Incidents of bullying, while decreasing, remain a problem because many students refuse to talk about the experience, experts said Monday.

"We have to stand up and talk about it," Education Minister Leona Dombrowski told a Toronto Coalition for the Awareness and Prevention of Bullying event.

This week is Bullying Awareness Week.

"I think it's a really big monster and hard to tackle," said Nan Milabinovic of the Children's Aid Society.

The first step for parents is to let their children know they should open up if they are being bullied -- and to look for signs their kids are being tormented.

Those signs include:

  • becoming withdrawn
  • anxiety about going to school
  • unexplained crying or anger
  • a sudden drop in grades

Parkdale Junior and Senior Public School principal Susan Yun said bullying is a problem that must be taken seriously.

"For us to deny it exists is doing a disservice for our children and a disservice for our community," she said.

Yun said children must be given ways to cope with bullying when it happens to them.

The Toronto District School Board defines bullying on its website as a "behaviour where an individual purposefully and deliberately hurts others."

This can be carried out through physical, verbal or social means and can continue over time. Some bullies gather "entertainment value" from the torment they inflict on others, it said.

Bullying is not about conflict, which is usually just a difference of opinion, it said.

"The individual exhibiting bully behaviour tries to control and dominate others," the board said.

The main factors that allow children to harm others are:

  • a sense of entitlement
  • an intolerance towards difference
  • feeling free to "exclude, isolate and segregate a person deemed not worthy of respect or care"

If one's child is being bullied, the board advises parents to not advise their child to physically fight back. Nor does it suggest confronting the bully or his family.

Instead, it suggested the school should be treated as an ally.

Bibpin Aassi is only 12 years old and has witnessed episodes of bullying, which he described as very shocking and physical.

"That moment gave me something to say, 'I don't want to be a bully,'" he said.

As a result, he is serving as an anti-bullying ambassador this week.

With a report from CTV Toronto's Dana Levenson