Understand what child-on-child abuse is
Child-on-child abuse is most likely to include, but may not be limited to:
- Bullying
- Including cyber-bullying, prejudice-based and discriminatory bullying
- Abuse in intimate personal relationships between children
- Sometimes known as ‘teenage relationship abuse’
- Physical abuse such as hitting, kicking, shaking, biting, hair pulling or otherwise causing physical harm
- This may include an online element that facilitates, threatens and/or encourages physical abuse
- Sexual violence, such as rape, assault by penetration and sexual assault
- This may also include an online element that facilitates, threatens and/or encourages sexual violence
- Sexual harassment, such as sexual comments, remarks, jokes and online sexual harassment, which may be stand-alone or part of a broader pattern of abuse
- Causing someone to engage in sexual activity without consent, such as forcing someone to strip, touch themselves sexually, or to engage in sexual activity with a third party
- Consensual and non-consensual sharing of nudes and semi-nude images and or videos
- Also known as sexting or youth-produced sexual imagery
- Upskirting, which typically involves taking a picture under a person’s clothing without their permission, with the intention of viewing their genitals or buttocks to obtain sexual gratification, or cause the victim humiliation, distress or alarm
- Initiation/hazing type violence and rituals
- This could include activities involving harassment, abuse or humiliation used as a way of initiating a person into a group and may also include an online element
This is explained in paragraph 33 of Keeping Children Safe in Education (2024), the Department for Education (DfE)'s statutory safeguarding guidance.
Develop a culture where abuse is recognised but not tolerated
Ofsted recommends this in light of its review of sexual abuse in schools (completed in 2021). See our summary of Ofsted's review of sexual abuse in schools.
Your school needs to create an environment where:
- Staff model respectful and appropriate behaviour
- Children and young people are clear about what is acceptable and unacceptable behaviour
- Children and young people are confident to ask for help and support when they need it
Find out how to review your vision and strategy to develop inclusion and safety.
How can I monitor this?
Throughout this article we signpost how you'll monitor each area in practice, but there shouldn't be anything new for you to do.
How you monitor your school's efforts to prevent child-on-child abuse is nothing new, and it's already intertwined with how your board monitors things such as safeguarding, behaviour and the curriculum.
To monitor your school's vision and culture you can:
- Meet with school leaders and ask them questions about what they've put in place (see our questions at the bottom of this article)
- Review your school's policies (e.g. the safeguarding and behaviour policies) to make sure they reflect your school's vision
- Take parti in school visits to see how staff and pupils interact
- Speak with staff and pupils about how safe they feel, and whether they're clear on what acceptable behaviour looks like
Continue reading to understand how you can support your school leaders to develop this culture.
Appropriate staff training is essential
It’s vital staff know how to identify child-on-child abuse early to prevent it escalating. Make sure your school provides staff with regularly updated and appropriate safeguarding training so they 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
For child-on-child sexual abuse specifically, staff should have training to:
- Deliver relationships and sex education (RSE)
- Better understand the definitions of sexual harassment and sexual violence, including online sexual abuse
- Identify early signs of child-on-child sexual abuse
- Consistently uphold standards in their responses to sexual harassment and online sexual abuse
Find out more about Ofsted’s review of sexual abuse in schools.
How can I monitor this?
This will link up with how you monitor safeguarding already, but you want to be assured that staff training covers child-on-child abuse. You should:
- Meet with school leaders and ask them questions about the training staff receive
- Speak to staff on school visits about when they last had safeguarding training and what it covered
Point school leaders to The Key Safeguarding
If your school is a member of The Key Safeguarding, your school leaders can share our safeguarding scenario on child-on-child abuse with staff, and train staff with our briefing on child-on-child sexual abuse.
Challenge inappropriate behaviours
Your school is required to have a behaviour policy and measures in place to prevent all forms of bullying. Your school's child protection policy should also include the procedures in place to minimise the risk of child-on-child abuse.
When reviewing these policies and measures, make sure staff are trained to 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 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. Your school should have clear sanctions in place to respond effectively to incidents.
This is outlined in paragraphs 453 and 454 of Keeping Children Safe in Education (2024).
Your school should also have routine record-keeping and analyse cases of sexual harassment and sexual violence (including online), to identify patterns and intervene early to prevent abuse.
How can I monitor this?
You should:
- Meet with school leaders and ask them questions (see our questions at the bottom of this article)
- Review your school's policies to make sure they include staff training to challenge inappropriate behaviours
- Speak with staff about how confident they feel challenging inappropriate behaviours
Make sure your school has a preventative curriculum programme
It should address issues associated with child-on-child abuse
Your school's curriculum should make sure children are taught about safeguarding, including how to stay safe online.
This is in the context of a whole-school approach to preparing pupils for life in modern Britain and a culture of zero tolerance to sexism, misogyny/misandry, homophobia, biphobic and sexual violence/harassment. This will be underpinned by:
- Your behaviour policy
- A pastoral support system
- A planned programme of relationships, sex and health education (RSHE), which is inclusive and delivered regularly, tackling issues such as:
- Healthy and respectful relationships
- Boundaries and consent
- Stereotyping, prejudice and equality
- Body confidence and self-esteem
- How to recognise an abusive relationship (including coercive and controlling behaviour)
- The concepts of, and laws relating to, sexual consent, sexual exploitation, abuse, grooming, coercion, harassment, rape, domestic abuse, so called 'honour'-based violence such as forced marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM), and how to access support
- What constitutes sexual harassment and sexual violence and why they’re always unacceptable
This is explained in paragraphs 128 to 130 of KCSIE 2024.
It should follow statutory curriculum guidance
The DfE’s statutory RSE guidance outlines how your school's curriculum should cover these issues – read our articles to find out about requirements for RSE in primary schools and RSE in secondary schools.
While not statutory, the PSHE Association’s programme of study for Key Stages 1 to 5 also suggests what schools should cover when teaching about relationships in PSHE.
School leaders might need specialist support
Not every school will feel sufficiently equipped to address these sensitive topics. As a board, support your school leaders – professionally and financially – if they decide they need external input, particularly when approaching sexual violence and sexual harassment as part of preventing child-on-child abuse.
Specialist organisations may be able to support your school by training staff, teaching children and/or providing them with support.
How can I monitor this?
You should:
- Meet with school leaders and ask them questions about the curriculum and what it covers (see our questions at the bottom of this article)
- Review your school's curriculum and RSE policies
- Go on school visits to see a lesson in action (be sensitive to the lesson content if you do this – there may be some lessons where pupils won't feel comfortable with a visitor in the room)
- Speak with staff and pupils about the curriculum, and what they've learnt about child-on-child abuse and associated topics (for example, during their RSE lessons)
School leaders should know your school's context and work with local partners
Child-on-child abuse incidents and/or inappropriate behaviours can be associated with factors outside of the school, so make sure school leaders consider the context when preventing and dealing with such incidents.
For example, when tackling violence it's important that school leaders:
- Understand the problems that young people are facing both in school and in their local community
- Consider possible avenues of support
- Work with local partners (who may have valuable information, resources or expertise) such as the police and youth offending teams
- Your school's local safeguarding partners (LSPs) may also be able to provide support
This is explained on pages 9 to 13 of the Home Office's guidance on preventing youth violence and gang involvement.
Your school should also give your designated safeguarding lead (DSL) time to engage with LSPs as part of their timetable. See our article for more on Ofsted's review of sexual abuse in schools.
How can I monitor this?
You should:
- Meet with school leaders and ask them questions about your school's context and how they work with local partners
- Review your school's child protection policy to make sure it covers your school's context and multi-agency working arrangements
Questions to ask school leaders
Do our safeguarding and behaviour policies address child-on-child abuse and does everyone understand them?
Are staff and other adults trained to recognise the signs of child-on-child abuse?
Are staff and other adults clear about procedures where they're concerned a child may be a victim of child-on-child abuse?
Do pupils feel protected and safe from child-on-child abuse? How do you know?
How does our RSE curriculum help to develop a culture where sexual harassment is not tolerated?
Next steps
- Find more questions to ask about safeguarding
- Be clear on how to review your vision and strategy to develop a culture of inclusion and safety
- Get tips on how to review your child protection policy and your behaviour policy