Say Something

For the Respect lesson in 5th grade, we read the book Say Something by Peggy Moss. This is a great book to go along with the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program because it talks about the roles of the bystander and ally. In the book, the main character sees other students being made fun of, pushed around, and laughed at. She comments to the reader that she does not do those things, but she does not defend the other students either. After reading the book, we discussed the terms bully, victim, and bystander. We discussed the different reasons why someone may remain a bystander and not stand up for the victim.

After our discussion we talked about how to "say something" to stand up against bullying. The students came up

with ideas of phrases they could say to both the bully and the victim such as "Stop it! That's not nice!" or "Come and play with me today." We then created a poster with all of our sayings. The posters are hung in the 5th grade classrooms as a reminder for the students to say something and become an ally rather than a bystander.