Blog #5 - Cyberbullying
This image that has a girl sitting on her yellow couch with her computer reading harsh words like "you are a looser," "no one likes you," "UR fat."
Bullying can be identified as a repeated behavior that intends to cause harm to people of lesser
power (Faucher, Cassidy, & Jackson, 2015). These actions from the bully can be overt and convert,
physical, verbal, psychological and cyberbullying. I was fortunate to grow up without the last type of
bullying, cyberbullying. Back in the day, there was bullying, but we did not have phones or
computers. If you were going to pick on someone, usually someone around you would know about the
problem because it was fact to face because it was either physical or verbal.
What surprised me so much about this weeks module is how easy it was to bully someone via text,
emails or social media. There are so many different platforms that people can use to communicate
hurtful words. When you put something on social media, you are not just sharing it with your group of
friends, but ultimately with anyone! Not having that face to face interaction makes it easy for the bully
to do harm without anyone knowing except their target. When I was reading From the Sandbox to the
Inbox: Comparing the Acts, Impacts and Solutions of Bulling in K-12, Higher Education and the
Workplace, the likely hood of reporting bullying were low for fear of either escalation or the loss of
privilege to technology (Faucher, Cassidy, & Jackson, 2015). Using technological devices to bully
makes it very easy to delete messages and make the bully not see how it is affecting the other person
which leads to less empathy. Watching the first video, Let's Fight it Together, is a perfect example of
this. The boy was hiding emails and texts from his mother until it got to be too much.
One would think being in an elementary school library, I would not have to deal with
cyberbullying due to the lack of devices my students have. Unfortunately, we do have to deal with it.
I am always amazed about the number of students who do have their own phones or watches. One
solution I do have for this problem is to start teaching digital media literacy and digital citizenship at an
early age. Giving students the tools to deal with cyberbullying and identifying vocabulary to express
these concepts will allow them to cope with situations when it comes to the ever changing world of
technology. Here are a few resources that I have found that will help me explain what it is and how to
deal with it.
Here are some great books to include in your library about bullying and teaching empathy.
References
Faucher, C., Cassidy, W., & Jackson, M. (2015). From the sandbox to the inbox: Comparing the acts, impacts, and solutions of bullying in k-12, higher education, and the workplace. Journal Of Education And Training Studies, 3(6), 111-125.
Hi Heather! Thank you for sharing your cyberbullying post this week! I agree with you, I do not remember growing up with cyber bullying either. It is surprising to think about how easy someone can be bullied by text or popular social media platforms. I was also surprised to learn that it is an incredibly small number of people who report cyber bullying. I like your suggestion of teaching digital citizenship at an early age. Thank you for sharing the YouTube videos and books to help those who are affected by cyber bullying. Have a great week!
ReplyDeleteHeather, thank you for including the link to picture books on bullying. I have read several of them and plan to use a couple next year in my elementary library. Nerdy Birdy and Strictly No Elephants are two of my favorite from the list. I agree with you that we need to instruct on how to behave online and how do we respond to others online as well starting at an early age.
ReplyDeleteHi Heather. Isn't it really interesting that we grew up without internet and social media and now here we are bombarded with the digital world at every turn? I was in 8th grade when my family got AOL! I can remember first getting a bag phone for the car that we shared between drivers. The amount of information, both good and bad, and the quick rate "news" travels in the digital landscape is mindboggling. Unfortunately, children are getting phones at a younger age than ever before, and I agree, it is so important to begin teaching digital citizenship before middle school! Our 8-15 year olds are not mature enough, nor do they have enough experience and wisdom to understand the lasting impacts of hurtful speech, even when they think it is "deleted".
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing these videos and book lists. I am always looking for new lesson ideas for digital citizenship!
Hi Heather,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing those videos, they are a great help to deal with cyberbullying at an early age. I agree that we need to start young with kids these days. They are already on screens for hours when they are young. While technically you have to be 13 to use social media, this is easily bypassed by many kids. There should be better ways to ensure that children do not have access at such young ages.
Hi Heather! Thank you for for the link to the picture books. I used Have You Filled a Bucket Today? with my 3rd grade class my first year teaching. We read the book and then did an activity together as a class. I remember overhearing one of them at recess respond to someone being unkind by saying "you aren't being a bucket filler right now". I have read a few of the others but not all of them so I will have to check them out!
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