Anti-Bullying

How do we define bullying?

At Clare House Primary School, we believe that children and young people have the right to be safe. We value and work towards the emotional health and well-being of all our children and young people. We aim to create an environment of respect where anti-social and bullying behaviours are not accepted or tolerated.

As a school we define bullying as behaviour by an individual or group, often repeated over time, that intentionally hurts another individual or group either physically or emotionally. It can take many forms (for instance, cyber-bullying via text messages or the internet) and can be short term or continuous over long periods of time and can take place anywhere.

Bullying involves an imbalance of power between the perpetrator and the victim and often involves those children who might need greater support to deal with the impact of bullying or who lack the social communication skills to report such incidents.

We use the phrase STOP to help children to identify when an incident should be classed as bullying words or actions. It is bullying if it is done Several Times On Purpose (STOP). If a child has been entered on the Behaviour log for more than 2 inappropriate incidents against the same child and the incidents are on purpose, class teachers will need to discuss the issues with a member of the SLT and decide whether this constitutes bullying.

How can you report bullying?

If you are concerned about bullying, please report it to the school in the following ways:

• Children should speak to an adult in school.
• Parents and carers should approach the class teacher in the first instance if they have concerns.

How will we deal with bullying?

Staff will:

Investigate

• Investigate bullying incidents thoroughly and talk to those involved, e.g. witnesses

Record

• Record the incident on our school systems

Respond

• Respond to the child concerned by:
• Listening actively
• Offering support and strategies to deal with unacceptable behaviour
• Protecting the child and ensure their safety as and when necessary
• Involving parents
• Involving external agencies to support the child as appropriate

Respond to the child who bullied by:

• Ensuring he/she recognises his/her behaviour and how it affects others
• Applying appropriate sanctions
• Guiding, supporting, advising and offering strategies to change behaviour
• Encouraging him/her to take responsibility for actions and help them to make amends
• Involving parents

Prevent

To prevent similar situations, offer children a chance to explore the issue together through circle time or group discussion. They may share how the behaviour made them feel and work collaboratively to agree on a solution.

Review

Review the situation with the all involved. Review policies and procedures - consider changes that can be made to environment, groupings, rules and codes of conduct etc.

Monitor the situation

Provide opportunities for children to say how safe they feel and if the policy is working. This should take place on a regular basis.