School Bullying: Teachers Helping Students Cope

2. School bullying: Teachers helping students cope. London: Routledge. Author: Phillip T. Slee Publisher: Routledge, London Year of Publication: 2017 ISBN: 978-1-1389-1193-2Educators' and parents' as well as policy makers' concerns about bullying of children have increased significantly. There is increasing awareness of its pervasiveness in schools and classrooms, particularly of the victimisation of marginalised students, as well as of its new form in cyberbullying. There is also higher awareness of the harmful effects of a lack of feeling of safety and social wellbeing on children's learning. On the other hand there is a growing understanding of how bullying can be effectively addressed (e.g. Downes and Cefai, 2016).Those who are seeking up-to-date, evidence-based, clearly outlined and critically evaluated information on all the above issues about bullying should make use of Slee's (2017) book under review on School Bullying. Slee has been a frontrunner in researching bullying in Australian schools (Rigby and Slee, 1991). He has also been a long time practitioner in supporting schools to reduce bullying (Slee, 1996). In his new publication, he shares both his deeper and wider understanding of the nature, extent and impact of bullying as well as effective ways for addressing it. The book is full of descriptions of instruments used to investigate the nature, prevalence, and impact of bullying as well as of the relevant findings. These are complemented with descriptions of programmes for enabling schools to reduce bullying. The book's greatest value is that it gives a comprehensive account of school bullying, while still remaining grounded in the evidence and providing an opportunity to grasp the essential elements and practicalities of each issue.Modelling one of the ways in which bullying should be addressed, Slee opens the book with a chapter on 'Promoting positive peer relations at school'. Here he describes the nature and healthy impact of pro-social behaviour and friendships as well as strategies for the development of prosocial skills including empathy and conflict resolution. This is complemented with another chapter on building friendships and social networks, including through the use of ICT.The next three chapters present a detailed account of the nature and extent of both 'traditional' and cyberbullying, as well as how psychology has tried to explain its occurrence particularly in relation to the biopsychosocial development of aggression, anger and violence. …