Talking Point: How can young people raise awareness of bullying?

This week is National Anti-Bullying Week (15 to 19 November), and this year's theme is about taking action together and encouraging children and young people to speak up about bullying. In an effort to further protect young people, anti-bullying charity Beatbullying yesterday (Monday 15 November) launched the Big March, an online interactive protest march displayed across 50 websites, including cypnow.co.uk, to lobby the government to introduce new anti-bullying legislation.

Start a discussion with young people about bullying. How does bullying affect young people? Have young people ever been bullied, or witnessed bullying? What happened? Did they tell someone? What action was taken? How would young people know if someone was being bullied? Would there be physical signs such as bruises and cuts? What about emotional signs? How would being bullied affect someone's mental wellbeing? Would they start acting differently? Would they seem withdrawn? Less confident? Afraid? Ashamed?