Behaviour Management Policy

Aim

It is our intention to involve the children in setting the ground rules at club as much as possible so that they take ownership of their behaviour. These rules are reviewed regularly, particularly when new children join the setting.

• Encourage children to develop positive attitudes, values and respect towards their environment and thereby enhancing their personal and social behaviour.
  
  
• Planning within play activities to discuss the appropriate way to behave towards each other e.g. role-play – bullying.
  
  
• Use praise and positive reinforcement with children to build their confidence and provide opportunity to be work as a team to gain recognition of positive behaviour
  
  
• Provide stimulating age appropriate activities for the children to reduce inappropriate behaviour due to boredom or recognise other factors such as hunger, tiredness and act appropriately.
  
  
• Identifying children who are behaving out of character and investigate causes.
  
  
• Develop relations between the child’s home and Clubland with the aim of encouraging parents to share information that may affect their child’s behaviour so that we can work together to readdress behavioural issues.
  
  
• Encourage through a consistent approach, a sense of self-discipline and shared values.
  
  
• Encourage children to treat staff and their peers with respect.
  
  
• Dealing quickly, firmly and fairly with any incident that may arise: allowing children to have a voice and act as a mediator to allow children to resolve conflict.
  
  
• The Supervisor to speak with the parents immediately to share their concerns regarding the child’s behaviour difficulties.
  
  
• Encourage a calm, friendly atmosphere throughout the club.

Members of staff are expected to be positive role models for the children and on their induction read and implement the behaviour management policy in their everyday work.

The Supervisor is the named person for behaviour management within the setting and has attended relevant training to support them in this role. Their role is to support the rest of the team with their behaviour management strategy, share information with the staff and parents/carers when necessary, access expert advice and ensure staff attend appropriate training courses to enhance their performance. We work with the school and where ever possible enforce their behaviour policy to provide consistency for the children.

Behaviour Strategies

We use a combination of behaviour strategies from a simply chat to 1,2,3 Magic, a ladder chart, 3 strike system and reward charts. 1,2,3 Magic Behaviour strategy (in use at TDI, LDI, Claygate) This is a good tool to reduce the negotiation of negative behaviour. If a child shows inappropriate behaviour there is no engagement but a simply warning in the form of ‘Step 1’, if they persist or engage in confrontation they immediately progress to Step 2, if the behaviour does not improve it is escalated to ‘Step 3’ which means a ‘cool down’ period. The cool down period is based on 1 minute per year of age up to a maximum of 10 minutes. The children are given a box of stress relieving toys to engage with during this period. When the ‘cool out’ period has expired a member of staff will speak to the children involved to discuss the nature of the incident, this will be achieved by sitting at the child’s level, side by side or below them so as not to intimidate the child. Staff will act as mediators to assist the children in resolving their conflict. If it is a more serious nature the Supervisor will speak to them and consult with their parents upon collection of the child.

However, if a child displays violent behaviour, the child will be removed from the play activity and will immediately be placed on ‘Step 3’.

Ladder Chart (in use at RK, St Martin’s)

This is a visual behaviour chart whereby children are moved up and down the ladder according to their behaviour. Each ladder wrung has a slogan and relevant emoji reflecting their behaviour, such as: I am watching you and your behaviour!, I’ve noticed you are behaving well- well done! to ‘Your behaviour is not acceptable and you will be placed on Time Out! and ‘Super behaviour- you earn a star!

However, all children start on the middle section ‘You are doing fine!’ and should they end up on Time out, once they have had time out they are placed back at the middle section again.

3 Strike System (Claygate for the junior children)

1 Strike = conversation with parent regarding negative behaviour
3 Strikes= possible temporary exclusion with the view to permanent
exclusion should behaviour not improve.

Staff always use positive reinforcement and praise to highlight good behaviour and we have other several methods in place such as a ‘Star Chart’, pasta jar or or group ‘building awards’ to celebrate children’s positive behaviour towards each other.

At no point will a member of staff give or threaten corporal punishment to a child in their care, or place them facing against a wall for ‘time out’.

Intervention Techniques

Structuring the environment

Where we choose to speak to the child and whether we sit or stand can communicate the nature of the discussion, and may help the child to modify their own behaviour, for example, warm and friendly or cold and business like.

Planned ignoring

By not giving the attention to minor, harmless, attention-seeking behaviour, these behaviours are likely to die out. Remember, it is equally important to praise appropriate behaviour.

Prompting

Gentle reminders to a child of what they need to stop doing or prepare for, can help the child to adjust to a change. This can be verbal or sensory input. Be careful to avoid ‘nagging’ the child.

Active listening

Sometimes listening to what the child has to say and exploring and acknowledging their feelings through the use of reflective responses can help a child to feel that:

• Someone else acknowledges the reality of their feelings
• They are not alone
• Someone cares.

Sometimes this can be enough for a child to stay in control.

Interpretation and interference

Verbalise what has happened and ask the child if there was another way that they could have acted. For example, ‘it looked like you were really upset before you hit Gemma- was there another way you could have let her know how upset you were?’

Backing away

This is not the same as backing down. You are not giving in, simply giving the child time to calm down before you discuss the situation with them. Staying in continuing to challenge someone who is already angry is likely to make the situation worse. Alternatively, allow the child to back away through offering them a verbal or physical way out.

Affection

If a child’s behaviour is motivated by fear, anxiety or uncertainty, a big injection of affection - verbal or physical- can help head off inappropriate behaviour. Children do not always appreciate the care that is provided for them on a daily basis and need additional affection to understand how much the adults really care for them.

Hurdle help

Where the child is stuck, providing assistance can help overcome feelings of failure or inadequacy.

Proximity

Sometimes an adult quietly heading in the general direction of what is going on can be enough to encourage children to do something else.

Involvement and interest

Adults becoming involved in a situation can diffuse things.

Redirecting/distracting

Trying to refocus the child away from what they are doing now, on to something else as a way of avoiding trouble.

Directive statement/direct appeal

A clear instruction to the child to stop certain behaviours, or start something else.

(source: Surrey County Council, 2009)

Exceptional Circumstances

There are times when it is necessary for a child to be taken immediately to the Supervisor, they are:

• If a child has been extremely aggressive or abusive towards another child or member of staff (inclusive of sexual, discriminative behaviour)
• Consistent inappropriate language
• Bullying
• Damage to property
• Stone throwing
• Stealing
• Persistent inappropriate behaviour

If physical intervention has been used to manage a child’s behaviour then this is recorded on an incident form (see Accident and Incident Record Policy).

Parents are informed if there has been a serious incident. If the negative behaviour persists, a behaviour book and ABC (Antecedents, Behaviour, Consequences) tracking sheet will be introduced. The child’s behaviour will be observed and recorded. This may identify a ‘cause and affect’, as well as a useful tool to inform the child of the impact their behaviour has on other users of the setting. The book will act as a means of communication between the staff and parents. If the challenging behaviour persists, a meeting will be set up between the parents/guardians and Karen Fitzwater and a contract will be drawn up for the child with targets and reviewed weekly.

If the behaviour does not improve we may seek help from outside agencies through a referral to EHA (Early Help Assessment), engage school or in extreme cases make a referral to the Safeguarding Board if we deem it necessary. However, due to the severity of the behaviour we do reserve the right to temporary exclude a child without any warning. If the child’s behaviour did not improve and was too disturbing for other users, a permanent exclusion be considered. This decision will be made by the senior management team in conjunction with the Supervisor.

ABC Behaviour Chart

This ABC chart can be used to record behaviour concerns.

• ‘A’ stands for antecedents, that is, what happens immediately before the behavioural outburst and can include4 any triggers, signs of distress or environmental information.
  
  
• ‘B’ refers to the behaviour itself and is a description of what actually happened during the outburst or what the behaviour ‘looked’ like.
  
  
• ‘C’ refers to the consequences of the behaviour or what happened immediately after the behaviour and can include information about other people’s responses to the behaviour and the eventual outcome for the person.
  
  
• It can also be a good idea to keep track of where and when the behaviour occurred to help in identifying any patterns. Please see below for an example.

Example 1

Boy 8, with autism, verbal and fairly articulate. Starting mainstream school, no support in place.

Interpretations:

Consistent reaction to the same event – likely caused by anxiety about lunchtime at school.

Strategies:

Giving him anxiety reducing tools before he gets overly anxious. Consider adjusting how he experiences lunchtime, ie, could he leave for lunch before it is too busy? Or start lunch in the classroom before joining classmates later in the lunch time? Look at offering him extra support at that time. Visual supports explaining what will happen at lunchtime, structure added to reduce anxiety. If there are sensory needs, make sure they are met.

National Autistic Society