Purpose

What were your reasons for doing this development work?

We had noticed that children were not clear about the distinction between bullying and the random incidents of bad behaviour in the playground.

We wanted to raise the children’s awareness throughout the school of what bullying actually is and to give them an understanding of the impact bullying can have on children’s lives. In particular we wanted to deepen the children’s understanding of what a bystander is, in order to ensure that bystander behavior was significantly reduced.

We were offered the opportunity to take part in the Camden’s Anti-Bullying Champions programme, which offered a whole day’s training, either with a whole class or with a smaller group. We decide to select a small group of 13 children from Year 5 as we had done it the previous year with a whole year and felt that the impact lessened over time. With a smaller group it gave the ABCs a high profile and strong sense of identity.

Who were the identified target learners?

Year 5

What did you do? (What success criteria did you use?)

The children attended a whole day Anti-Bullying Champion (ABC) training provided by a Health and Wellbeing Consultant from Camden Health and Wellbeing Team.

The training started by asking the children to consider their standpoint on a range of different issues to do with bullying and to decide whether they agreed, disagreed or were unsure about each statement. This activity, repeated after the training formed the basis of our assessment of whether the training had impacted on children’s attitudes to bullying. Looking at a number of different scenarios helped the children be clear about what bullying is and helped them distinguish it from situations when children are having a falling out or just being mean to each other.

The children learnt about the different types of bullying: emotional, physical, verbal, online and discriminatory bullying, including homophobic bullying. They were asked to consider the impact of the bullying on the target. They also thought about why some people bully. We then looked at the role of the bystander and how their response to the situation could change the outcome of the bullying. In groups the children devised different scenarios and acted out the different options available to the bystanders and indeed to anyone experiencing bullying.

The focus of the afternoon session was to developing an anti-bullying awareness raising campaign to roll out to the whole school.

The group agreed on a campaign slogan “Keep calm and don’t be a bystander” and decided on the key messages they wanted to get across to the school community.
• Stand up!
• Speak out!
• Stay safe!

They then went on to plan a programme of activities that they would deliver to the school
• Launched a poster competition
• Created an animation
• Held an whole school assembly where they performed a role play demonstrating the different types of bullying
• Took part in a parents’ meeting to speak about their role
• Each child has a dedicated role around the school each day as part of the ABC rota
• ABCs have set up and monitor the ABC post box where children can post a “worry”.
• To raise their profile in the school and to make them stand out, the ABCs wear the bright red T-shirt they designed in the work shop.

What specific teaching resources did you use?

• Video: BBC Bitesize: what is Bullying?
  https://www.bbc.co.uk/education/clips/z7vnvcw
• Scenarios developed by Health and Wellbeing Team
• ABC Powerpoint

Outcomes and Impact

What has been the impact on pupil learning and teaching?

• There is an increased awareness around the school that no bullying is acceptable
• Children know who they can talk to if they are worried about bullying.
• We have noted a decrease in behaviour incidents at break and lunchtime and children throughout the school say that they feel safe and are happy to come to school. Pupil and parent questionnaires indicate the same

Challenge Partners conducted a review in March 2017 and noted:
“Pupils have high levels of respect of one another’s differences and demonstrate outstanding behaviour both in lessons and throughout the school. “

Evidence of impact on pupil learning and teaching/leadership

• Children are calmer and more focused when they come into the classroom after lunch and playtime. They are better able to solve conflicts themselves due to modeling by the ABC, This means that less time is spent after lunch dealing with incidents and more time on learning.
• There has been an increase in reporting due to raised awareness of the issues. Children are confident that the problems will be dealt with.