Rosie Dutton. Photo: Relax Kids Tamsworth

A British teacher taught children about the effects of bullying by using apples.

Rosie Dutton from Birmingham, UK, tours schools, teaching children about relaxation and mindfulness. In one class she decided to demonstrate how bullying affects everyone, but how it cannot often be seen from the outside.

To demonstrate this, Dutton had two apples with her in the class. She dropped one purposely on the floor, bruising the apple. Both apples still looked identical and perfect from the outside.

In the class, she took the apple she had bruised earlier and told the kids she didn't like that apple, telling mean things about the fruit. She then asked the children to pass the apple around, telling the apple mean things.

After some confused looks, the children cooperated.

“You're a smelly apple”, “I don't even know why you exist”, “you've probably got worms inside you,” were among the things said to the apple.

After a while Dutton took the apple away, feeling bad for the bruised fruit. She then took the other, unhurt apple and asked the kids to say kind things to it.

Unlike an apple, we have the ability to stop this from happening. We can teach children that it's not ok to say unkind things to each other and discuss how it makes others feel

“You're a lovely apple”, “Your skin is beautiful”, “What a beautiful colour you are”.

The class looked at the apples, both identical outside. Then she cut them open.

“The apple we'd been kind to was clear, fresh and juicy inside. The apple we'd said unkind words to was bruised and all mushy inside,” Dutton wrote on her Facebook post.

“I think there was a light bulb moment for the children immediately. They really got it, what we saw inside that apple, the bruises, the mush and the broken bits is what is happening inside every one of us when someone mistreats us with their words or actions.”

She explained to the children how bullying may affect a person, even if they seem fine on the outside. She shared her own experiences after people had said hurtful things to her, how she looked fine on the outside, while on the inside the mean people had caused her a lot of pain.

“Unlike an apple, we have the ability to stop this from happening. We can teach children that it's not ok to say unkind things to each other and discuss how it makes others feel. We can teach our children to stand up for each other and to stop any form of bullying, just as one little girl did today when she refused to say unkind words to the apple,” she wrote.

Dutton posted her lesson on her Relax Kids Tamworth Facebook page. The post received over 140,000 shares in its first 36 hours.

She thanked everyone for their comments about her lesson.

"It starts with us. Our children are watching… Let's support each other; be kind, build each other up and begin to strengthen the emotional resilience of every child,” she said.

"Also, remember to be kind to unkind people; they need it the most.”