Cyber Bullying & School Bullying

To help a student or young person who were bullied, mental professionals such as counselors need to understand that bullying is aggressive behavior that is intentional and that involves an imbalance of power or strength. Children who were bullied need support and encouragement to tell what has happened to them and to talk about their feelings. They also need protection from future bullying.

By establishing a strong, positive relationships with adults and peers, bullied children can fee where they belong and stop blaming themselves for the bullying. In extreme cases, bullied children need support with post traumatic stress symptoms, even after the bullying has been stopped.

Source: www.ask.hrsa.gov

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Parents should take school bullying seriously and often they are the first ones to detect the warning signs. However, some parents hesitate to tell the school teachers when they find out that their children are bullied in school. There are few reasons for parents to hesitate. One of them is that they are afraid that they might make the situation worse by telling the school. Or the parents feel embarrassed to tell the teachers fearing that the teachers might think of them as overly protective. Often times, the bullied children ask the parents not to tell the school and want to solve the problems on their own.

But children need parents’ help to prevent and stop school bullying. Call the school as soon as possible if the parents see any bullying warnings signs.

Parents’ involvement in bulling prevention and detection is essential in the battle of stopping bullying. But how do you find out if your children are being bullied if they are too embarrassed or too afraid to tell you. There are a few warning signs that parents should pay attention to:

1. If your child comes home with torn, damaged, or missing pieces of clothing, books, or other belongings;
2. Has unexplained cuts, bruises, and scratches when the child come home;
3. Complains frequently of headaches, stomachaches, or other physical issues;
4. Has trouble sleeping;
5. Shows a loss of appetite;
6. Appears anxious and suffers from low self-esteem,
7. does not have any friends or very few friends to play with;
8. Seems afraid of going to school, walking to and from school, riding the school bus, or taking part in organized activities with peers;
9. The child has no interest in school work or suddenly begins to do poorly in school;
10. When your child comes home appearing sad or moody.

Talk to your child if you see any of the 10 warning signs.

Source: U.S Department of Health and Human Services

Bullying is aggressive behavior that is intentional and that involves an imbalance of power or strength. Often, it is repeated over time. Bullying can take many forms such as hitting, punching (physical bullying); teasing or name-calling (verbal bullying); intimidation through gestures or social exclusion (nonverbal bullying or emotional bullying); and sending insulting messages by e-mail (cyberbullying).

Students report that most bullying happens at school, but bullying does not stop at the end of the school day. Children and youth are also involved in bullying in out-of-school time programs. Although there is very little research on bullying in these settings, a recent national study of sixth through tenth graders in the U.S. (Nansel et al., 2003) found that

• Nine percent of boys and 5 percent of girls reported that they had been bullied away from school “sometimes” or “weekly” (compared with 16 percent of boys and 11 percent of girls who reported being bullied at school).
• Children who bully and who are bullied (both in school and away from school) are more likely than other children to be involved in fighting and carry a weapon. In fact, 70 percent of boys and 30–40 percent of girls who were involved in bullying outside of school on a weekly basis reported carrying a weapon in the past month.

Source: Department of Health and Human Services

In a telephone survey of preteens (6-11 year-olds) and teens (12-17 year-olds) (Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, 2006):

• 45% of preteens and 30% of teens who had been cyberbullied received the messages while at school.
• 44% of preteens and 70% of teens who had been cyberbullied received the messages at home.
• 34% of preteens and 25% of teens who had been cyberbullied received the messages while at a friend’s house.

Source: U.S. Department of Health & Human Services

Research shows that bullying can be a sign of other serious antisocial and/or violent behavior. Children who frequently bully their peers are more likely than others to:

• Get into frequent fights
• Be injured in a fight
• Vandalize or steal property
• Drink alcohol
• Smoke
• Be truant from school
• Drop out of school
• Carry a weapon

Source: U.S. Department of Health & Human Services

There are many signs that a child is being bullied. Some signs to look for:

• The child comes home with torn, damaged, or missing pieces of clothing, books or other belongings.
• The child has unexplained bruises, cuts or scratches.
• The child seems afraid of going to school, walking to and from school, riding the school bus or taking part in organized activities with peers.
• The child appears sad, moody, teary or depressed when he or she comes home.
• The child frequently appears anxious and/or suffers from low self-esteem.

Source: The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Not only can bullying hurt someone’s feelings, it can have other more serious effects. Some problems can even last until you are an adult! Bullying can play a role in:

• Sadness, hurt feelings, loneliness, and depression
• Poor body image, low self-esteem, and even eating disorders, especially when teased about weight
• Skipping school, bad grades, and being afraid to go to school
• Headaches, stomach aches, and anxiety
• Trouble sleeping
• Thoughts and acts of suicide, in very bad cases

Bullying others or being bullied can hurt someone both physically and emotionally — and have effects even after you become an adult!

If you are being bullied by someone, it’s ok to ask for help if you are experiencing any of the effects listed above. Teachers, parents, a doctor or nurse, and other trusted adults should be able to help you.

Source: Office on Women’s Health.

Bullying is when one person or a group of people scare or hurt someone else over and over again. Bullies hurt others who are often weaker or less confident. Bullying is often done on purpose and it can happen anywhere, such as at school, in the park, on a sports team, or even at home. Often the person being bullied has a hard time defending herself.

There are many types of bullying. Bullying can be:

• Leaving someone out of group activities on purpose.
• Giving someone the “silent treatment.”
• Using the Internet, IMs, text messages, and/or e-mail to hurt others (also called cyberbullying).
• Making faces and/or bad gestures with your hands at someone.
• Using a person to get something you want, such as making friends with someone who is smart just so they can do your homework for you.
• Making fun of someone for being “different.”
• Forcing someone to do something embarrassing or dangerous in order to join a sports team or social group (also called hazing).
• Name-calling, teasing, gossiping, and/or spreading rumors.
• Hair pulling, biting, and pinching.
• Threatening and scaring others.
• Hitting, punching, and shoving.

Bullying doesn’t just happen between girls. Did you know that sometimes adults bully kids? This doesn’t happen often, but it does happen sometimes. Bullying can happen when one person has power over another person. Teachers and coaches have power over students. Anytime a person hurts another person on purpose (either with words or actions), over and over again, this is bullying.

Also, girls sometimes bully boys. Girls may call a boy “gay” or hit a boy because they know he can’t hit them back.

Source: Office on Women’s Health

Cyberbullying is hurting someone else over and over again through the Internet or a cell phone. So, instead of whispering a rumor to a friend, a bully might e-mail the rumor or post it on Facebook for everyone to see! Or, a bully might use technology to ignore you. (An example of this would be a friend ignoring your e-mails or IMs all of a sudden.)

Cyberbullying happens most often through:

• Web sites (including social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook, or Twitter)
• Blogs
• Instant messages (IMs)
• E-mail
• Chat rooms
• Text messaging/texting
• Cell phone photo messages
• Virtual worlds

Many teens today, especially girls, use technology to bully others. Teens may be more likely to cyberbully because they feel protected by the Internet. It’s much easier to type mean words to someone than to say them in person, but that doesn’t make them any less hurtful.

Source: Office on Women’s Health