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Technology and Cyber bullying are intimately linked. Digital Natives (generally agreed to be people born after 1980 and who have therefore grown up with technology being a part of their daily lives) have many advantages; children living in rural areas with a small number of youth are more connected to other children their age, there is more potential for personal expression, even obscure interests can find a group of likeminded individuals and communication methods are instantaneous and generally free or inexpensive.

However, as with everything good there is also a bad side. The Internet also allows a degree of anonymity which allows people, especially young teens, to feel as though they can do and say things that they would not do or say in person. Bill Belsey, a nationally recognized educator from Alberta gives this definition of cyber bullying: “Cyber-bullying involves the use of information and communication technologies such as e-mail, cell phone and pager text messages, instant messaging (IM), defamatory personal Web sites, and defamatory online personal polling Web sites, to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behavior by an individual or group, that is intended to harm others.”

Students being cyber bullied are not always as easy for teachers to identify and cyber bullying offers no place of relief of students; bullies at school simply move online and continue bullying there. This can have terrible consequences for the emotional health of students.

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