Reflections

A Walk Through My Slide:

For this slide it visually shows the type of bullying that I did my section of the project on which was physical bullying.  Physical bullying is in any way causing physical harm to another person.  This is the way boys tend to bully the most.  They resort to physical violence with things such as hitting, punching, pushing, and fighting whereas girls are more of a verbal bully. Physical violence is becoming more sever and almost every day as you watch the news you learn of another incident where I child is now in the hospital.  For instance, Bailey an 11 year old boy who has been in a coma for over the past month due to bullying.  While he was on the playground at school two other boys jumped him and broke his nose. This is why schools are pushing bullying prevention and Anti-bullying week, which, I think, is a great idea.  We need to educate them while they are young to help stop and prevent bullying.

What I learned about my blog topic:

As an aspiring teacher, bullying is a very important topic to me.  With becoming a part of the BullyBeatDown blog I became more aware of bullying incidents going on the news and what things are being done to prevent it.  One of my blog posts is about how Sen. Casey and Cartoon Network joined together and go around to middle schools and talk about bullying prevention.  Also Sen. Casey has drafted a bill in which schools will are federally funded will be required to teach bullying prevention.  Also I blogged about a new case study that studied the effects bullying has on a person throughout their life.  This was the first study to follow the same person for more than a short limited time.  What they found was amazing but made perfect sense.  Both the bully, and the victims have dramatic effects for the rest of their life. Please read my blog titled Bullying Effects Carried On into Adulthood for the full story and amazing statistics.

Final Project

For our final project we created a small powerpoint on Bullying.  Here is the link to check it out! Let us know what you think!

https://www.dropbox.com/s/f5qgnn9k7qb9wlb/Bullying%20pics%20preview%20(write%20your%20topic%20under%20the%20pic%20you%20post)%20with%20narrative.pptx

Reflection on Pecha Kucha Assignment & Blog Topic

 

Cyber bullying is becoming more common in today’s society, especially for the younger generation. The slide I chose to write about is cyber bullying. I decided to draw out my pictures because I thought it would make the Pecha Kucha slide show more interesting. I did a basic drawing of a man sitting on a computer looking frightened. The bald man is nervously typing away and because there were not allowed to be words on the slideshow, I drew symbols on the computer screen. I think the drawing is simple but self-explanatory for any person, any age. I did not want to make the picture too complicated because I thought it was hard to describe cyber bullying through a drawing. It is unlike physical bullying where you can draw someone hurting another person. My narrative states, “ Cyber bullying is becoming more common in society with young people. It is used in electronic forms on social networking sites to harass their victims.” The reference I made was from “Becoming Screen Literate”, because Kelly talks about how screens are everywhere we go. I never really thought about how much I am looking at a screen until I read this article. It is absolutely crazy to think screens are everywhere and with everything we do! I quoted Kelly when he said, “We are becoming people of the screen.” Which is a totally true statement and we are continuing to grow with our technology, which involves screens being everywhere.

This slide blends in with each of my other slides for my part of the presentation and I believe each of my slides builds off of each other. My five slides are the introduction to some types of bullying. I will give a brief description on each type and example. Then each member in the group will go into deep detail of their specific type of bullying or how we can help prevent bullying. The drawing, narrative and reference all flow nicely together and each builds off one another. The drawing of the man with a computer screen in front of him shows the electronic form of cyber bullying, which I state in my narrative. Then the quote by Kelly builds how we are becoming people of the screen. In my cyber bullying slide, maybe I could have made the man look more scared or I could of put some type of picture on the computer screen to show more of cyber bullying. Overall, I am very proud of each of my drawings and narrative. Everything has a nice flow to one another and I was excited to share my part of the bullying presentation.

The last four weeks I was giving a topic to learn and discuss about in a group of Elementary Education students. Our topic was Bullying and although I was aware of bullying, I did not realize the depth of bullying and the victims. In some of my education classes we discussed the topic of bullying and how badly it has gotten, but we never studied it or went into greater detail about the topic. I was glad to have the topic of bullying because I want to be in the education field one day and I can’t imagine how bad bullying will be in a few years. I was very eager to read articles on all types of bullying and to see if there was some sort of solution in this madness. My favorite time to blog was when I was able to pick a bullying topic of my choice. At this time I was able to explore through articles and bullying websites to find out about bullying. I only knew the common stuff about bullying and was not aware of how horrible it has become in todays society.

Whether kids are in school or at home, they can be bullied and most kids do not tell their parents or teachers. Verbal bullying, relational and reactive bullying may go unnoticed by parents or teachers because they are harder to identify. Parents need to continue to be apart of their child’s life and to always ask questions about their day, school and life. Personally, I think teachers need to do the same thing because during the school year, teachers are with their students more than the parents. In the article “Becoming Screen Literate”, Kelly makes a lot of great points on how our society is becoming apart of the screen. He states, “When technology shifts, it bends the culture.” Kelly then says, “Once, long ago, culture revolved around the spoken word. The oral skills of memorization, recitation and rhetoric instilled in societies a reverence for the past, the ambiguous, the ornate and the subjective.” Maybe because our society is growing and becoming so attached to technology, the bullying is more severe. Kids can see videos or images online and may want to mimic what they see.

The “Cyberspace Rape; or How an Evil Clown, a Haitian Trickster Spirit, Two Wizards, and a Cast of Dozens Turned a Database into a Society”, shows how dangerous the internet is and how you may not know the person you are talking too. This really opened my eyes to see how scary the world is and how harmful it can be to someone in real life. A lot of the articles read were not necessarily related to bullying but in there own ways they were. Most of the articles read in Web 2.0 show the increase of technology, video games and how advanced we have become. Each article could somewhat tie to bullying whether it was meant too or not.

Bullied Boy lies in a Coma

            While watching the news a recent story grabbed my attention.  Bailey, an 11 year old boy in the Darby Township School was jumped last month by two classmates while on recess.  He received a broken nose.  The next day he started to have severe seizures which forced the doctors to put him into a medically-induced coma where he still lies today.  Since the incident occurred Bailey received a blood transfusion and currently has pneumonia.

The family has been patiently waiting, but they cannot help but question what will be with the two boys that attacked their son.  “While the students who jumped Bailey were suspended for two days, police have not yet revealed whether they will be criminally charged. “I would like to see these kids punished,” said Fecanin. “Something has to be done. I don’t know what’s taking them so long.” Delaware County District Attorney Jack Whelan says investigators are trying to determine if the injuries Bailey received in the fight caused his seizures. Investigators interviewed kids and recess aides who were on the playground when the fight broke out. “We can assure them that we are going to continue with our investigation,” said Whelan.” (Chang,NBC).

Bullying has become an all too familiar event in today’s schooling which needs to be eliminated.  Every day on the news there is another story about a young child that took their life because they were being bullied every day at school for years, and this is unacceptable. You would think with the advances we have made as time progresses we would have more ways to prevent these things from happening.  Unfortunately, with our advances there are now more ways for bullies to attack others, now with our biggest form of bullying known as cyber bulling.

Thankfully there are many programs schools now participate in to help raise awareness about bullying, like for instance there is a whole week dedicated to awareness to bullying which I think is awesome.  Teaching students to come together and recognizes the signs of bullying and what to do if you are a victim or bystander at a young age is what needs to be done in every school around the world.  Our world has become too desensitized to violence we have young children, like in this story beating other children while on the playground.  Now what do we do with these boys who attacked Bailey?  Are they charged and tried in a local court system or are they reprimanded by the school. As of now they have been suspended for two days and that’s it.  As the parents of this child I would be absolutely floored if this is the only punishment these boys receive.  I do not take bullying lightly.  A child should feel safe going to school and be able to learn in a comfortable environment.  This should be every school and teachers goal, but sadly it is not.

To read the NBC article follow the link : http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Bullied-Boy-Lies-in-a-Coma-192156541.html

 

 

Bullied Canadian Teen shared story

After reading this horrific and saddening story about Amanda Todd, I am in disbelief of how cruel people are. I do not understand how people can be so mean and malicious to ruin another persons life or make them not want to exist anymore. The story of Amanda Todd was extremely touching and I hope her story is heard so other teens who are bullies will see the reason to stop. In my opinion, I feel that teens think it is okay to bully others because “it’s what high school is”. I believe this to be untrue. Amanda was a 15 year old student in Toronto, Canada. She was in the tenth grade and a cheerleader at her high school.

In Oct 2012, Amanda committed suicide. On September 7, 2012, Amanda made a youtube video on her story of being bullied. Although, Amanda did not speak at all during the video she made flashcards that told her story for her. Amanda explains she was lured by a stranger to show her breasts and then the picture ended up on Facebook, in which all of her school friends saw it. Amanda switched schools after this awful incident and then encountered another girls boyfriend. Well this started the bullying all over again. Amanda was beaten and continuously bullied again. She writes in her youtube video that she went home and drank bleach and thought she was going to die, but she was rushed to the hospital to flush out the bleach inside of her. After, Amanda turned to cutting and overdosing and much more anxiety. She was in the hospital for overdose and was in contact with a counselor but none of this helped her.

After, I read the Amanda Todd story, I decided to find her youtube video of her story. I watched the almost 9 minute video where Amanda told her bullying story and I broke my heart. This 15 year old high school student was way too young to die and it is so saddening that this had to happen. She writes in her youtube video, “I am not doing this for attention to be an inspiration and to show that I can be strong.” She then goes on and says, “Everyone’s future will be bright one day, you just gotta pull through. I’m still here, aren’t I?” Those words sank into me and I thought if she was trying to show how strong she was, why did she commit suicide? How is she going to show other teens that are being bullied that they can pull through and overcome this horrible experience, when in fact she could not handle the pain anymore. The British Columbia gym where Amanda was a cheerleader posted a statement on its Facebook page.”I ask that we all watch her video and share her story so that her loss is not in vain,” the statement read. “Allow this to be her legacy. Allow us to all look around and find the next Amanda before another precious spunky teenager is lost.” This story should be spread so that others can hear her story and to see the pain and outcome of someone being constantly bullied.

Cyberspace Rape

For a person living in the 21^st century is sounds pretty crazy to be raped through cyberspace, yet believable.  People today know the danger that lurks online and many do things to protect themselves.  For instances, I have my Facebook on private and only accept people to be my friend that I physically know. Also I do not put any personal details online like my last name or where I live.  Many people also do this put is it enough?  Although technology has come a long way is it still safe?

Julian Dibbell’s article “Cyberspace Rape; or How an Evil Clown, a Haitian Trickster Spirit, Two Wizards, and a Cast of Dozens Turned a Database into a Society”  she explains how this cyberspace rape all started.  It was with the game of LambdaMOO where an evil man started it all.  “And there was cruelty enough lurking in the appearance of Mr. Bungle presented to the virtual world- he was at the time a fat, oleaginous, Bisquick-faced clown dressed in cum-stained harlequim garb and girdled with a mistletoe-and-hemlock belt whose buckle bore the quaint inscription “KISS ME UNDER THIS, BITCH!”… The he began by using his voodoo doll to force one of the room’s occupants to sexually service him in a variety of more or less conventional ways.  That this victim was legba, a Haitian trickster spirit of inderminate gender, brown-skinned and wearing an expensive pearl gray suit, top hat, and dark glasses. That legba heaped vicious imprecations on him all the while and that he was soon ejected bodily from the room.” (Dibbell, 200).  The idea that someone can do this to you while playing a game online is ridiculous and scary.  This incident then changed the way for the world we now live in.

After this incident some light was shed as to how dangerous the internet is and how you may not know the person you are talking to or think you know.  Today there is a show on MTV called “Catfish” that fully explores the people you think you know online to see if they are who they really say they are.  Most of them are people who created fake Facebooks because they were bored and just started to talk to people to get attention.  But this is wrong and many people do not realize it. What you do online can hurt someone in real life.

To read the article go to: http://williamwolff.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/dibbell-cyberspace-1993.pdf

Exploring the life of a Gamer

I don’t know much about the video gaming world, so I felt that I learned a lot from the video David Perry: Are games better than life. I didn’t think that I was going to enjoy this video as much as I actually did. It was very cool to see what games were like when they were first created and played on the first computers called Sinclair. Perry said “you had to use your imagination to play the games”. The graphics were terrible and I can understand that you needed to have a pretty imaginative mind to play games back then. I was also shocked to learn that the average gamer isn’t a child or even a teenager; the average age of gamers is 30 years old. That information totally shocked me. So other shocking information was Perry said that 83% of games don’t have violence in them, this was hard to believe because of all the news you hear about how violent video games are and how children shouldn’t be playing them. Well it turns out not all are violent and more 30 year olds are playing then children! I was really blown away with the video Perry showed about the evolution of gaming graphics from 1973- 2007. I can remember playing some of the games like Duck Hunt and Super Mario. To see the comparison to what the gaming graphics look like now is just incredible! The worlds and characters that are created today are so detailed and so life like. This leads me to Perrys’ two next parts of his presentation. The question ‘If this is now, what will the gaming graphics look like in ten years’ and the life of a video game addict. Like I said previously the worlds and characters are so detailed and so life like it’s incredible. Michael a student that Perry knows created a video to explain what the life of a gamer is like. Michael explains gaming as an alternate existence. He often feels like he is questioning what is real because the games play on the players emotions, their fears, their hopes. Players get emotionally invested in the games and Michael says that because of video games this generation” believes that they can actually fly a plane, snowboard, and even kill a man.” This leads to Michael talking about Video game violence; he says that “real life violence is starting to look more like video game violence.” Instead of vice versa, these interactive games make people believe they can do what they do in the games in real life. They tend to compare the virtual world to the real world and like the virtual world better because it is perfect. Michael’s example was the fact that he has driven thousands of more miles on the TV screen then down an actual rode and “when he is driving and the sun is setting, it’s almost as beautiful as his video game but his virtual world is perfect all of the time, unlike the real world. I just can’t believe how wrapped up in video games people get. Michael says you can learn from the video games, but I believe you have to actually live your life around real places, real people, and real things, not in front of a TV screen playing video games for hours. Of course people are going to want to live life through their characters in the games because video game worlds are perfect, but they aren’t real life.