Source - BBC News education correspondent, Sean Coughlan

Parents in the UK feel powerless as consumer pressures have effects on their children.

The study by Unicef, comparing families in the UK, Sweden and Spain, found UK parents buying high status brands to “protect” their children from being bullying.

In the UK families felt under much greater pressure and where worried about a shortage of time with their children and feeling unable to resist the “materialism” of modern childhood.

Overwhelming fears about not having the right brand of trainers or electronic gadgets for children means that parents in the UK, mostly those on low incomes, felt they had to buy these goods, even if it meant getting into debt.

A 14-year-old from the UK told researchers: “No matter how much money they have, people still manage to put up a front of like they have money… You could live in a dustbin, and as long as you have an iPod, a Blackberry, then you’re accepted.”

This value attached to such possessions was a particular feature of family life in the UK, said report author Agnes Nairn.

“Fears about ‘brand bullying’ are much stronger in the UK. Parents seemed to feel much more helpless,” said Dr Nairn.

“There was an incredibly strong feeling that children have to have these things to fit in – otherwise they’ll be the only ones in their class not to have them.”

The Unicef report describes parents as feeling “compelled” to buy – even though they knew much of this spending was “pointless”.

“Toys, broken presents and unused electronics in the home were witness to this drive to acquire new possessions,” say the researchers.

It is clear that in order to be “accepted” within schools having the latest phone, gadget, trainers or brands does have an impact. Not fitting in can cause bullying problems within schools and does have a larger effect on family’s who try to buy things to help prevent their children from being bullied.

In order to combat these issues children need to recognise that they do not have to have an iphone to make real friends and to be accepted.

Educating children and making them aware of the problems they face regarding all issues surrounding bullying is something that Trap Media takes very seriously. There can be so many problems that lead to bullying, not fitting in either socially or regarding possessions is a key problem that needs to be addressed.

During Our Anti Bullying Workshops we aim to tackle numerous subjects regarding bullying. If there is a specific issue for example text bullying or brand bulling that your school is facing then we can gear or workshops around you and your chosen subjects and targets.

We find interaction through role play and drama makes children respond and learn at a much more efficient rate. Not only this but it enables children and teens to openly discuss and run through scenarios they may face day to day.

Brand Bullying is fairly new term but it has been around for a while, wanting possessions that others have and being made to conform has been an issue for years. Often bullying is focused around fitting in and not having the latest brands is something that bullies can use against victims.

Our Bullying Workshops are aimed at helping children and teens understand in more detail about bullying and how to deal with it. Our Anti Bullying Workshops are a great soundboard for students to discuss real problems or potential issues that worry them.

We also offer workshops for adults to help guide them in the correct direction regarding bullying, aimed at teachers and parents it is important to know how to deal with both victims and bullies.

Our Anti Bullying Workshops are designed to be customised according to the needs of your organisation and are a natural compliment to your anti-bullying policy.

To book a workshop on Anti Bullying please contact us on 0800 689 9909 for more information.

Worried about going back to school? Worried about school bullying? Intimidation, threats, taunting, violence?

Recently there’s been much increased awareness of bullying in schools it appears that bullying is on the increase. It seems that children bully for a variety of reasons and when dealing with child bullying it’s essential to identify who is the bully at the centre of the violence – there’s usually one person who’s the gang leader – and the reasons for bullying which include:

• frustration – a child is impaired in some way and is frustrated and resentful because the source of their difficulty has not been identified – problems can include deafness, dyslexia, autism, allergy, being left-handed or some unidentified learning difficulty – nevertheless the child is expected to perform at the level required by the school and no attempt is made to identify the source of the frustration.
• the child is being bullied, the responsible adults have repeatedly failed in their duty of care, so the child slowly and reluctantly starts to exhibit aggressive behaviors because that’s the only way to survive in this bullying-entrenched climate.
• poor or no role model – the child has no role model at home, or a poor role model for one or both parents and has never had the opportunity to learn behavior skills
• abuse at home – the child is being abused and is expressing their anger through bullying.
• neglect at home – similar to abuse as the child’s emotional and behavioral development is being restricted.
• undue influence – the child has fallen in with the wrong crowd.
• conduct disorder – the child has a conduct disorder, the precursor to antisocial, psychopathic or other personality disorder.

So how do you inform and educate children on their level about the issues of bullying?

We find that working with them and including them in finding out why they may have issues or face issues is the key.

By allowing children to openly discuss issues problems and act out scenarios they are acknowledging and facing this huge problem that goes on in many schools, bullying in schools is at a higher level than ever and we need to make sure children understand why this occurs and how to prevent it.

Trap Media offer a range of PSHE workshops to help prevent all kinds of problems and issues. Using drama based workshops and involving all participants it is a great way to educate and help combat the issues children face in schools. Our Anti Bullying Workshops are run by the UK’s best facilitators who have key knowledge and experience in dealing with tricky subjects such as bullying.

Our Anti Bullying Workshops are designed to be customised according to the needs of your organisation and are a natural compliment to your anti-bullying policy.

To book a workshop on Anti Bullying please contact us on 0800 689 9909 for more information.

Bullying isn’t something that just happens in the real world, most teenagers have a social network presence and more and more are being bullied through this social networking. It is very important that we help to educate children in how to correctly use these sites so that they can help to prevent online bullying.

Anti Bullying Workshops help tackle a range of bullying problems, one being that of social network bullying or cyber bullying. Our workshops are aimed at helping to make children aware of the pitfalls of social networking and helping them to manage and address any issues that may arise.

So what are online social networks?

There are many different online social networks that users chat or interact with other internet users.

You can create your own profile and user name; fill in details about your likes and dislikes, share all your interests, comments, add music, videos and photos to your profile that other people can comment on. All of which is a great way of sharing information and interacting however this can also be used by bullies to target individuals.

Sadly there are people who use social networks to tease and bully others, abusing the system and individuals with various methods.

Ways of bullying online:

• post abusive messages on your profile wall
• add rude comments to a picture you’ve uploaded
• put a video or photo on their own profile that makes fun of someone and encourage their friends to send it to others
• share an abusive message or photo with other users

Bullying on social networks is very difficult to deal with, especially if a victim is being bullied by the same person at school.

There are some methods you can use to help, if you’re getting bullied by a linked friend, block them or delete them from your list. If you’re getting bullied by someone and they try to become your friend online, you can refuse their friend request. After all, why would you want to chat online with someone you don’t get on with in the real world?

In our specialist workshops we offer help to children who need it guidance on subjects such as Cyber bullying how to prevent or safeguard against it, ways of dealing with bullies and making sure that you have your privacy and security settings set correctly.

Our Bullying Workshops are aimed at helping children understand in more detail about bullying and how to deal with it, it is important that all of us look out for these signs and try to help put a stop to it. We also offer workshops for adults to help guide them in the correct direction regarding bullying, aimed at teachers and parents it is important to know how to deal with both victims and bullies.

Our Anti Bullying Workshops are designed to be customised according to the needs of your organisation and are a natural compliment to your anti-bullying policy.

To book an Anti Bullying Workshop please contact us on 0800 689 9909 for more information.