TeachRock

Entry Ticket Activity:

1. Distribute Handout – Bystander Intervention KWL Chart (Teacher’s Guide). Explain to students that during class they will be making notes on what they already know, would like to know, and what they learned about each term. Provide time for students to make notes in the first two columns of the chart. Then, ask students to share about the notes they made in the first two columns.

Motivational Activity:

1. Distribute Handout – Lesson Vocabulary. As a class, go over the terms and people that will be introduced in the lesson.
2. Display Image 1, Bullying Definition. Then, ask students:
   • What is bullying? How might you describe bullying to someone?
     
   • Have you or someone you know ever experienced bullying?
   • Has the way bullying presents itself changed during your time in school? If so, how has it changed?
   • What do adults often get wrong about bullying?
   • Have you ever heard of the term, “harassment”?  If so, what is harassment and what might it have in common with bullying?
3. Inform students that they will be watching a video explaining what harassment is and what it has in common with bullying. Play Clip 1, What is Harassment?. Then, ask students:
   • Considering the video, what is harassment and how is it linked to bullying?
   • Have you ever heard of, seen, or experienced anything like what was described in the video? (Students likely have, even if they call it bullying, or have seen outright violence.) If so, explain.
   • How might you respond to harassment?
   • Why might it be important to intervene when someone is being harassed?
4. Inform students that they will be watching a video explaining why it is important to intervene when someone is being harassed. Play Clip 2, Why is it Important to Intervene?. Then, ask students:
   • Considering the video, what are the two main reasons it is important to intervene? (Harassment typically includes several incidents happening over a span of time and early intervention reduces escalation.) Might there be other reasons as well? If so, what might they be? 
   • Is there any reason why you wouldn’t be comfortable intervening? (All reasons are valid and can usually be overcome by using one of the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention. Most common reasons are: not sure what to do, not sure if what they are seeing is harassment, don’t want to make it worse, don’t want it to be redirected onto them, no one else was doing anything, don’t want to be seen as a “snitch,” etc.)
   • Are you familiar with any experiences where someone has been [choose best term: bullied, harassed, etc.] and no one intervened? If so, explain.
   • How do you wish other people present would have reacted? (Common answers: “I wish someone would have done or said something,” “I wish someone would have acknowledged what was happening,” etc. If students answer more vaguely, like “stand up for me” or “have my back,” encourage them to get more specific.)
   • What might it look like to intervene?

Procedure

1. Inform students that they are going to examine terms about intervening when someone may be harmed. Explain to students that they are going to identify how to intervene when they witness bullying/harassment. Display Image 2, What is an Active Bystander and what is Bystander Intervention?. Then, ask students:
   • What might be the difference between a “bystander” and an “active bystander”? 
   • What might be required to be an active bystander?
     
2. Inform students that they are going to identify how to intervene when they witness bullying/harassment. Display Image 3, What are the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention?. Then, ask students:
   • What is the purpose of the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention?
   • How might someone use the 5 Ds effectively?
3. Explain to students that they will practice a bystander intervention scenario and how they would use the 5 Ds of bystander intervention in that scenario together as a class. Display Image 4, Bystander Intervention Scenario. (Use the Teacher’s Guide to support students in their practice by providing examples of the 5 Ds for this scenario.) Then ask students:
   • Have you ever used one of the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention without knowing it?
   • Which of the 5 Ds seemed most effective? Which one seemed the hardest to use in school? Which one seemed most helpful to the victim?
   • What might happen if you “Document” someone’s harassment and post it online without their permission?
   • What is the difference between “Delegate” and snitching?
   • Why shouldn’t you just get into an argument with the person harassing the victim?
4. Display Image 3, What are the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention? again. Organize students into small groups and distribute Handout – Bystander Intervention Practice Scenarios and the 5 Ds (Teacher’s Guide). Explain to student groups that they are going to practice different Bystander Intervention scenarios. Instruct students to follow the directions for their scenario, determine how they would use the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention, and then answer the questions.
5. Once student groups have completed their scenario, instruct groups to take turns presenting to the class their scenario and how they used the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention. Then, ask each student group after their presentation:
   • Which one of the 5 Ds did the group use? Why might they have used that 5 D?
   • What other one of the 5 Ds could have been used in this scenario? Why might that 5 D have been an appropriate choice?
   • Which D seems like the least appropriate for that scenario? Why might it be the least appropriate 5 D to use in that scenario? (The 5 Ds value personal safety and victim safety above all else. Sometimes Direct is not the best option for your own personal safety. Sometimes Document is not enough to help the victim in the moment, unless your personal safety prevents anything else from being done.)

Summary Activity:

1. Play Clip 3, Bystander Intervention Takes All of Us Working Together. Then, ask students:
   • Where else could you use the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention? (Almost anywhere: public spaces, school, workplace, family dinner table, etc.)
   • What do you think would happen if more people knew the 5 Ds? (Hopefully students believe it would lead to less violence! Great opportunity to encourage them to share this new knowledge with others.)
   • Have you or someone you know used the 5 Ds before but didn’t know what it was called? (Get them to briefly describe the scenario. If they didn’t do it automatically, ask the class which of the Ds were used.)
   • What types of bystander intervention scenarios are you afraid of happening and you’re not quite sure how to use the 5 Ds in those scenarios? (If you’re unsure how to respond to student answers, you could ask the class “OK, so how do YOU all think we could use the 5 Ds in that scenario?” Sometimes the best answers or critiques come from other students! While some people desire a big grand gesture, the reason Bystander Intervention works is that even actions that feel small have a huge impact while helping to de-escalate situations, so sometimes the answer is just “Delegate” or “Delayed” and that’s ok.)
   • What if you don’t know the entire situation? For instance, if two people are play-fighting? Which D could you use to make sure everyone is ok that also doesn’t make you come across as nosey? (“Delay” – check in and ask if everything is ok, “Delegate” – get someone else to check in, “Distract” – gives the person a chance to get away if it’s not play-fighting.)
   • When you walk out of this room and you see someone being harassed or bullied, which D are you most likely to use?

Extension Activities:

1. View Clip 4, Shawna Potter: Safer Space Expert, Musician, and Author to meet the contributing author of this lesson, Shawna Potter.
2. Read Shawna Potter’s book, Making Spaces Safer: A Guide to Giving Harassment the Boot Wherever You Work, Play, and Gather which this lesson is based upon.
3. Explore Right to Be’s tips for responding to online harassment, make a list of how responding in person with the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention is different or similar to responding online.
4. View the YouTube video, “Microaggressions (Clean)” and create a response to each microaggression that occurs using the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention.
5. Read the fanzine, “Your Right to Party” and then create an image of your own safer space by either drawing, using software, a mood board on Canva or Pinterest, or another artistic method.

Resources

1. Accessibility guide: http://attitudeiseverything.org.uk/
2. Calling All Crows: https://www.callingallcrows.org/hftm
3. Crisis text line: https://www.crisistextline.org/
4. Good Night Out: https://www.goodnightoutcampaign.org/
5. Harm reduction: https://harmreduction.org/
6. HeartMob: https://iheartmob.org/
7. Right to Be, creators of the 5 Ds of Bystander Intervention https://righttobe.org/resources/
8. TeachRock lesson: https://teachrock.org/lesson/third-wave-womens-rights-and-music-in-the-1990s/

Bystander Intervention Practice Scenarios and the 5 Ds (Teacher’s Guide) Handout – Bystander Intervention KWL Chart Handout – Bystander Intervention KWL Chart (Teacher’s Guide) Handout – Bystander Intervention Practice Scenarios and the 5 Ds Handout – Lesson Vocabulary

CASEL Social Emotional Learning Standards

Relationship Skills (High School)

Relationship Skills 4.F.4. Students can participate in harm reparation by using restorative affective statements and restorative questions in order to communicate the impact of harm and hold community members accountable for their actions. Students are able to take responsibility for their own actions and can contribute to the collaborative process of harm reparation.

Relationship Skills 4.H.4. Students demonstrate respect for human dignity and actively work to be allies for social and racial justice. Students practice calling out injustices, such as microaggressions, and standing up for their peers.

Responsible Decision Making (High School)

Responsible Decision Making 5.D.4. Students can accurately identify physical, intellectual, emotional, and social safety considerations for themselves and for others based on identity and social factors in real-world scenarios. Students accurately discern the difference between risky and safe behaviors and actions.

Learning for Justice Social Justice Standards

Action 17 AC.9-12.17 I take responsibility for standing up to exclusion, prejudice and injustice.

Action 18 AC.9-12.18 I have the courage to speak up to people when their words, actions or views are biased and hurtful, and I will communicate with respect even when we disagree.

Action 19 AC.9-12.19 I stand up to exclusion, prejudice and discrimination, even when it’s not popular or easy or when no one else does.

Common Core State Standards

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Reading

CCSS.ELA-Literacy RI.11-12.7 Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in different media or formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively) as well as in words in order to address a question or solve a problem.

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Speaking and Listening

CCSS.ELA-Literacy SL.9-10.1 Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9-10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.SL.11-12.1 Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 11-12 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.

College and Career Readiness Anchor Standards for Language

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.9-10.4 Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 9-10 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.L.11-12.4 Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and phrases based on grades 11-12 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies.