The National Parents Council (NPC) has called for increased co-operation in drafting school codes of behaviour so that the behaviours of principals and teachers are incorporated.
One in five calls to the council's helpline concerns children's bullying behaviour but also accounts for the conduct of principals and teachers, according to the findings of an annual report published this weekend.
Some 10 per cent of the 2,745 calls to the helpline in 2005 directly related to the conduct of teachers and principals, with complaints ranging from children being ignored in class, being compared to their siblings or who were being refused permission to go to the toilet.
"What has happened is that when schools were drawing up their codes of behaviour, they failed to incorporate adult behaviour and instead based it primarily on children's behaviour," said Fionnuala Kilfeather, chief executive of the council.
The report found that in some instances, schools failed to recognise that bullying was taking place or did not act to prevent or remedy the bullying behaviour.
"Some of these calls were passed on to the National Educational Welfare Board, where children had been kept out of school or where the children were too scared to go to school," the report says.
The report also found that in some cases, parents were not allowed into school to see a teacher or principal, that problems arose with substitute teachers and that the health and safety of some schools was not adequate.
However, Ms Kilfeather recognised that as part of the development of schools' codes of behaviour under the educational welfare board, the behavioural guidelines were providing for consultation with children.
"It's great to see children involved at class level and that teachers are becoming open to looking at how they can make their classroom a happy place," she said.