this by starting off from a point where we treat everyone the same – our goal is to achieve equity first and we need to address the imbalance -

Creating environments such as these and role modelling how to challenge prejudice and promote what makes people different, and to learn to accept this, is exactly what we sign up for if we work with or even have children.

Brian 

Bullying in Scotland 2014 Reserch Survey Findings

I have posted a brief summary of the results of a survey carried out earlier this year - I will be posting a lengthier blog in the not too distant future  discussing the findings in greater depth but for now at least - here is a quick snapshot of what children and young people told us

The research

The primary aim of this piece of research was to obtain a picture of how children and young people are experiencing bullying in Scotland in 2014.

This research was designed to:

·         Identify the types of bullying that is experienced by children and young people.

·         Give a clear picture of where bullying happens and where online and offline/face to face experiences differ or crossover.

·         Identify from children and young people’s own experience what they feel works and what is less helpful.

·         Identify where children and young people go online and what technology they use to get there.

 

An online questionnaire was designed and tested and distributed to all schools in Scotland in May and June 2014. In total, there were 8310 responses, of which 7839 were useable. Responses came from all over Scotland with all 32 Local Authorities represented. Respondents were aged between 8 and 19 years old. Sixty five per cent were 12 - 14 years old.

This was an open survey and the findings presented here represent only the views of the children who took part.

Three focus groups took place with 45 young people to get a more detailed insight into children and young people’s experiences of bullying – in particular, their thoughts on what happens online and in person, where these two are different and where they crossover.

Key findings

 

The key findings from the survey are as follows:

• 30% of children and young people surveyed reported that they have experienced some sort of bullying behaviour between the start of school in August 2013 and June 2014. Of this 30%:

§  49% experienced bullying in person

§  41% experienced bullying both in person and online

§  10% experienced bullying online only.

 

• A number of children and young people had more than one experience of bullying. Children and young people surveyed reflected 12,003 experiences of bullying behaviours. Of these experiences: -

§  60% took place in person

§  21% took place both in person and online

§  19% took place online only

 

• 92% of children and young people who were bullied knew the person bullying them (91% online and 92% offline). Anonymity therefore may not be what is driving bullying online.

·         Behaviours such as name calling, hurtful comments and spreading rumours that make people feel angry, sad and upset happen both face to face and online.

·         Children and Young people employ a range of strategies to cope with bullying; some are more successful than others.

§  Almost half (48%) of children and young people who are bullied tell their parents.

§  Friends and teachers are also providing support to a high number of children and young people who are bullied.

·         The most successful anti-bullying interventions are embedded within a positive ethos and culture and don’t just focus on individual incidents.

• Children and young people’s use of technology, especially mobile technology and social media, is woven into their everyday lives.
• The majority of children and young people (81%) consider their online friends to be all or mostly the same friends they have in real life
• Children and young people access internet content on mobile devices, such as phones and tablets, more than other devices such as  PC’s or laptops.
• Google, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook are the most popular websites and Apps used by children and young people when they go online.

 

  Next Steps

 

We will further analyse the data we have collected and use it to help develop effective policy and practice around bullying. The data is likely to help us to address some questions more effectively including: -

·         Given the relatively low proportion of exclusively online bullying, and the similarity of online and offline bullying behaviour, to what extent is a specific response to online bullying needed?

·         What are the appropriate responses to gender specific differences in experiences of bullying?

·         How can we help schools to further develop an anti-bullying ethos? And how can we continue to ensure children and young people are involved and included in this process?

·         How can we continue to support parents to respond when their children tell them about being bullied?

·         How can schools further help children and young people learn from other pupils about the strategies that they have found useful?

 

Do we really all have to be friends?

The line that gave respectme its name has served us very well over the years and made for a very popular poster and video campaign – ‘You don’t have to like me, agree with me or play with me… but you do have to respect me’. The thinking behind this was the need for a way to describe how we wanted to help children and young people shape the terms for relationships and interactions with peers.

While this sounded quite catchy and lends itself well to a campaign – I always wanted to it have substance – and that is why we always follow this up by exploring what does this statement actually mean or what does it actually feel or look like for children and young people?

It is a nice demand to make of people I know but again, what does it mean. For the most part – it means simply leaving someone alone – you don’t need to connect with them, learn about them, understand them or become friends with them – just let them be.

The example I tend to use when discussing this, relates to an experience I had when my second oldest was at nursery. As reputations were being built and lost around the sandpit I heard the teacher tell the boys and girls who were playing and getting out of hand that ‘they should all be friends and play nicely’. This was of course said with warmth and with the best of intentions but at the time it really got me thinking – ‘’Do they all have to be friends?’ how realistic an expectation is this?

Now, if a bunch of 4 year olds cannot behave around the sandpit we need to intervene and let them know how they should behave but do they all need to be friends? No – should they be expected to play near each other in a civilised way? Yes – perhaps a better response is along the lines of ‘if you are all going to play here together you need to be nicer to each other, no grabbing or shouting and you take turns – that’s one of the rules here’.

That is an easier boundary to set and easier to role model, if you tell them they need to be friends you are setting up an unrealistic expectation that they can’t possible manage – friends with everyone in your class? Are we as adults expected to be friends with everyone we work with? Do we even like everyone we are related to at times? Of course not.

I know for some this is not a huge issue but friendship is one of the first currencies children have to withhold or bargain with – it is a very powerful tool in early years and as such I think we can frame it more effectively. I would rather see a group of P1’s who can get along on different tasks, are respectful of each other and make friends on their terms. This also lets us talk about what it means to be a ‘good friend’ and help them understand that there will always be a wide group of people around them throughout school, some you’ll be friends with. Some you’ll know and say hello to and some you won’t get on with or agree with.

The skills needed to understand and negotiate this will serve them well in life not just school. Anti-bullying agencies get a bit of stick at times because the impression they give is that all they want is for everyone to be nice to each other and in fact this is unrealistic – I think it’s no bad thing to want everyone to be nicer but I agree that it’s not realistic.

What I do believe is that we should be asking children to respect their peers and that can mean a whole range of things. It can include talking and listening to someone and perhaps becoming friends, or it can mean fixing what was once a friendship or it can mean learning to be quiet and not shouting at or about someone you don’t like. I think friendships are vitally important to our children and young people – they rely on them, value them and as they get older, they turn to them for support and comfort - all this message and these campaigns seek to do is to help frame an understanding of what it really means to be friends.  

Learning that it is okay not to like someone, that it’s okay not to agree with them is important - it’s what you do that matters. Not being friends does not have to mean that you are enemies. That is a message I have seen young people benefit from exploring on many occasions.

If you think about it there must be a few people in your life you don’t like, you don’t and never will agree with – you don’t hound and abuse them at every opportunity – you may have learned the hard way that a family Christmas dinner is not the time to get these feelings off your chest. It might be a colleague or your boss – most people learn to use their developed social skills that enables them to work effectively or not fall out with the whole family.

If you pick on, exclude or verbally abuse someone in person or online you don’t like or agree with then that’s the kind of bullying that will cause problems for everyone – if you are able to let them walk by, be online or in the corridor without you responding in some negative way – then everyone will be a lot happier.

We will always respond to bullying more effectively when we focus on what someone actually did and the impact it had. If they behaved in a way that is unacceptable then we focus on their actions and what they should be doing in future.  This will be more effective than trying to fix or reframe a dynamic between two people that might not need ‘fixed’- nor will it ever fit into what we might think a ‘friendship’ is.

 

Brian

Online Bullying - Evidence to Education and Cutlure Committe

I have posted this briefing that was submitted ahead of the Education and Culture Committee Evidence Session on online bullying - it is an extended version of the briefing posted earlier on this blog 

The service provides strategic policy support, offers skills development training and campaigns to raise awareness. The service was externally evaluated between 2009 and 2011 and was found to be a ‘catalyst for change’ and was a ‘credible’ and ‘robust’ anti-bullying service. The service was instrumental in developing the National Approach to Anti-Bullying for Scotland’s Children and Young People and ensures all stakeholders operate in-step with this approach.

 

respectme’s resources and approach to anti-bullying is recognised internationally, we have delivered training and materials across Europe and the UK as well as the US. We work with all adults who play a role in Children’s lives – parents to policy makers and we have trained teachers, social care staff, foster carers, football coaches, residential workers and many people in many other roles.

Bullying is behaviour that makes people feel frightened, hurt, threatened and left out. It impacts on a person’s ability to feel in control of themselves (their ‘agency’) and to respond effectively. This behaviour can harm physically and emotionally and the threat is typically sustained. This behaviour takes place in a variety of places, including on-line.

Online bullying was an emerging issue when the service launched early 2007 and at the request of the then Minister, respectme delivered a campaign on cyberbullying that urged parents to ‘connect’ with what their children were doing on-line not ‘disconnect’ from the internet. We found that parents and adults who understood how social media worked, what it was used for and how to make it safe or monitor it, were much more confident when dealing with bullying that happened on-line.

Over the year’s respectme developed resources, web content and a very popular training event on cyberbullying. We were able to refine and develop confidence with our core messages about online bullying and communicate these to our stakeholders through newer campaigns and resources aimed at adults and at children and young people. Our learning has now seen us bring the core messages on online bullying into our generic anti-bullying training.

These key messages include:

Bullying online is all about relationships – not technology We must focus on equipping young people with the skills to conduct themselves online in a more respectful manner; the skills to manage these environments safely, and to develop their confidence and abilities to negotiate relationships and problems. This is built on promoting and developing resilience. But we also have to equip parents with the knowledge and understanding about how these sites work; how to make them safe and, most importantly, how to talk to their children about using them.

‘Cyberbullying’ is bullying – it is still about relationships that are not healthy or being managed or role modelled well. It is behaviour done by someone to someone else, it is the ‘where’ this is taking place that is new. The behaviour appears to be migrating, as children spend more time on-line, the behaviour they have always exhibited and experienced comes with them.

It is important to include cyberbullying in your policies and procedures on anti-bullying and not see it as something entirely separate - it is still rooted in relationships between people. Our work and international research supports our assertion that you deal effectively with bullying that happened online as part of your whole approach to bullying. Carving it off as something different dilutes the reality of bullying experienced by children and young people – this is that they can experience bullying online and in person simultaneously.

The internet is a place, not a thing – for many the internet is a tool that they use for a variety of things, buying, sending messages or research. To most children and young people it is a social space that they spend time in and use to stay in touch with their friends. This principle underpins all of our anti-bullying work in this area. This led to a very successful video campaign in 2011 called ‘She’s still going somewhere’, the message for adults was, whether your child is going into town or online, they are still going somewhere and you need to be just as interested and concerned about where they are going and who they are going with.

Like all places children and young people go to, there are risks.

 

 

 

 

Children and young people do not differentiate a great deal between friendships online and in person – most of their interactions on-line or using their smart phones is with friends and people they interact with in other areas such a schools or where they live. This is not to say they do not know the difference but it is ads natural for your friendships to be evident in both your day to life online and where you live or go to school.

Children and young people use this to communicate –the purpose of using smart phones, consoles or laptops is primarily about staying in-touch with friends, this is as important for young people today as it was 40 years ago. They have different means at their disposal but the principle is the same.

Adult fear and anxiety – has been the biggest hurdle in dealing with cyberbullying. This has had a very high media profile at times and it appears ’new’ and for parents or adults who do not use social media or connect with their friends using the internet, this is a challenging and at times bewildering experience. There are so many types of phones, connections and complex safety features and so on. That is why respectme’s training focusses on developing adult skills and confidence and their understanding of how and why technology is used this way.

We have developed a two and a half hour training session for parents that we will be piloting across the Central belt later this year. This session will involve some ‘hands-on’ experience on social networking sites and leaning about safety settings and how they work.

Lots of colleagues have said they are ‘technophobes’ or are not ‘tech savvy’ and have voiced how much they dislike Facebook or twitter. We have maintained that if you work with children and young people or are a parent or carer – that is no longer good enough. You need to know! For some that will require a real effort to spend time and utilise the relationship they have to learn this. We cannot abdicate responsibility for this to software. We need to connect and learn about how young people use the internet and the phones or laptops they access it from. They use it mainly to talk to and meet their friends.

Many adults have experience of managing risk when working with children and young people, this is a new place for us to consider. We need to be as imaginative and creative with the internet as we have been in other places.

respectme undertook extensive research on October 2011 on this issue that both confirmed our messages and informed the work we do.

This research involved 3,944 young people from 29 of Scotland's 32 local authorities aged 8 - 19 years. It confirmed that children and young people are online almost every day. They use phones and laptops, boys also use games consoles to connect with friends and socialise. For the most part, the friends they talk to at school are also the friends they chat to on-line. They do not draw any difference between talking to a friend on the phone, instant messaging or on the way to school – it’s all talking to friends.

16% say they have been cyberbullied – this is reflective of the findings from colleagues in the rest of the UK. 25% worry about cyberbullying,

55% say they are online every day for 1 – 3 hours, nearly 10% claim they are on for 5 hrs. or more

63% of children bullied online knew the person who was doing this and 40% of the time this carried over into school. Children who had been bullied on-line stated that reading a nasty comment was worse that hearing it or knowing it had been said. Children who had not been bullied on-line were ambivalent about the difference in impact.

There is a real fear that anonymity is pushing this behaviour online – however there is little research to support this – what we do know is that believing they will no get caught and not fully understanding how permanent posting are online link to bullying and aggressive behaviours more than anonymity – many social network sites have a /name’ culture and most abusive behaviour online is not actually anonymous.

 

 

 

 

The impact of this behaviour is the same as the impact of other types of bullying, fear, anxiety and worry about repercussions. It is likely for many children and young people that if they are being bullied, say in school, it is highly likely they may also experience bullying behaviours online as well.

71% of children who were bullied would like to tell a parent or carer, 43% would tell a friend and 31% would want to tell a teacher.

This year will also see respectme undertake new research into children and young people’s experiences of bullying online and off. This research will enable us to help parents and professionals get a clear national picture of how young people are experiencing bullying in 2014. Crucially this will support and influence effective responses that recognise relationships play out on line and face to face more than ever.

 

 

Schools have struggled at times to deal with bullying that happens on-line as they believe it happens ‘out of school’, respectme’s take on this is that bullying happens to individuals, the impacts are felt by them and they take this with them wherever they go. If they tell their teacher something happened and they are worried, like any disclosure of this kind, teachers and schools must respond in a supportive way. Children will be telling a teacher for good reason; they believe they can help them.

  

Cyberbullying can be more intrusive and children and young people may find fewer ‘escape routes’ as switching off their phone is rarely an option. While messages can be blocked, deleted or reported, they can be seen by hundreds of others within minutes and incidents can spiral out of control very quickly. A comment made while angry to a friend can be seen and shared in no time at all.

 

 

respectme has develop very successful guidance for children and young people on bullying, staying safe and their own behaviour on-line as well as resource for adults. There is a need to help adults develop skills and confidence in this area though. There is still a gap between what they currently know and what they need to know about the platforms and devices children and young people use.

A new publication for parents and carers will also be delivered this year and this will cover anti-bullying advice including online bullying.

Brian Donnelly

Director respectme

February 2014