Essex County Council SENCO Manual 2011

SEN and Children with Additional Needs

Promoting Positive Behaviour

Guidance for schools

Promoting Positive Behaviour: The Essex Approach

Aims:

·  to promote effective practice in every school in Essex

·  to provide a practical framework for supporting individuals which is embedded in the Code of Practice

·  to provide information and materials which relate to the processes of identification, intervention and evaluation of programmes

·  to support the partnership between schools, pupils and parents/carers

‘Promoting Positive Behaviour: The Essex Approach’ is a comprehensive guide to ways of helping pupils behave appropriately. It supports schools in developing levels of response to pupils’ needs, starting with whole-school policies that create an ethos, which encourages appropriate behaviour. ‘Promoting Positive Behaviour’ then moves to strategies for whole-classes and to ways of working with individuals.

All strategies and interventions are designed to encourage:

·  self-esteem and emotional strength

·  good social relationships

·  negotiation with pupils about their individual programmes

·  co-operation between parents or carers and the schools

The resource includes case studies, many ideas for activities and many pages of resources that can be photocopied (almost 200 in the Primary version and 100 in the Secondary version). These sheets can be used with whole classes, groups of children and individual pupils. The illustrations are designed to encourage pupils’ ownership of their own progress.

Comments from Schools.

·  We have benefited ‘immensely’ from the guide. The guidelines are ‘thought provoking’, ‘inspirational’, ‘workable’, ‘practical’, ‘successful’ ‘incredibly useful’ and ‘down to earth’.

·  We are really excited about the future for children with EBD using this approach.

·  Pupils enjoyed negotiating their own programmes and liked the reward sheets and certificates. Two pupils actually ‘borrowed’ the folder one lunch time when no one was looking! It was returned to the headteacher later with the following request: ‘Can I have a pass card and can he have a points programme?’ Their behaviour improved very quickly.

·  Parents were ‘delighted’ with the positive changes in their children’s behaviour and found the ‘Getting up’ and ‘Going to bed’ resource sheets very successful.

Please also see: ‘Learning Behaviour’ the Report of The Practitioners’ Group on School Behaviour and Discipline, chaired by Sir Alan Steer. The report, published in October 2005, identifies aspects of practice that create the right conditions for good behaviour to be learnt and offer practical examples as to how this can be done. It is available free from the DCSF (formerly the DfES) website, reference DFES-1950-2005.

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Ref: SM1/4.1

First issue: April 2002