Cyber-Mobbing - What teachers don'T hAVE ACCESS TO
Mobbing has been a topic that schools have been dealing with for a long time. The consequences of bullying of pupils can have dire consequences such as social isolation and traumatic experiences. For teachers it has never been easy to discern what is really going on. If the name calling in class is harmless or if it follows a pattern that distinctly targets a single pupil.
With growing numbers of students in classes and no extra personal to take care of problems the problem even got worse. It is hard enough for a teacher to get to know each single student in his class. It is however close to impossible to secure everybody’s psychological well-being.
The school has a chance to intervene when a pupil comes forward with his / her problems. Approaches that can be a remedy can be holding a class conference, discussing the issues and having an eye onto what happens in class and in between lessons.
In the last years a phenomenon has come up that rendered the latter solution almost impossible. Contrary to the bullying that takes place in school, kids today make extensive use of the internet and mobile communication to get to their victims. This can be social networks, e-mail or instant message communication. To the teacher this stays invisible.
In this context we speak of cyber-mobbing or cyber-bullying. The portal klicksafe.de offers a lot of information on this topic for pupils, teachers and parents. According to their definition cyber-mobbing is deliberate insulting, threatening, denouncing, or harassing by means of using modern communication devices, often over a longer period of time.
Source: Klicksafe – Brochure on Cyber-Mobbing
Looking at statistics it is not a rare phenomenon in German schools. In 2009 in the context of the JIM study that did surveys with twelve to nineteen year-olds, 24 % said that they knew somebody who has been a victim of this kind of mobbing practices. This is quarter of a class. According to a study by the University Koblenz-Landau (zepf) 19.9 % of pupils from first the thirteenth grade were in some way affected by cyber mobbing. Mostly it took the form of spreading rumors about a person.
With growing numbers of students in classes and no extra personal to take care of problems the problem even got worse. It is hard enough for a teacher to get to know each single student in his class. It is however close to impossible to secure everybody’s psychological well-being.
The school has a chance to intervene when a pupil comes forward with his / her problems. Approaches that can be a remedy can be holding a class conference, discussing the issues and having an eye onto what happens in class and in between lessons.
In the last years a phenomenon has come up that rendered the latter solution almost impossible. Contrary to the bullying that takes place in school, kids today make extensive use of the internet and mobile communication to get to their victims. This can be social networks, e-mail or instant message communication. To the teacher this stays invisible.
In this context we speak of cyber-mobbing or cyber-bullying. The portal klicksafe.de offers a lot of information on this topic for pupils, teachers and parents. According to their definition cyber-mobbing is deliberate insulting, threatening, denouncing, or harassing by means of using modern communication devices, often over a longer period of time.
Source: Klicksafe – Brochure on Cyber-Mobbing
Looking at statistics it is not a rare phenomenon in German schools. In 2009 in the context of the JIM study that did surveys with twelve to nineteen year-olds, 24 % said that they knew somebody who has been a victim of this kind of mobbing practices. This is quarter of a class. According to a study by the University Koblenz-Landau (zepf) 19.9 % of pupils from first the thirteenth grade were in some way affected by cyber mobbing. Mostly it took the form of spreading rumors about a person.
What makes
cyber-mobbing such an explosive topic is that the internet offers a lot of
advantages for the bullies. For one they can stay anonymous. An e-mail address or
a social platform profile from which the harmful messages are sent can be
registered with a false name. So the victim often does not even know who is after
him. The same counts for mobile phones where the number can be concealed when
making a call.
Furthermore the content of the mobbing, for example pictures, spread rapidly on the internet. A good example for this is the so called Star Wars Kid. A Canadian boy made a video of himself using a golf club like a laser sword. He left this video in a media room at school where other pupils found it and published it on the internet, where it gained a very high popularity within days, and soon new versions with sound and light effects could be found on the web. The incident led to the kid being harassed by the audience and ended in his requiring psychological treatment.
Other factors are that cyber-mobbing can take place around the clock and not in every case the bully has to be a friend or another pupil from the same school. There have been incidents where complete stranger sought out public profiles on social platforms.
What can teachers and schools do to better the situation? The first thing is taking up preventive measures. Often pupils do not realize what harm they are doing with mobbing another person. Thus the topic should be discussed openly. A school should foster a culture of respectful treatment of others. This should extend to online activities. At best a school should have somebody who is specialized in the department of mobbing and a concept of how to deal with the problem. In the worst cases also the police and other institutions can offer help from the outside.
The one important thing teachers can contribute, is being in touch with the class and making room for improving the social climate. This involves taking time for activities that do not only deal with the contents from the subjects he / she is teaching. Also open lessons for exchange within the class and the discussion of problems can be helpful. Last but not least teachers should strive to have an eye on each and every pupil’s well-being. As hard as that might be in classes that are considered to full even for good teaching.
Cyber-bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken very seriously. It requires mobility on the part of the schools as they have to develop new concepts for dealing with the issue. Teachers can do special trainings and should in any case be made aware of what takes place out of their sight. There is a very good video on the topic by childnet international that wants to raise awareness:
Furthermore the content of the mobbing, for example pictures, spread rapidly on the internet. A good example for this is the so called Star Wars Kid. A Canadian boy made a video of himself using a golf club like a laser sword. He left this video in a media room at school where other pupils found it and published it on the internet, where it gained a very high popularity within days, and soon new versions with sound and light effects could be found on the web. The incident led to the kid being harassed by the audience and ended in his requiring psychological treatment.
Other factors are that cyber-mobbing can take place around the clock and not in every case the bully has to be a friend or another pupil from the same school. There have been incidents where complete stranger sought out public profiles on social platforms.
What can teachers and schools do to better the situation? The first thing is taking up preventive measures. Often pupils do not realize what harm they are doing with mobbing another person. Thus the topic should be discussed openly. A school should foster a culture of respectful treatment of others. This should extend to online activities. At best a school should have somebody who is specialized in the department of mobbing and a concept of how to deal with the problem. In the worst cases also the police and other institutions can offer help from the outside.
The one important thing teachers can contribute, is being in touch with the class and making room for improving the social climate. This involves taking time for activities that do not only deal with the contents from the subjects he / she is teaching. Also open lessons for exchange within the class and the discussion of problems can be helpful. Last but not least teachers should strive to have an eye on each and every pupil’s well-being. As hard as that might be in classes that are considered to full even for good teaching.
Cyber-bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken very seriously. It requires mobility on the part of the schools as they have to develop new concepts for dealing with the issue. Teachers can do special trainings and should in any case be made aware of what takes place out of their sight. There is a very good video on the topic by childnet international that wants to raise awareness:
