Introduce as appropriate, and explain this assembly will help us to understand what the effects can be of hurting other people.

What does the word bullying mean? The word ‘bullying’ means hurting someone’s body or someone’s feelings on purpose, over and over again. The person doing the hurting uses their actions or words to make the other person feel less powerful than them.

What does it look like? Ask for ideas from the children of what bullying might look like. Can be physical (hurting someone’s body), verbal (hurting someone with words) or psychological (hurting someone by changing the way they think). Can happen face-to-face or through cyberspace (texting, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, email or similar). Can be other children, teenagers, parents, brothers/sisters.

Why do people do it? Ask the children: “If bullying isn’t good, then why might someone do it?” Ask two children to come forward as volunteers and stand facing each other. Ask one child (if one is smaller, choose that child) to point to one of the other children’s arms or legs. If an arm pointed to, put arm behind back. If leg pointed to, kneel on that leg. Repeat this until knelt on both knees with both arms behind back. “Sometimes, by being unkind to somebody else and stopping them from feeling happy, it can make people feel in control and more powerful.” Ask the child who did the pointing to put hands on hips and stand close to kneeling child, looking down at them. “By focusing on something they don’t like about somebody else, it can stop the person bullying from thinking about the bits of themselves or their own life that they aren’t happy with. By making sure that somebody else is scared or embarrassed, it can stop the person bullying from feeling those things themselves, so they feel more confident.” Thank the children and ask them to go and sit back down. “BUT… (ask the children) Do you think the person doing the bullying really feels happy inside? What do you think they might worry about?”

Does it matter? Ask the children: If someone is being bullied, how do you think they might feel when it first happens? How do you think they might feel if it carries on? Someone who is being hurt on purpose is likely to find lots of things more difficult because they are trying to cope with the way they are being made to feel. They might feel like they want to spend more time on their own, and sometimes people don’t feel like they want to look after themselves properly. Why do you think this might be? (Don’t feel valued/ self-worth/ self-esteem is affected) It might mean that the person being bullied can’t concentrate properly at school, and they don’t get on as well with their friends as before. You can imagine why they might find these things tricky if they’re busy thinking about why they’ve been chosen to be bullied or feeling like the hurtful things people have said to them might be true. The person being bullied might feel really sad, or like they don’t want to take part in activities that they used to enjoy. They might really worry about things that they didn’t used to worry about before the bullying started.

What should I do if I ever feel it’s happening to me? Hopefully today will help you begin to understand how bullying can affect people and how serious it can be. There are always people in school who you can talk to if you feel that you might be being bullied. There are also places to go online, or you can ring Childline on 0800 1111. You don’t have to give your name and it’s a safe space where you are always listened to.