Table of Contents
Physical bullying
Smashing, hitting, pinching, biting, pushing, pulling, shoving, slapping, punching, strangling, kicking, intentional bumping, tripping, scratching, throwing things, ripping and double banking.
Body language
Bullying can be done by gestures:
- ‘It can just be a dirty look.’
- ‘It might be a sly smile to mean that something is wrong.’
Verbal bullying
- ‘What’s your go?’
- running someone down
- carrying yarns
- calling someone names
- chipping
- jarring
- teasing someone in a mean and hurtful way
- being sarcastic in a hurtful way
Threatening
- telling someone they’re going to get their family involved, like their brothers and sisters, cousins, parents, carers, nana, aunties or uncles
- making someone feel scared of them
- telling someone they are going to hurt them
- yarning to get someone into trouble
- forcing someone to do their schoolwork or homework for you
- forcing someone to break the law like stealing or damaging someone’s stuff
Property abuse
- taking someone else’s stuff
- breaking or damaging someone else’s belongings
- stealing someone else’s money
Emotional bullying
- getting kids into trouble or wrong situations
- ignoring someone or keeping them out of group conversations (known as exclusion)
- making fun of someone’s appearance or body odour
- trying to get others to dislike someone or not have anything to do with them
- carrying yarns about someone
- trying to get other kids to harm someone
Sexual bullying
- touching someone when and where they don’t want to be touched
- pressuring someone to do things that they don't want to do with their body or with someone else’s body
- making sexual comments about the way someone looks or behaves
Racist bullying
- making racial comments about someone and/or their family; it might be telling someone they aren’t Aboriginal enough or that they’re trying to be or act ‘White’
- making rude gestures or jokes about someone’s religion
- making comments about the way their features look compared to others (e.g. big lips, curly hair)
Cyber bullying
- uploading videos of other people on social network internet and video sites, such as Bebo, MySpace, Facebook and YouTube
- sending harassing or abusive emails
- making prank or abusive phone calls
- sending someone offensive texts (SMS) and multimedia messages (MMS) by mobile phone
- carrying yarns through chat rooms, by email, by SMS and MMS, or on Twitter
- posting insulting messages in chat rooms and on social network sites
Being picked on
Being picked on can be a form of bullying. Sometimes it's hard to work out why kids pick on other kids. It could be because:
- someone is considered a winyarn
- someone is in the wrong place at the wrong time
- someone is different (taller, fatter, darker or lighter skinned, smarter, weaker or slower)
- someone who seems easy to frighten or upset
- someone who is smaller or younger
Bystander bullying
Bystanders are people who see, support or know the bullying is going on.
Bystanders can be:
- the friends of the kid bullying
- the friends of the kid being bullied
- kids who see the bullying happening
- kids who know about the bullying
Bystander graphic adapted from Erceg and Cross (2004). Friendly Schools and Families Project: Classroom Teaching & Learning, Handbook Level 5. Child Health Promotion Research Unit: Edith Cowan University, Western Australia.
Kids who bully feel powerful when bystanders give them attention.
