Bullying Prevention
Conflict resolution and bullying prevention are natural partners. A comprehensive violence prevention plan should include both. Schools that have a solid conflict resolution program in place are ideally positioned to engage in bullying prevention as a next step. Conflict resolution teaches students how to solve problems when power is fairly equal and when both parties have some interest in resolving the conflict. Bullying, on the other hand, occurs when one party has more power, that party has no interest in resolving the problem, and he is primarily interested in hurting the other. In these circumstances, conflict resolution techniques are not likely to be effective, so other methods must be in place. (To learning more about bullying prevention, please visit our online learning module.)
A bullying prevention program should teach students how to distinguish normal peer conflict, which responds well to conflict resolution strategies, from bullying violence, which warrants a different set of strategies. Once students understand which type of conflict they are dealing with, they can decide which strategies to use. There are several factors (for example, contextual factors and personality traits) that determine when some strategies are more appropriate than others.
Rethinking the deeper impacts that bullying has on our school culture is important for existing conflict resolution programs. While many such programs have a long history of creating safe and caring youth cultures and providing students and staff with specific skills to confront injustice, the recent attention to bullying has expanded the importance of this work and has provided language and additional strategies for surfacing and handling this more serious form of conflict and violence. Likewise, bullying prevention programs can benefit from the comprehensive experience that conflict resolution programs offer.
Videos of Possible Interest
- Overview of the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program
- Teaching Students How to “Stand Up” to Bullying – Webinar Archive
- Cyberbullying (UNICEF)
- Social Emotional Learning via The Heart Story (RCCP)
- PAX Good Behaviour Game
- The Transformation of West Philadelphia High School: a story of hope
- Puppet Show – Kids Against Bullying
- Help Increase the Peace Students Bullying Research Project
- Cyberbullying Toolkit for Educators
- Peaceful School Bus Program – Hazelden Foundation
- Another Bully Busters Song
- On-the-Spot Bullying Prevention
- Students Take on Cyberbullying
- On-the-Spot Mediation: how to use your skills in everyday life
- Girls Bullying
- Cyberbullying Toolkit: Webinar Archive
- Bullied: A Student, a School and a Case That Made History
See MORE VIDEOS...
Sample Catalog Resources
Below you'll find a randomized listing of up to 20 related items (we may have more...) drawn from our Resource Catalog.
| Resource Title | Description | Links |
|---|---|---|
| What should I do if I'm bullied | Pdf document with advice to children who are bullied. | |
| Faith-community responses to bullying among children and youth | Pdf document which outlines steps that faith communities can take to stop bullying. | |
| Working with young people who are bullied: tips for mental health professionals | Pdf document with tips for mental health workers who treat bullied youth. | |
| SACSC Toward a safe and caring secondary curriculum | Web site developed by the Society for Safe and Caring Schools and Communities in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada whose mission "is to encourage home, school and community practices that teach, model and reinforce socially responsible and respectful behaviors, so that living and learning can take place in a safe, caring and inclusive environment. Achieving this mission requires the involvement not only of parents, teachers, and children, but of all the important adults in children's lives." The "purpose of the Society for Safe and Caring Schools and Communities Toward a Safe and Caring Curriculum Secondary Unit and Lesson Plans web-based resource is to provide units, lesson plans and other resources that integrate safe and caring knowledge, skills and attitudes into all subject areas in the Alberta secondary curriculum... this resource was developed by Alberta reachers in whose classrooms the accompanying lessons have been field tested." The lessons address 6 topics: Living Respectfully; Developing Self-Esteem; Respecting Diversity and Preventing Prejudice; Managing Anger; Dealing with Bullying; and Resolving Conflicts Peacefully for junior and senior high school students. | |
| Bullying prevention: CRETE training day 3 | Powerpoint presentation for educators on bullying and ways to prevent bullying behavior. | |
| STOP: On-the-spot bullying intervention | Word document presenting actions and statements for on-the-spot intervention of bullying behavior. | |
| Clique bullying scenario | Web-based interactive scenario which presents children reacting to a clique bullying situation and "taking a stand against the crowd." | |
| SACSC Elementary unit and lesson plans | Web site developed by the Society for Safe and Caring Schools and Communities in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada whose mission "is to encourage home, school and community practices that teach, model and reinforce socially responsible and respectful behaviors, so that living and learning can take place in a safe, caring and inclusive environment. Achieving this mission requires the involvement not only of parents, teachers, and children, but of all the important adults in children’s lives." The site houses a number of lesson plans and educational units "focusing on adult modeling, the SACSC programs prevent negative social behavior through character education, conflict management training and building respect for diversity. They promote a problem-solving approach to discipline that encourages positive social behavior by expecting young people to fix the wrong they have caused, thereby learning from their mistakes." They focus on 5 topics: Living Respectfully; Developing Self-Esteem; Respecting Diversity and Preventing Prejudice; Managing Anger and Dealing with Bullying and Harassment; and Resolving Conflicts Peacefully for grades K-6. | |
| Bullying in out-of-school time programs: tips for youth-serving professionals and volunteers | Pdf document that examines bullying in extracurricular activities with tips for professionals and volunteers. | |
| How to intervene to stop bullying: tips for on-the-spot intervention at school | Pdf document with instruction on dealing with bullying at school, how to intervene and follow-up procedures. | |
| Being an ally | Pdf document for students outlining steps and sample phrases to help diffuse bullying incidents. | |
| Physical and verbal bullying | Web-based interative scenario which explores bullying. | |
| What can students and youth do to lend a hand | Pdf document with advice to students and youth on bullying prevention. | |
| 2010-2011 Playworks Playbook | Playworks is a non-profit organization whose mission is to improve the health and well-being of children by increasing opportunities for physical activity and safe, meaningful play. The Playbook, a 390-page pdf, provides full descriptions of games and activities appropriate for K-5 school children. They are organized in the following categories: Ice Breakers; Readiness Games; Tag Games; Cooperative Games; Core Playground Games and Sports; Core Games Modifications; and Health and Fitness - FitKid Program. Also included is structured curriculum in Violence Prevention and Peace Promotion. The Violence Prevention materials focus on providing students with a set of foundation skills for preventing violence using a framework called the Five Fingers of Safety. The Peace Promotion materials focus on proactive measures to encourage and foster a healthy community, and can be used with a variety of student groups. | |
| Restorative Interventions Implementation Tool Kit | Implementation tools and resources for school staff and other adults trained to facilitate conferences and circles to repair harm in educational settings. The tools and resources are designed to assess readiness, implementation and outcomes, as well provide guidance for implementing any school-based restorative model. | |
| Olweus intervention suggestions | Powerpoint presentation providing guidelines for combating bullying in schools, from the Olweus Bullying Prevention Group. | |
| Bully Prevention in Positive Behavior Support for Middle Schools | This 45-page handbook focuses on school-wide positive behavior support, explicit instruction, and a redefinition of the bullying construct in a middle school. | |
| Social and Emotional Learning and Bullying Prevention | 21-page briefing paper prepared for the National Center for Mental Health Promotion and Youth Violence Prevention by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) and the Social and Emotional Learning Research Group at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Schools using a social and emotional learning (SEL) framework can foster an overall climate of inclusion, warmth, and respect, and promote the development of core social and emotional skills among both students and staff. Because bullying prevention is entirely congruent with SEL, it can be embedded in a school's SEL framework. The aims of this brief are to (a) provide a basic description of a school-wide SEL framework, (b) illustrate the relationship between social and emotional factors and bullying, and (c) explain how an SEL framework can be extended to include bullying prevention." | |
| Flirting or hurting?: Teacher guide, grade 6-9 | 9-page PDF teacher's guide which accompanies 3 filmed programs on sexual harrassment, "two of the modules target students, and one targets teachers. Throughout the student programs, the host, an older sister character, provides definitions, explanations and insights based on her own experiences ... the two 15-minute classroom programs include breaks for discussions or activities. These programs are appropriate for coeducational Health, Guidance, Family & Consumer Science, English, Social Studies, Physical Education, and New Student Orientation classes, or Vocational shops in grades 6 through 9." | |
| What we know about bullying | Pdf document with information on bullying. |