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ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Hello.
I'm Dr. Rosemarie Truglio, the vice president for education
research at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit educational
organization behind Sesame Street.
I'm here today to talk about a very important topic,
bullying, and what we can do to stop it.
Sesame Street has never shied away from addressing tough
topics, like the death of Mr. Cooper, challenges facing
military families, and the horrific events of 9/11.
There are a lot of bullying behaviors in our society.
And this is an important societal issue that we need to
address early.
Let me introduce you to our panel of experts today, who
are going to help us identify what bullying is and what we
could do to stop bullying now.
Dr. Joseph Wright is the senior vice president at the
Children's National Medical Center.
JOSEPH L. WRIGHT: My interest in the issue of bullying comes
from what is presenting itself in front of my face.
Almost a decade ago, I really began to become interested in
why I was seeing some of the injured children that I was
taking care of and really came to understand that the impact
of bullying and, more importantly, retaliation was
at the root of a number of the injured children that I was
taking care of.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Mia Doces is a curriculum developer for
the Committee for Children.
MIA DOCES: One of the things that's really rewarding for me
is to be able to provide tools for teachers who know that
this is a really important issue, but they don't
necessarily know specifically what to do about it.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Dr. Catherine Bradshaw is the
deputy director for the Johns Hopkins Center for the
Prevention of Youth Violence.
CATHERINE BRADSHAW: I came into this actually working
with kids who are already involved in the juvenile
justice system, kids that were locked up for things
that they had done.
And as I was working with them in a clinical capacity, I
learned a lot about things that people had done to them.
And it became very apparent to me that many of those children
were witnessing violence in the home, in their community,
and also in their peer relationships.
And that's what drew me to bullying.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Dr. Jamie Ostrov is an associate
professor of psychology at the State University of New York
at Buffalo.
JAMIE OSTROV: Bullying is associated with major
problems, both concurrently, that is
during early childhood.
But then there are a long-term effects as well.
And so as a developmental psychologist, I can attest to
the fact that it's important that we deal with these issues
at the beginning.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Trudy Ludwig is a children's
advocate and author of My Secret Bully and Confessions
of a Former Bully.
TRUDY LUDWIG: We've even normalized this abnormal
behavior far too long.
And often, our media glamorizes meanness.
And I think we really need to redefine what it means to be a
popular person--
popularity through acceptance as opposed to popularity
through dominance.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Bullying is definitely a societal issue.
56% of children have said that they have
personally witnessed bullying.
JOSEPH L. WRIGHT: Clearly, it is a pervasive issue.
Most all children will be exposed in one way or another.
CATHERINE BRADSHAW: And about 30% of youth are involved in
bullying in a pretty regular basis.
BIRD: You are way too big, so you can't be included in the
Good Birds' Club.
Right, birds?
BIRDS: Right.
BIG BIRD: Oh, gee, that's too bad.
BIRD: Yeah.
So long, big goof-ball.
BIG BIRD: That's Big Bird.
BIRD: Yeah, right.
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: A recent episode on Sesame Street is
addressing this topic of bullying for
our preschool audience.
There's a story where Big Bird is actually bullied on Sesame
Street by another bird in the neighborhood.
BIRD: Well, look at those feet!
BIG BIRD: Oh, yeah, my feet.
They're great, aren't they?
BIRD: [LAUGHS]
Great?
Those feet are ridiculous!
[LAUGHS]
BIG BIRD: They are?
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: The story provides an opportunity for us
to actually show, to model what bullying behaviors are.
It also models that children alone can't solve the problem.
It's important for children to feel safe for them to go to an
adult, a trusted adult.
And that's when the adult needs to intervene and to help
the child cope with the situation.
CHRIS: You know what, buddy?
Who cares what they think?
They're just bullying you.
They're treating you as if you're not good enough.
The question is, what do you think?
ROSEMARIE TRUGLIO: Now, adults mean well, but sometimes these
behaviors are so subtle and they don't recognize them.
So the purpose of our discussion today is to help
adults recognize what these bullying behaviors are so that
they could be addressed and stopped.
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