At Oakwood, we recognise the right of every child to learn in a safe and secure environment. We are determined to promote pro-social behavior through our school values of kindness, curiosity and ambition and develop a school ethos where anti-social behaviour, including bullying behaviour, is regarded as unacceptable. We aim to develop an environment in which all members of the Oakwood school community are valued and are encouraged to treat everyone with kindness and respect. We aim to ensure all members of our community are curious about instances where bullying may be occurring and we are ambitious in our assertion that bullying is dealt with efficiently and effectively towards the complete eradication of bullying within our community.

We recognise that bullying can be emotionally abusive and can cause severe and adverse effects on children’s emotional development.

Bullying is recognised by Oakwood as being a form of peer-on-peer abuse; children can abuse other children.

• Abuse is abuse and it should never be tolerated or passed off as “banter”, “just having a laugh” or “part of growing up”.
• We recognise that even if there are no reports of bullying, it does not mean it is not happening and it may be the case that it is just not being reported.
• All victims will be taken seriously and offered appropriate support, regardless of where the abuse takes place.

Oakwood Primary School’s approach to anti-bullying and the contents of this policy are founded in the guidance provided in the legislation below, linked school policies and the information developed by the Anti-Bullying Alliance.

Definition of Bullying

“The repetitive, intentional hurting of one person or group by another person or group, where the relationship involves an imbalance of power. Bullying can be physical, verbal or psychological. It can happen face-to-face or online.”

Our definition of bullying has been taken from the Anti-bullying Alliance with the DfE's Preventing and Tackling Bullying guidance in consideration.

Guide for Parents

Parents should discuss any concerns with their child's class teacher in all instances. Should it be more convenient, please complete a bullying concern form and hand this to either the class teacher or the school office. These forms can be found at the bottom of this page. All bullying concern forms will be directed to the child's class teacher who will then act upon the information in accordance with the school's Anti-bullying policy.