Site You Should Know About

New Site You Should Know About: Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, is a wonderful site that includes a variety of classroom activities and teaching kits that can be used to help teach students about tolerance. Included in the website is the DVD Bullied: A Student, a School and a Case That Made History. For any school counselors who have not seen this DVD, I implore you, GO SEE IT NOW. Order your free copy from this website! It truly is an important message about tolerance that we all need to remember. You can order your free copy and learn more about the DVD here: http://www.tolerance.org/bullied.

In addition, take some time to learn more about the amazing organization that is the Southern Poverty Law Center. They have some amazing resources that can be helpful to school counselors that can be located here: http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/publications, including:

Release Statement from GLSEN, PFLAG, and the Trevor Project on Recent Tragedies

In relation to my last post, I wanted to share this Release Statement emailed last night from LGBTQ organizations on the recent tragedies of several LGBTQ youth due to bullying. Hopefully you will find it inspiring and useful as I did.

Note of Caution: In an effort not to sensationalize these events, GLSEN is refraining from posting this statement to our social networking sites, including Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, etc. We ask that you please take the same caution to reduce the risk of future tragedies.

Recently, there has been heightened media attention surrounding the suicides in New Jersey,Texas, California, Indiana, and Minnesota of several youth who were known to be bullied relentlessly because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity.

These horrific stories across the country reflect on school bullying culture and how it can lead to tragedy. Such cases are not new, but actually do reveal an important trend: the public is becoming more informed and in tune to the realities that adversely affect our youth. However, it is now up to the public to not just be aware, but to be active in changing this reality.

Bullying Prevention Week: October 4-10

It's coming up folks! While the whole month of October is technically bully prevention month, bully prevention week is usually celebrated during the first week of October-- this year October 4th through 10th. The PACER Center has put together a number of resources that counselors can use to infuse their school with anti-bullying preventative messages. Check it out here: http://www.pacer.org/bullying/bpam/index.asp.

There are obviously many other bullying resources available in publications and online. You may want to take this time to start becoming familiar with them as Bully Prevention week and month come closer. Think about ways that you can start infusing bully prevention into your everyday work with all the students you encounter. We may be just interns, but this is something we can always be considering!

What I'll Be Reading this Weekend: The Girls

The Girls, by Amy Goldman Koss, appropriate for grades 5 through 8. After seeing the bibliotherapy seminar a few weeks ago, the other intern and I at our elementary school though it would be interesting to follow in the speaker's footsteps and develop a group curriculum for fifth grade girls based on this novel. The speaker at the seminar could not recommend this book enough and said that her fifth grade girls could NOT put it down! Let's see if I feel the same way :)

Here's a description from Amazon.com:

When the other members of Maya's clique decide to ostracize her, the girl is shocked and devastated. She has no clue what she could have done wrong, and neither do Brianna, Renee, or Darcy. However, Candace is their leader, the self-assured one, the one who decides who's in and who's not, and, suddenly, Maya's not. In brief chapters that jump from one girl's perspective to another, a picture emerges of social status and peer pressure among middle schoolers who are struggling to figure out who they are, where they belong, and maybe even what is right.

Middle school cliques, relational aggression, queen bees, what more could a girl ask for, right?

Sexting!

To go along with my previous post about cyberbullying, Sexting (sending sexually explicit messages or photographs, usually via cell phones) is becoming a more and more common phenomenon, and is often included in cyberbullying. For those of you who may be dealing with this issue in your middle or high school, here are some resources you may find useful:

Sexting Fact Sheet: http://www.ncpc.org/resources/files/pdf/internet-safety/NCPC-FactSheet1.pdf

The Lowdown on Sexting: http://www.greatschools.org/parenting/behavior-discipline/sexting.gs?content=2079&print=true&fromPage=all

Talking to Kids and Teens about Social Media and Sexting: http://www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/june09socialmedia.htm

Safety Tips for Tweens and Teens: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/tech/tec14.shtm

Girl Scouts Cyberbullying (Sexting): http://lmk.girlscouts.org/

The Truth About Teens and Sexting: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=7337547&page=1

Rosalind Wiseman "Sext-Ed": http://rosalindwiseman.com/2010/01/12/sexted/

Gosh, time does fly! Let's talk about...Cyberbullying!

Well, folks, time certainly does fly when you're learning how to be an intern! As you can see, I haven't been updating as frequently as I suspected might occur. I promise, I will try an do better.

Today I want to talk about Cyberbullying. We all know about bullying and how harmful its effects can be on the bully, the victim, and the bystander. And I'm sure, by now, you've all heard about cyberbullying-- the 21st century, technological version of run-of-the-mill bullying--whether it's on the internet, through social media networks like Facebook or MySpace, through cell phones, wherever! -- If it uses technology and it's bullying, then it's cyberbullying.

Bullying Books!

Just realized you need to do a bullying lesson tomorrow with your 4th graders? Check out the following great illustrated books with a bullying theme:

Alley Oops by Janice Levy
Band- ‐Aid Chicken by Becky Henton
Billy Bully by Ana Galan
Bullies Are A Pain in the Brain by Trevor Romain
Bully B.E.A.N.S. by Julia Cook
Carla’s Sandwich by Debbie Herman
Don’t Laugh At Me by Steven Seskin and Allen Shamblin
Good- ‐Bye Bully Machine by Debbie Fox and Allan Beane
Hey Little Ant by Phillip and Hannah Hoose
Howard B. Wigglebottom Learns About Bullies by Howard Binkow
Jungle Bullies by Steven Kroll
Just Kidding by Trudy Ludwig
My Secret Bully by Trudy Ludwig
Nobody Knew What To Do by Becky Ray McCain
Oliver Button Is A Sissy by Tomie DePaola
One by Kathryn Otoshi
Our Friendship Rules byPeggy Moss and Dee Dee Tardif
Say Something by Peggy Moss
Simon’s Hook: A story about teases and put- ‐downs by Karen Gedig Burnett
Stop Bullying Bobby! by Dana Smith Mansell
Stop Picking On Me by Pat Thomas
The Recess Queen by Alexis O’Neill
Trouble Talk by Trudy Ludwig