Full Transcript for Should Every Teacher Respond to Behaviour in the Same Way?

expectation, and that's where I think schools sometimes get confused about what consistency actually means from class to class. Because consistency doesn't necessarily mean treating every child identically. Imagine you've got two pupils who are expected to complete the same writing task. One can organise their ideas independently and get started straight away. The other has difficulties with working memory and needs the instructions broken into smaller steps. If we insist on giving both children exactly the same support, we might be treating them equally in one sense, but we're not necessarily giving them an equal opportunity to succeed, and that's an important distinction. So I'm going to unpack that a little bit. Fairness, having the same, and consistency are not the same things. 00:07:29.420 --> 00:08:42.600 Having the same is obvious. It means everyone in the class gets exactly the same approach. That's like giving every child in year one exactly the same reading, but regardless of their ability, because the expectation is they all work to a certain standard. Fairness is where everyone gets what they need. In this case, the kids in year one get a book that's matched to their reading ability roughly, allowing everyone to access the text. Consistency is about having a shared approach amongst the adults, a shared thinking process for working out and deciding what each child needs, and at the end of that thinking process, two different professionals might arrive at two different answers, both of which can be correct, because in something as complex as learning or SEMH or behaviour, sometimes there's more than one right answer to meeting their needs. More than one approach can work. So fairness and consistency are about maintaining the expectation, but adapting the route that the pupil takes to get to the expectation. Now that's not an argument for abandoning boundaries or lowering expectations whenever a child finds something difficult. 00:08:42.879 --> 00:10:43.360 Of course it is not. Sometimes pupils need encouragement to persevere. Sometimes consequences are appropriate, and not every refusal that you'll see from a child is caused by deep anxiety, dysregulation, or an unmet SEND need. The important thing is that our response should be informed by what we know about the pupil, tuned to what we know about the pupil, rather than automatically assuming that their outward behaviour must have the same underlying cause, or that the child is just choosing to be awkward. And if you're listening to this and thinking, well how do I actually work out what might be sitting underneath the pupil's behaviour, then don't panic because I've got a free resource that can help you to download from our website. It's called the SEND Behaviour Handbook, and it includes a behaviour analysis grid to help you explore possible underlying causes, and to start thinking deeply about what support a pupil might require to succeed. You can download it for free. I'll put a direct link in the episode description, so all you have to do is tap on your podcast app for this episode and it will open up the description for the podcast, and I'll put the link there. Or you can download it manually for free from beaconschoolsupport.co.uk. You go to our website, you click on the free resources section at the top, and you will find the SEND Handbook waiting for you. That's beaconschoolsupport.co.uk. Click on the free resources section at the top of the home page, and you will find the SEND Handbook in the downloadable resources section. Now, there's another side to this argument, and I think that's just as important, because we can take this idea of individualizing our responses just a bit too far, and sometimes if we're not careful, the phrase, every child is different, or every child is an individual, can become an excuse for every teacher doing something different in every classroom. For example, imagine you've got a pupil who's repeatedly calling out in lessons. In one classroom, the teacher gives them a reminder. 00:10:43.695 --> 00:10:47.394 In the next, the teacher just ignores it because they don't want to disrupt the lesson. 00:10:47.814 --> 00:10:51.995 In the third classroom, the teacher immediately sends the pupil out of class. 00:10:52.475 --> 00:11:32.075 And when the head teacher asks why are they responding so differently, each teacher has a perfectly reasonable sounding explanation about the child's needs or what was causing the behaviour. One says they're following the behaviour policy, another says that they're choosing their battles, and the third says they're maintaining high But from the pupil's perspective, the rules seem to change depending on which classroom they're currently sitting in. And that is a problem because there's a difference between a deliberate adaptation made for a specific reason and inconsistency that happens because different adults have different beliefs and habits and levels of confidence. 00:11:32.174 --> 00:11:42.654 The first can be really helpful. The second can leave pupils confused, frustrate staff and undermine the school's behaviour policy. 00:11:42.814 --> 00:12:29.575 So how do school leaders deal with this effectively? Well that brings us back to what consistency is. It's a thinking process. And I think the answer is to be much more specific about what we want our staff to actually be consistent about. And I think there are three areas to focus on here. The first is expectations. What are the things we expect from pupils across the entire school? That might include behaving safely, treating other people respectfully and engaging with learning. Now the level of support needed to achieve those expectations might differ from pupil to pupil, but staff need to understand what they're working towards. So we've all got a good idea of what a good noonar should look like and that's our goal. 00:12:29.575 --> 00:12:45.014 The second area is to think about how adults should respond.

And I don't mean giving teachers a script they have to follow word for word regardless of the child that's standing in front of them. I mean agreeing the important principles that should underpin their response. 00:12:45.294 --> 00:12:57.134 So for example that adults respond respectfully, that consequences are proportionate and that we're trying to help the pupil return to participating successfully with their learning. 00:12:57.134 --> 00:13:02.054 Those principles shouldn't change simply because a pupil's walked into a different room. 00:13:02.634 --> 00:13:14.835 So if my noonars aren't in great shape, just to be clear, they're fine, they're all right. But if they weren't, then there's a shared process for approaching what's happening with my noonars. 00:13:15.014 --> 00:13:36.154 And the third area is how decisions about adaptations are made. Because if a pupil needs a different response, there should be a reason for that change that we can explain logically. Let's say we've got a pupil who's become overwhelmed in busy classrooms and has an agreed kind of arrangement to leave the room briefly so they can regulate. 00:13:36.835 --> 00:13:46.735 That's a thought through purposeful adaptation. But the arrangement needs to be understood by all the relevant adults. What does the pupil do when they leave? Where do they go? 00:13:46.735 --> 00:15:58.615 How do they support that child when they come back into class and need help to return to their learning? If one teacher understands the arrangement, another refuses to allow it, and a third lets the pupil wander around the school indefinitely, well we haven't got a consistent approach to meeting the pupil's needs. We've got three adults making separate decisions which, if I'm honest, as someone who's visited hundreds and hundreds of schools, when you have that happening, it just looks like people making stuff up. And the example here, the analogy is, I've been to see three consultants, they've checked my noonars, they've all recommended something different and contradictory, and now as someone visiting the consultant, I don't know what to do or what to think. And as a child in that situation where we're getting different responses from different adults, I don't know what to do and I don't know what to think. And this is where school leaders and SENCOs do have an important role because they can make sure that individual adaptations are understood and communicated and reviewed. That doesn't mean every little adjustment needs a meeting, a form, three signatures from school leaders before a teacher can offer people some help. Teachers need the professional judgment and the latitude and the freedom to respond to what's happening in front of them moment by moment. But there needs to be a shared understanding of where that freedom sits within the school's wider approach. And there has to be a golden thread from the school's approach to thinking consistently about SEND to what happens in class, the adaptations that are in place, and what appears in the pupil support plan, if that's necessary. And I think there's a practical way to start developing that understanding. At your next staff meeting, take a behaviour situation that tends to produce, in your experience, different responses from staff across your school. It could be a student refusing to work or calling out or people leaving class without permission. Pick something that's relevant to your school and present your staff that situation and ask them what they do. Now, don't immediately tell them the correct answer. Instead, explore why they've suggested those responses. What expectation are they trying to maintain? 00:15:59.075 --> 00:16:55.514 What information about the pupil might make them change their mind about the right approach? And are the differences between their responses based on the child's needs, or is it simply based on personal preference? Because that conversation might show you something interesting about the viewpoints of your staff. You might discover that staff disagree about what the behaviour policy actually expects them to do, or that some staff don't know about adaptations that have already been agreed for particular pupils, or that the policy itself doesn't give teachers enough guidance about when they should use their professional judgment or think about behaviour as having an SEMH or an SEND need. That's useful feedback for a leadership team because you can't solve those problems by telling staff to be more consistent if they're not sure what that means or how they implement it. So sometimes, based on that, you might need to improve communication. 00:16:56.394 --> 00:17:16.275 Sometimes you might need to model what an appropriate response looks like. And sometimes, actually, you need to review the policy itself. After all, if everyone's consistently doing something that isn't working and the staff are changing their approach because they're frustrated and the students are frustrated, that's not necessarily a successful base to work from. 00:17:16.275 --> 00:17:20.215 So let's bring this back to Josh, our pupil who was refusing to start his writing. 00:17:20.215 --> 00:18:02.355 The important question isn't whether every teacher should give him a warning or whether every teacher should sit beside him and help him out. It's whether staff understand the school's expectations, whether they have enough information about what's making the task difficult for Josh, and know how to make reasonable professional judgments about how best to support him in a consistent way across the school. So if you're a school leader or SENCO, there are three things I'd encourage you to think about this week. First, identify one behaviour where staff responses vary across your school. Is that variation deliberate and justified and part of a thought-through approach? Or is it happening because adults have different understandings of the expectations? 00:18:03.295 --> 00:18:06.755 Secondly, look at the adaptations you're making for individual pupils. 00:18:07.315 --> 00:19:09.855 Are they understood by the people who need to use them? Or do they only exist in one teacher's head or on a support plan on a piece of paper? And thirdly, give staff an opportunity to discuss a real behaviour issue together because developing consistency is more than about writing a policy and asking everyone to read it and sign it. It's about helping staff develop a shared understanding of how to apply that policy in real situations in real classrooms. And that's all I've got time for today. If you found this episode useful, please subscribe to School Behaviour Secrets and leave me a review on your podcast app. It helps other school leaders and teachers discover the show and find out more about my new nurse. That's enough about my new nurse for one episode, probably, you know, the podcast forever. I hope you have a brilliant week, that you've learned something useful that you can apply in school today, and I can't wait to see you on the next episode of School Behaviour Secrets. Bye now.