Context for joining Behaviour Hubs
We are a 2 form entry primary school with 442 pupils on roll including our nursery. We are city centre based, serving a highly deprived area and as at January-22, a census showed 70.9% of the school population fell within 0-10% of most multiple deprivation indices of deprivation and 37.2% lowest 10% income deprivation. In addition:
- 49.8% are FSM ( 67% FSM 6)
- 46% are EAL
- 22% SEND (8 EHCPs and several pending).
Mobility is increasing year on year as we are surrounded by rented high rise flats and similar rented accommodation which is used as temporary housing for families new to the city before more permanent accommodation is found. Often these families are new to English, fleeing from domestic violence or other social crisis.
Our Last OFSTED was December-18 with overall effectiveness graded as RI with good leadership and management. Behaviour was graded as Good. We are an inclusive school and support many children with highly complex needs and behavioural challenges.
Behaviour challenges and goals
We had already changed our Behaviour Policy in September 2019 but the pandemic had meant it had not been embedded as well as it could or further refined, and we were constantly required to meet the needs of children with the most challenging behaviours. Our main goal therefore was to ensure our Behaviour Policy and systems and procedures that supported this changed context were effectively meeting our current needs and that all staff were trained in the new arrangements and there was a consistency of approach across the school.
The main challenge was doing all of this with multiple staff and pupil absence to ensure that all staff were available to receive training, especially in Autumn 2021. We were keen to bring the whole staff team on board with this, and not just teachers. We also wanted to ensure lunchtime ran smoothing, using the same standards as the rest of the day.
Solutions to behaviour challenges
- Keeping the aim a high priority and making constant reference to it in whole staff weekly memos and staff briefings
- Forensically looking at routines and establishing very clear protocols which everyone understood – pupils and staff
- Introducing more structured activities at lunchtime and assigning staff to supervise
- Ensuring that wherever possible the cover of staff to attend training was prioritised
- High SLT presence daily in corridors and in the dining room, so that the message was relentlessly delivered and followed through, and that staff felt supported
- Using INSETs where all staff were together to reinforce new messages and to undertake bespoke training for lunchtime staff on a fortnightly basis to ensure they too were moving with the rest of the staff.
Impact on behaviour
Calmer corridors and general movement around school and to and from yards. Fewer instances of low-level behaviour recorded on newly introduced weekly audits which capture the number of occasions where pupils who had to miss minutes of playtime, whole play times or removal to another class. This audit was introduced in January-22. Most classes had low numbers to start with but 3 classes with most challenging behaviours had recorded incidents of minutes of missed play as high as between 20 and 30 occasions in one week (this would vary), however by summer 1 these were down to mainly single figures and across the school far fewer occasions.
It was of particular note that incidents of poor behaviour for our KS1 children reported by lunchtime staff to teachers dramatically reduced once we introduced the range of activities which had been restricted to Y1 continuous provision, but we allowed Rec to Y2 to access over lunch. This has been hugely successful.
The language of calm corridors, indoor voices, and single file is heard all the time around school and fully understood by all children. Our updated sanction and praise protocols, developed in full consultation with pupils and staff, are now embedded and working very well.
Next steps on your behaviour journey
- To further work towards more tailored support at lunch time and timetabling TAs to offer quality lunchtime intervention, over and above what we already have
- To ensure our systems are embedded
- It will be good to see how our new induction processes supports new staff in quickly adapting to our expectations, so that consistency is not in any way watered down by the arrival of new staff
- Likewise, we will build on our improved transition arrangements for pupils to ensure that our systems offer the best support possible to help them quickly meet our expectations.