WELLBEING

Level 4 Wellbeing

This semester in Wellbeing, level 4 students will be focusing on Cybersafety. This week, the classes I have during term 1, begun by establishing the difference between jokes, being mean and bullying. 

Sometimes, people get confused about what is and isn’t bullying.

People can think that someone saying something they don’t like is bullying – but it’s not. Bullying is different from conflict or unkindness.

Bullying is mean, but being mean doesn't always mean bullying.

Bullying behaviours:

• Are aggressive, unkind or mean behaviours
• Are repeated behaviours (it must happen multiple times, in an ongoing way to be defined as bullying)
• Happen on purpose
• Must have a power imbalance – which means that people bullying and the people being bullied aren’t seen as being ‘equal’, e.g. older, bigger people picking on smaller, younger people, or ‘popular’ people targeting someone who they see as being ‘unpopular’, or who is struggling to make friends.

Some other serious types of behaviours, like discrimination, harassment and abuse, can overlap with bullying and are actually against the law.

Bullying is not the same as

• Being rude – saying or doing something hurtful that wasn’t planned or meant to hurt someone, e.g. someone pushing in front of you in the canteen line
• Being mean – doing something hurtful to someone on purpose once or twice, e.g. a friend refusing to play with you one day
• Conflict – having a disagreement with a friend, e.g. two friends getting into an argument and saying mean things to each other
• Respectful feedback on behaviours you're doing that aren’t ok, e.g. “It’s not ok to roll your eyes every time they talk about sport.”
• A friend putting in a ‘boundary’ e.g. “I don't like it when you keep telling me what to do.”
• Natural consequences in socialising, e.g. a friend not trusting you because you shared their secret

Source: kidshelpline.com.au

In the coming weeks, students will explore how to seek help, how to be an upstander if witnessing bullying, the ways in which cyberbullying occurs and explore the impacts it can have on victims.