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Have you ever worked with a pupil who was obviously struggling, but they never put up their hand to ask for help?
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After working with hundreds of schools on behaviour and supporting tens of thousands of teachers through our website with SEND and SEMH, I've learned that those pupils often aren't coping well—and they certainly aren't coping better than anyone else—and sometimes their silence might actually be a sign that they need help.
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So today, I'm going to show you the hidden coping strategies those pupils use to stay under the radar, why asking for help can actually feel uncomfortable for them, and a simple method called the SAFE approach to find out what's really driving their behaviour.
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Hi there, my name's Simon Currigan, and welcome to this week's episode of School Behaviour Secrets.
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And yes, I am wearing my new pants—thank you for noticing.
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It must be the extra confidence in my voice that gave it away.
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Anyway, enough about my exciting new boxer shorts; they are silky smooth.
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In this episode, I want to talk about how kids use silence as camouflage in the classroom to hide that they're having difficulties, and talk about why that happens for some pupils.
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So, we've come back after the summer.
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September is a funny time of year in schools because you've got new classes, you've got new routines, lots of new relationships, actually, with new pupils and new staff.
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And as teachers, SENCOs, and school leaders, we're all trying to build a picture of the children in front of us as quickly as we can.
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And the loud pupils tend to get our attention first because, well, they're loud, right?
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They're hard to miss, even in the fog—like the deep fog, the sort of fog you find on a poster for Silent Hill.
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But today, I don't want to talk about the loud pupils.
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I want to talk about the children who kind of slip through the cracks, the ones who are struggling every bit as much, but never ask for help from the adults.
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Because understanding their behaviour and what's happening for those pupils on the inside can change the way we support them.
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If you find this episode useful, I'd really appreciate it if you could follow or subscribe, wherever you're listening, and share it with a colleague who would find it helpful too.
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It really helps more educators discover the podcast when you share it and when you subscribe.
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And I know we have a lot of people that listen to the show on our website, but I'd really encourage you to listen and subscribe to our podcast app, because it just makes it a lot easier to get new episodes.
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Right, so let me paint a picture.
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It's the second week back after the summer holidays, you're teaching a lesson, and you notice one pupil has hardly written anything.
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So you wander over and you say, "Are you okay?" and they smile politely and they say, "Yeah." Then you ask, "Do you need any help with that?" and they kind of just look at you and say, "No, thanks." And then you move on, because there are 29 other children who also need you, and you're being pulled in lots of different directions at the same time.
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But when, sort of at the end of the lesson, you go and check their work, you find out despite asking them if they needed help, they've completed almost no work.
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And then a week later, when you go through their book, you can see they're falling behind.
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They look confused during whole-class explanations, or, you know, they sit there with their face pointed in your direction, but you can tell from their eyes they're not really listening to what you're saying.
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They never ask a question, they never put their hand up, they never tell you they're stuck or confused or need help.
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They just kind of disappear into the background.
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Now, it's easy to assume they're unmotivated, or they lack confidence, or they're simply not trying hard enough, they must just have a poor work ethic.
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And those things can—they can be true.
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I'm not saying every behaviour has a complex explanation, because it doesn't.
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But often, none of those explanations are true.
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And when you dig down, what you find is those kids are working incredibly hard during the lesson, just not on their learning.
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They're working hard to kind of protect themselves.
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And that's the first big idea I want you to take away from today.
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Sometimes their silence is camouflage.
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So say that with me.
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sometimes silence is camouflage.
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Okay, I'll stop doing that.
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It makes me sound like a cult leader trying to program you remotely. And you deserve better. Right, where was I? Right.
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Some pupils don't stay quiet because they're okay, or they're happy with a poor work ethic, or they don't care about the work.
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Sometimes they stay quiet because there's safety in not being seen, not being noticed, in being invisible.
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Once you
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start looking at their behaviour through that prism, you start noticing all sorts of coping strategies they're being using.
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Instead of asking for help, they copy the work from the person who's sitting next to them.
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They wait until everyone else has started before pretending to know what they're doing with a task.
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They spend five minutes sharpening a pencil or organising their equipment while they're watching what everyone else is doing.
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They suddenly become fascinated by helping someone else, or they ask to go to the toilet, or they stare at the page as you go by, eyes down, hoping you'll think that they're busy thinking and that you'll move on and go and help another child.
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They smile, they nod, they say, "I'm fine," but actually they aren't.
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These aren't necessarily kids who are refusing to learn.
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They feel uncomfortable and are trying to reduce some sort of perceived threat they're experiencing in the classroom.
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And that's where I think we sometimes ask the wrong question.
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We ask, "Why won't they ask for help?" But that's not necessarily the most useful question to ask.
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A better question is, "What makes asking for help feel unsafe for them?" Because some pupils, putting up their hand isn't a neutral action.
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It puts them under the spotlight and exposes them to a social danger or risk.
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Maybe they're worried that everyone will think they're stupid when they share their opinion.
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Maybe they've been laughed at before when they've got something wrong when they're answering a question.
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Maybe they're frightened you'll think that they weren't listening.
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Maybe they're a perfectionist who'd rather not attempt the work than chance-making a mistake.
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Maybe they're overwhelmed and don't even know how to explain what they're feeling.
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They can't put it into words.
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Maybe they're new to the school or the class, and they don't trust the adults around them yet.
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Maybe speaking up in front of 30 other children feels scary.
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And you know, that makes sense, because most adults would hate to stand up before 30 of their peers and start speaking in public.
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It's the number one phobia of adults, because the adult fears ridicule or embarrassment in that situation.
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But we ask kids in school to pipe up all the time in that exact scenario.
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So suddenly, the silence starts making sense as a protection mechanism.
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It's not lack of motivation. It's armour or self-protection.
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And if you've listened to this podcast for a while, you know that I always like digging beneath the behaviour to understand the need that behaviour reflects underneath.
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And this is exactly where the PAIN framework becomes useful.
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Rather than seeing their silence as a problem, it encourages us to ask, "What does their silence tell us?
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What need or stress does it reveal?
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Is this about integration and belonging?
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Do they worry about what other people will think, or that other people will overlook their contribution, or if their contribution will be rejected, full stop?
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Is it about mental processing?
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Are they so overloaded by the task they don't even know where to begin?
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Is it to do with anxiety and emotions?
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Have they become so overwhelmed that staying quiet so they don't get noticed feels like the safest option to them?
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Or are there SEN-specific needs affecting communication, language processing, or recognising and expressing emotions that are in play?" It's going to be individual to the student, obviously.
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That's why in school, sometimes we need to question what we're seeing and look beyond the obvious.
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So instead of asking, "They did very little work, why didn't they understand the task or ask for help?" we shift to the question, "Why did they feel the need to go under the radar when they were struggling?
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What were they trying to escape?" And by the way, if you'd like a practical way to start looking beneath behaviour, to understand the needs that are driving it, we've put together a free SEND Behaviour Handbook packed with strategies, ideas, and practical advice for supporting pupils with behaviour, SEND, and SEMH needs.
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You can download it completely free using the link in the episode description, or you can go there manually.
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You can go to our website, beaconschoolsupport.co.uk, click on the Free Resources tab, and you'll find it at the top of the page. That's beaconschoolsupport.co.uk.
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Click on Free Resources at the top, and you'll see it near the top of the Free Resources page.
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So, what should you do when you go back into school? Here's three simple ideas.
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First, pick one quiet pupil in your class who is struggling with their work and deliberately observe their behaviour for a week.
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Not the loudest pupil, the quietest one.
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And when I say observe them, you know, not a creepy weaker standing in front of their desk and staring at them like that girl from Paranormal Activity who just watched her parents sleep all night. That'd be weird.
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But for one week, just pay more attention to what they're doing in class, because that will give you information and clues about what's going on underneath the surface.
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Second, look for their coping strategies.
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And remember, sometimes silence is camouflage.
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Have I said that enough?
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Use that to prompt your thinking.
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And thirdly, the next time you notice a pupil struggling and they don't ask for help, pause before jumping in with solutions and ask yourself, "Why do they feel uncomfortable asking for help in this moment?
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Why are they sitting there, struggling, failing, and not asking me for support?" And when I'm thinking about that question, I often use the word "safe" to kind of help structure my thinking.
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It's not a formal assessment tool or a framework, but it's a quick mental checklist.
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So in that acronym, S stands for Social Threat.
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Is the pupil worried about what their classmates will think if they admit that they're stuck on a piece of work?
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A is for Adult Threat.
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Are they worried that I, as the adult, will be disappointed with them or impatient or just think they weren't listening and tell them off? F is for Failure.
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Would they rather avoid trying the work altogether than risk making mistakes or getting the answer wrong?
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And E is for Expression.
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Do they actually have the words to explain what's confusing them or to express how they're feeling?
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And if the answer to any of those is yes, then asking for help suddenly becomes much more difficult than just putting your hand up.
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It comes with potential social danger or ridicule, with an emotional downside.
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Safe doesn't tell us why the pupil feels that way, but it gives you an idea about where to start looking.
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And that's when I reach for the PAIN framework, because they work really well together, because the PAIN framework will help you uncover the deeper need that's sparking that sense of threat or perceived danger in the first place.
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If you've not come across the PAIN framework before, I suggest you go back to earlier episodes where I've dug into what the PAIN framework is and how to use it to understand your child's needs.
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We've got loads of episodes on it now. So let's quickly recap.
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A pupil being quiet doesn't necessarily mean that they're okay.
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Some will be okay, but many anxious pupils develop silent coping strategies that help them avoid situations that they perceive as uncomfortable or threatening.
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Rather than asking, "Why doesn't this child ask for help?" ask, "What makes asking for help worry them or concern them?" Then use that understanding to explore the need underneath, rather than simply focusing on the behaviour you can see on the surface.
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Thanks so much for listening today.
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I hope you found that useful.
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I hope you have a brilliant week, and I can't wait to see you on the next episode of School Behaviour Secrets.