Provide appropriate and regularly updated staff training
Knowing what to look for is vital to early identification of peer-on-peer abuse and preventing it from escalating. Provide staff with regularly updated and appropriate safeguarding training that enables them to understand:
- How to identify the indicators of abuse
- What to do if they have a concern about a child
- How to respond to a report of abuse
- How to offer support to children
- Where to go if they need support
Challenge inappropriate behaviours
You're required to have a behaviour policy and measures in place to prevent all forms of bullying, and your child protection policy should also include the procedures you have in place to minimise the risk of peer-on-peer abuse.
As part of enforcing these policies and measures, ensure staff challenge inappropriate behaviours by, for example:
- Making clear that sexual violence and sexual harassment is not accepted, will never be tolerated and is not an inevitable part of growing up
- Not tolerating or dismissing sexual violence or sexual harassment as ‘banter’, ‘part of growing up’, ‘just having a laugh’ or ‘boys being boys’
Dismissing inappropriate behaviours risks normalising them. You should have clear sanctions in place to respond effectively to incidents.
Provide a preventative curriculum programme
Your curriculum should ensure that children are taught about safeguarding, including how to stay safe online. However, make sure your curriculum also tackles issues such as:
- Healthy and respectful relationships
- What respectful behaviour looks like
- Consent
- Gender roles, stereotyping and equality
- Body confidence and self-esteem
- Prejudiced behaviour
- Sexual violence and sexual harassment
These issues should be addressed in an age-appropriate and inclusive way, and could be explored through your computing, relationships and sex education (RSE), and personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) provision.
Resources
Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) Command has developed resources to help you support young people with developing confident, healthy approaches to relationships and the internet. These include videos, toolkits and activities that can be used in lessons, assemblies, or shared with parents.
Childnet International has an online safety PSHE toolkit with films and lesson plans exploring issues such as:
- Cyber-bullying
- Sexting
- Peer pressure
- Self-esteem
You can also find assembly ideas on the theme of bullying on assemblies.org.uk.
Members of The Key can download a useful staff fact sheet on peer-on-peer abuse available as part of our Safeguarding Training Centre. They can also access and adapt our model behaviour and child protection policies on The Key for School Leaders.