School bullying

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Vodcast Four Three more ways of intervening
School Bullying
Dr Ken RigbyConsultant
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The three ways

• 1. Strengthening the victim
• 2. Mediating between the bully and the victim
• 3. Applying restorative practice

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Strengthening the victim

• Rationale
• If there is no imbalance of power, then bullying
  cannot occur
• Therefore seek to equalise the power by
  strengthening the victim
• If this is achieved the school no longer needs to
  take action

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Reducing the imbalance of power

• This can be attempted by teaching the victim to
  learn new skills or suggesting the use of
  different tactics
• When the victim uses counter-aggressive means the
  conflict may escalate and lead to a worsening
  situation
• Hence, methods have been suggested that can
  discourage the bully without antagonising, for
  example by fogging

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Rationale for Fogging

• The bully enjoys a sense of being more powerful,
  as long as the victim is manifestly upset by what
  he/she is saying
• If the victim is not upset the bully loses any
  ascendancy
• The victim can learn to react as one unperturbed,
  reply in ways that are not provocative and give
  no satisfaction to the bully who then desists

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Fogging Advice on confronting the bully.

• Take control of the situation - Do not let the
  bully see that you are intimidated or upset
• Maintain eye contact with the bully, speak
  clearly and firmly, stand upright and try not to
  fidget. Act or pretend to be brave
• Be prepared to focus on the perceptions of the
  bully acknowledge how he/she sees things. Dont
  strike back! Become boring!

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Examples of Fogging

• Bully You have great big ears
• Victim Thats true, I do have big ears"
• Bully They stick out so much they flap in the
  wind
• Victim Its true they stick out
• Bully You are the most stupid person in the
  whole school
• Victim That might be true
• Bully You are wearing pov shoes!
• Victim You are not wrong.
• Further examples are given in the handouts

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When Fogging cannot be used

• The bullying is physical rather than verbal
• The bullying is being conducted by a group
• A childs disability - eg. Asperger Syndrome or
  speech impediment makes handling such verbal
  exchanges impossible or very difficult
• The targeted child is feeling traumatised or very
  
• anxious and is unable to use the technique with
  the bully

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Mediation

• Mediation involves meeting with students in
  conflict to help them to resolve their
  differences
• They must not be forced to meet and the mediator
  must remain neutral, favouring neither side
• The practitioners must be skilled in the process
• They may be teachers or students acting as peer
  mediators

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Mediation
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Advantages and limitations

1. A successful resolution removes the source of the
   conflict and ends the dispute
2. The use of mediation improves the ethos of the
   school students are encouraged to negotiate
   solutions
3. However, it does require that the bully and the
   victim are prepared to be mediated. Often the
   bully is unwilling
4. It is difficult if not impossible for
   practitioners to remain neutral when a student
   is being treated badly by another

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Restorative Practice

• This is a method that seeks to produce a
  resolution to a bully/victim problem by inducing
  the offender to feel remorse and to act so as
  to repair the damaged relationship
• It requires that the victim accepts the apology
  and,
• in some cases further restorative action

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Applications of Restorative Practice with
bullying

• These include meetings conducted by a
  practitioner
• 1. With just the offender and the offended
• 2. With a group of students who have
  participated in, or observed, the bullying
  behaviour, eg. a class of students
• 3. With the offender and offended plus persons
  closely associated with those in conflict, eg.
  parents and other adults. These meetings -
  sometimes used with very serious cases - are
  known as community conferences and require a
  highly skilled facilitator

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Method in Restorative Practice

• The approach involves
• Requiring the offender to listen to what the
  victim has to say
• Requiring the offender to reflect on what has
  been happening, the harm that has been done - and
  how things can be put right
• Inducing a restorative act and its acceptance by
  the person(s) offended against
• Commonly users of this method work from a
  script as in the handout

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Strengths and limitations

• Focuses upon restoring damaged relationships
• Seeks to gain the cooperation of the offender
  through a reflective process rather than by means
  of coercion
• Is limited to cases where a degree of remorse
  exists or can be induced without undue pressure
• For the best outcomes support is needed from the
  total school community

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Questions

• What has been your experience of employing the
  following approaches in tackling cases of
  bullying
• (i) strengthening the victim
• (ii) mediation and
• (iii) restorative practices
• What would your advice be to teachers considering
  using each of these?
• Can some students be helped by teaching them
  fogging? You may like to try out the script
  with a partner one playing the bully, the other
  the victim

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