Barcelona, October 2022
Barcelona, October 2022
Activity 1 - Maanaki approach
Maanaki is a Maori word to express support and protection for the other, showing respect for others and generosity Embracing this philosophy we can help ourselves and others to face bullying and make a community based on hospitality and care.
With this in mind our students will look in their close circle for people who can be those protectors and how they can practise maanaki.
The activity starts by talking about what maanaki means, what it means for us, why it is important and in which situations we lived experiences in which other persons showed maanaki for us. After that, they make a list identifying which people around them can act like that in different areas: at home, at school, at street, at sport activities, etc. Which characteristics do they all share? Why is their presence important? How could they help in a bullying situation? The expected result is that they identify teachers, parents, friends and even themselves as people who can protect others and help in a bullying situation.
As a closure the students make a “recipe for kindness” in which they will summarize which traits make a good friend and a kind person.
Activity 2- What’s a bystander?
What is a bystander?”
The bystander effect is a social psychological theory that states that individuals are less likely to offer help to a victim in presence of other people. We briefly discuss this theory with the students and give them different role play situations in which they are the bystanders and witness different bullying scenarios. These include online and offline cases.
We ask the students to work in mixed groups. First, they read the cards with the situations. For example: You are in class but the teacher hasn’t arrived yet. You can see and hear how one of your classmates is disrespecting another, calling him/her names and teasing him/her for his/her physical appearance. What would you do?
They have some time to read the situation and think of an answer or reaction. Then, they discuss within the group the different opinions and options. After having analysed two or three situations, students are asked to choose one and act it out for the rest of the groups. After each performance, we talk about the different situations presented, the possible reactions and what us, as bystanders, can do about them.
Activity 3 - Cyberbullying in social networks
We ask the students what apps they think are more likely to lead to bullying situations. We write down their answers and experiences, and then we present them the following graph from the article:
From: New Teen Survey Reveals Cyberbullying Moving Beyond Social Media to Email, Messaging Apps, YouTube
https://www.the74million.org/new-teen-survey-reveals-cyberbullying-moving-beyond-social-me dia-to-email-messaging-apps-youtube/
After a brief discussion, we ask them to work in groups and think of an example of a bullying situation in one of these apps. It can be a real or a hypothetical situation. Then, they have to write and plan a short video sequence to represent the situation and record it. We watch the videos together and comment on the situations.
Activity 4 - Consequences of bullying
To understand the implications and the consequences of bullying we ask the students to watch in groups different videos related to the topic. Each group watches a different video. The videos contain interviews and experiences of victims that talk about what happened to them. There are also some animations that explore the psychological effects and consequences of bullying. They take notes of the important or most shocking pieces of information after watching the videos. After some time, the students mix in different groups and share the ideas and thoughts about the videos they have watched. Finally, there is a group discussion collecting all the ideas and reflections and we watch some parts of the videos together.
Resources:-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDsrYiHjNbQ
- V https://www
Activity 5 - Cause and effect of vulnerability
We start the activity with a question and a short debate and brainstorming around the issue of vulnerability when facing a bullying situation. We write down all the ideas and try to connect them and think of examples. In the second part of the activity we address the conversation towards digital vulnerability, about how social networks and technology can expose us and how that can be a source for bullies.
We read in groups an article about the topic (Ways Kids Use Technology to Bully and Harass Others) and identify the ways and tools that bullies can use to harm their victims mentioned in the article. We ask them to think about this: have they heard about it before? Have they suffered from them? What are the implications of using them (legal, emotional, social…? Do they know other ways? How can we use technology to defend against bullying? We ask them to talk about this in the group and take notes. Later, they share their conclusions with the other groups, considering all the issues mentioned. We collect and summarize all these opinions and reflections in a poster.
Link to the article:
https://www.verywellfamily.com/how-kids-use-technology-to-bully-460552
Some examples mentioned in the article more convenient to work with the students are:
- Todding: This term was made popular by Internet trolls, after the suicide of a girl in Canada, they started to post cruel messages on her Facebook page, creating pain and anguish to her family and friends.
- Teen Shaming: These practices involve swiping photos from a person’s social media page and reposting them with comments that shame and ridicule the person in the picture. The shaming includes everything from slut-shaming and fat-shaming to public shaming.
- Cyberbaiting: In a cyberbaiting incident, students taunt their teachers to the point of an outburst. Then, they capture the teacher’s reaction on video and post it for others to see.
- Happy Slapping: This form of cyberbullying involves teens using a camera phone to videotape a bullying incident. Typically, the bullying includes one or more kids slapping, hitting, kicking, or punching a victim. Then, the videotape is downloaded and posted to YouTube so that a broader audience can view the bullying.
