Aim of policy:
For staff to provide a consistent approach to encouraging positive behaviour, and responding to unwanted behaviour in ways which are respectful, assertive and are based on a recognition of a child’s age and stage of development
Policy Statement:
Children of all ages respond best to clear and consistent boundaries, staff working with all children need to provide and reinforce such boundaries through a framework of positive reinforcement and support. Helping children to make the right choices and to exercise self-control is the foundation of our approach.
Policy Rationale:
It is important that all staff are aware of and follow this policy and associated guidelines for responding to challenging behaviour.
There can be more significant issues with behaviour at times. Sometimes there may be a child that does not co-operate with others, becoming a disruptive influence on the group. The difficult child often has problems in other parts of life and needs understanding and care, as well as discipline.
Policy Content:
Rainbow works on the premise of 4 key messages in approaching behaviour management:
- Clear expectations
- Positive reinforcement
- Consistent Approach
- Reflection
- Clear Expectations
Children need to know and understand what kinds of behaviour are acceptable. They do not automatically know. Expectations of behaviour need to be conveyed to children all the time. This should happen in the following ways:
- Adults modelling expected ways to behave (using good manners, caring for others, self-control)
- Clear instructions – all the time, before activities, during outside play, when moving around the building. Clear and simple instructions, regularly reinforced will help children understand what is expected of them
- Ground rules – the use of rules for the classroom, garden and activities can easily provide a clear framework of expectations. Referring back to these constantly, helps remind children how to behave
- Ongoing ‘talk’ and commentary about expected behaviour (eg – “we’re heading for the carpet, this is the time we listen” or “I can see you are reading, we always put books back when we are finished”). This kind of commentary embeds expectations into everyday routines
- Positive Reinforcement
Staff should be clear about what ‘positive’ behaviour is. Some examples include:
- Being helpful to others
- Taking full part in chosen activity
- Showing kindness and empathy to others
- Exercising self-control
- Following instructions
- Showing real remorse
- Listening and responding
- Looking after the environment and equipment
- Sharing and taking turns
Staff should recognise, praise and encourage these behaviours. When praising, staff should be specific (Eg – Well done Antonie for putting the scissors back in the right place, that was very helpful, it is important to keep things tidy, so we can find them”). In addition staff should create opportunities in everyday situations to enable children to display these behaviours. As role models, staff should always demonstrate positive behaviour in their own actions.
- A consistent Approach
When children display unwanted behaviour, it is important that it is always challenged, however ‘low-level’ the action may be. For example if a child stands on a book (even carelessly, without any malicious intent), a staff member should always respond; reminding the child to pick up the book, and that books are for reading, they will become damaged if we stand on them.
Staff should always focused on the desired rather than the undesired behaviour (Eg “please don’t run”, should actually be “Please Walk”). Emphasising what you WANT children to do rather than what they should NOT do will always provide a clearer ‘solution’ for children, and help them to focus on desired behaviour. This approach is much more likely to result in positive outcomes.
There are three main types of unwanted behaviour:
- Disengaged
- Disruptive
- Unaccecptable
Staff should know the difference between these, and how to respond to each behaviour type.
Disengaged behaviour can usually be spotted by children who may appear bored, or unfocused on an activity, they could be wandering around, or do nothing. Practitioners can support this child by re-engaging him or her in something meaningful and challenging. Staff should aim to help the child find something that they will enjoy and have an interest in. This will usually quickly and easily redirect disengaged behaviour to more positive engagement. Staff may need to consider the range of play opportunities on offer at that time, and change, increase or adapt the play environment to make it more appealing to the child or children.
Disruptive behaviour is where a child’s behaviour is impacting on another child, and preventing them from having a positive play experience. Examples of this kind of behaviour could be:
- Constantly removing a toy or equipment from another child
- Running around r through where another child is playing
- Name calling or excluding other children from playing at a specific activity or with a specific group
- Removing resources from a designated area, or swiping them off a table
There can be different triggers for disruptive behaviour, but staff should seek to ensure that children are reminded firmly about the desirable behaviour required in this situation and they are fully engaged in an activity or play experience which is interesting and meaningful to them. Staff usually need to work harder to distract or redirect children who are engaged in disruptive behaviour than who are disengaged. Sometimes a disruptive child may have to be moved to a different area of the nursery if they are unable to stop their disruptive behaviour in the situation they find themselves in. For example, a child in the garden may be throwing water on other children, possibly younger children and constantly removing the water from the water tray and taking it to other areas of the garden to throw. The staff member intervenes, and reminds the child that the water stays in the water tray, and shows her different tools she can use in the tray. However the child continues to throw water at the children. This child needs to then go inside to the classroom, away from the garden, and be re-engaged in the classroom.
Unacceptable behaviour is usually hurtful or harmful, and may include destruction of property. This is when a child’s behaviour has clearly crossed a boundary. Children need to understand this. They should be told in a firm, but friendly voice, and an appropriate sanction may also be used if the situation warrants it. Unacceptable behaviour often stems from a child’s inability or unwillingness to exercise self-control. Staff should work with the child to help them make positive choices which involve exercising self-control. It is important that staff have realistic expectations of children inline with their age and stage of development.
Any sanctions applied should be consistent, proportal and agreed with the team leader. The ethos of restorative justice should be applied. For example:
- If a child damages a book, and appropriate sanction would be to take some time out of playing and mend the books in the classroom
- If a child is jumping dangerously off the wallbars in the Rainbow Room on to other children, with the intent of hurting them, they can leave the Rainbow Room and choose a book from the classroom
Use of Rest Baskets
There are rest baskets in every classroom. These are first and foremost for children to retreat to independently if they wish to rest, or if they are finding things difficult and need some ‘time’ away from activity and action to get back in control of their emotions. The aim of the rest baskets is to provide a ‘safe’ and protective space for children. Sometimes adults may direct children to use a rest basket to have some time to recuperate. Where rest basket time is adult directed, children should be free to choose when to leave, although there could be a condition attached to it, for example “You can come back to play whenever you want, but you first have to pick up the bricks that you threw. Please stay in the rest basket until you are ready to pick them up.”
For children who struggle more with exercising self-control and display unwanted behaviour frequently, here are some additional ways to help and understand:
- Finding out and trying to understand the cause of their behaviour although awareness can ease a difficulty, it will not solve it.
- Discovering something the child is good at and encouraging them to do it; achievement and success will raise their self-esteem, often unacceptable behaviour comes from a low self-esteem and a sense of failure or lack of stimulation.
- Keeping busy, constructively, so they have no time to display unacceptable behaviour.
Children need to learn that there are consequences to their actions. Allowing a child to ‘cool down’ helps defuse confrontation and allows the child time to reflect on their behaviour and what impact it has had.
Explain to the child what cool down means and how it works at a time when you are both calm. State which unwanted behaviours will result in cool down.
If a child exhibits an unwanted behaviour then tell them it is not acceptable. If they have not changed the behaviour then direct the child to have some cool down time. If they do not go voluntary, escort them there, making no comment and avoiding eye contact.
Find a cool down spot that is away from the other activities, usually the rest basket is a good option. It needs to be completely un-stimulating.
Once the child completes cool down, praise them for complying, even if it was a battle, they did comply in the end and positive behaviour should always be rewarded.
The children are encouraged to follow the boundaries set out by Rainbow Nursery. Challenging behaviour may be tracked on a behaviour log and can be discussed with parents in a constructive way.
Unacceptable behaviour is generally defined as behaviour which is hurtful or harmful to themselves or others, or destruction of property. This may manifest as:
- Violent, physical conduct
- Bullying
- Discrimination or name calling
- Swearing or rudeness
- Refusing to do as they are asked without good reason
- Taking belongings that don’t belong to them
Staff may restrain should it be necessary to separate a fight or prevent a child from injuring themselves or others. Staff at no point should use physical punishment, or threat of them.
- We do not use techniques intended to single out and humiliate individual children.
- We only use physical restraint, such as hold, to prevent injury to children or adults and/or serious damage to property. Details of such an event,must be immediately reported to the nursery manager. The child’s parents are informed on the same day.
- We do not shout or raise our voices in a threatening way to respond to a child’s behaviour.
- All staff constantly uses positive language when communicating with children.
- We handle children’s unacceptable behaviour in ways that are appropriate to their ages and stages of development – for example by distraction, discussion or by withdrawing the child from the situation.
- We work in partnership with children’s parents. Parents are regularly informed about their child’s behaviour by their key person. We work with parents to address recurring behaviour, using objective observation records to help us understand the cause and to decide jointly how to respond appropriately.
- We have staff meetings where behaviour strategies are discusses in a constructive way.
- We formally write to parents regarding behaviour that is unacceptable. Informing them of actions that will be carried out should the behaviour persist.
The Use of Behaviour Log
Where a specific child’s behaviour has become a concern for the team. The child’s behaviour should be more closely monitored and tracked for a period of time. This will enable staff to stand back and analyse possible triggers, look for patterns and establish what further support could be planned to help the child make positive behaviour choices. The log should be requested by the team leader, every behaviour incident should be recorded, and the official (or specially designed) behaviour log should be used. This will also enable future discussions with parents and other professionals to have a clearer evidence base.
The use of Behaviour Plan
Following on from a Behaviour log, a Behaviour Plan can be produced to help staff deal consistently with a child who continues to have difficult in exercising self-control. The behaviour plan will usually be designed by the Team Leader, Key worker and Deputy Manager. The plan will be based on observations of the child, and will set out identifiable triggers, behaviour patterns and a list of specific strategies that staff should use with this child. It is vital that all staff working with the child:
- are trained and informed of the plan
- consistently follow the plan
- monitor the plan and clearly record the results
This policy should be read in conjunction with the Biting Policy.
4. Reflection
Staff should reflect all the time on how they respond to children’s behaviour. Staff need to consider if you could have done something differently, that would have had a different outcome, maybe more positive. Discussion with team members, team leaders and colleagues about specific children, about ground rules and different approaches are all valuable. Reflection should be ongoing and conversations about behaviour should be ‘always open’.
Further guidance and links on behaviour.
This is a policy document, rather than training or guidance to support practitioners development of skills. On Rainbow Moodle there is a behaviour management course, and on the Rainbow staff portal there are links to training, information and guidance that can help. Some of these can be found using these links below:
Further Reading
Behaviour policy – shared with parents