To create and maintain a supportive and safe environment for students to engage in daily, it is necessary for teachers to implement effective methods for working with challenging behaviours and to develop systems and settings that provide an engaging and safe atmosphere. One area teachers can focus on when developing a safe and supportive environment for students is positive behaviour support (PBS). PBS aims to reduce challenging behaviour by assisting the individual to build up repertoire of socially appropriate behaviours to help the student gain control and achieve goals in ways that effective and efficient (Hyde, et al., 2010).
Bill Rogers discusses this sort of behaviour management in his video Establishing Trust to Enable Classroom Co-operation where he discusses the steps to take and strategies to use when dealing with problematic behaviours to enable the student to achieve goals in an effective and efficient way while minimising outbursts or arguments. The example Rogers gives in this video is of a student who is not working when the class has started. Rogers demonstrates two scenarios using PBS and anger or judgement as the answer. Below, the breakdown of the scenario is broken into two sections and a discussion after about how the PBS strategy used not only reduced what could have turned into challenging behaviour but also maintained a safe environment for the other students and engaged the child discussed in their studies.
Bill Rogers discusses this sort of behaviour management in his video Establishing Trust to Enable Classroom Co-operation where he discusses the steps to take and strategies to use when dealing with problematic behaviours to enable the student to achieve goals in an effective and efficient way while minimising outbursts or arguments. The example Rogers gives in this video is of a student who is not working when the class has started. Rogers demonstrates two scenarios using PBS and anger or judgement as the answer. Below, the breakdown of the scenario is broken into two sections and a discussion after about how the PBS strategy used not only reduced what could have turned into challenging behaviour but also maintained a safe environment for the other students and engaged the child discussed in their studies.
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(Osiris Educational, 2012)
The PBS example provided above shows how to assist and manage a supportive and engaging learning environment for students without conflict and shows how a negative reaction to something simple and rather trivial can become a bigger problem than necessary. PBS identifies three levels of classroom behaviour which break up into primary, secondary and tertiary categories. The three levels of PBS creates a hierarchical set of strategies that teachers can use to support and teach appropriate social behaviours and can help teachers to plan and process learning outcomes, target challenging behaviour and create a positive environment in a whole-class situation.
It is important for teachers to understand students behaviours and backgrounds and to undertake in student observations to determine specific classroom triggers (Hyde, et al., 2010).
It is also important for teachers to know and understand the relevant legislative requirements, school policies and AITSL standards that relate to managing and creating a supportive, safe and engaging environment.
Previously discussed in the "Legislative Requirements and School Policy" page, the Safe, Supportive and Disciplined procedure provides a process to use in schools to promote a safe, supportive and disciplined environment where students can be engaged in their learning. This legislation aligns with the Code of School Behaviour and Statement of Expectations for a Disciplined School Environment and other legislative requirements and includes:
Using the procedure provided from the Queensland State above, it can be seen that there are many ways to provide a safe and supportive environment but one that is highlighted upon in the procedure is discipline.
Discipline is one option for maintaining a safe environment although it is not an option that works with every student. As seen above the PBS system could be one that students respond to positively or the Trust example shown in the video by Osiris.
There are many directions that a teacher can take to provide a supportive, safe and engaging environment for students, and it ultimately funnels down to the group of students that are in the class, how responsible they are for their education and their own engagement in the class and the dynamic of the group. If there are students in the class that have behavioural problems in another class or outside of the school yard, they will bring those external factors into the classroom which has the potential to disrupt the safe, and engaging environment not only themselves but for the other students. It is then the responsibility of the teacher to find a method of supporting these students and engaging them in a way that sets aside what issues they may have outside of the classroom to ensure that they are supported, safe and included in their education and that they are not disrupting the supportive, safe and engaging environment that has been set for the class as a whole.
The PBS example provided above shows how to assist and manage a supportive and engaging learning environment for students without conflict and shows how a negative reaction to something simple and rather trivial can become a bigger problem than necessary. PBS identifies three levels of classroom behaviour which break up into primary, secondary and tertiary categories. The three levels of PBS creates a hierarchical set of strategies that teachers can use to support and teach appropriate social behaviours and can help teachers to plan and process learning outcomes, target challenging behaviour and create a positive environment in a whole-class situation.
It is important for teachers to understand students behaviours and backgrounds and to undertake in student observations to determine specific classroom triggers (Hyde, et al., 2010).
It is also important for teachers to know and understand the relevant legislative requirements, school policies and AITSL standards that relate to managing and creating a supportive, safe and engaging environment.
Previously discussed in the "Legislative Requirements and School Policy" page, the Safe, Supportive and Disciplined procedure provides a process to use in schools to promote a safe, supportive and disciplined environment where students can be engaged in their learning. This legislation aligns with the Code of School Behaviour and Statement of Expectations for a Disciplined School Environment and other legislative requirements and includes:
- "the requirement for all state schools to have a Responsible Behaviour Plan for Students
- the application, where required, of Disciplinary Consequences
- provision for the use of Time Out as a proactive strategy as well as a behaviour management strategy. Time out is defined as giving a student time away from their regular class program/routine:
- to a separate area within classroom
- to another supervised room or setting.
- provision for the use of Physical Restraint, involving the manual restriction of a student’s movement for reasons of safety in cases where a student is behaving in a manner that is potentially injurious to themselves or others, or to prevent serious property damage. It is used only as an immediate or emergency response or as part of a student’s individual plan, including prevention of self-harming behaviours."
Using the procedure provided from the Queensland State above, it can be seen that there are many ways to provide a safe and supportive environment but one that is highlighted upon in the procedure is discipline.
Discipline is one option for maintaining a safe environment although it is not an option that works with every student. As seen above the PBS system could be one that students respond to positively or the Trust example shown in the video by Osiris.
There are many directions that a teacher can take to provide a supportive, safe and engaging environment for students, and it ultimately funnels down to the group of students that are in the class, how responsible they are for their education and their own engagement in the class and the dynamic of the group. If there are students in the class that have behavioural problems in another class or outside of the school yard, they will bring those external factors into the classroom which has the potential to disrupt the safe, and engaging environment not only themselves but for the other students. It is then the responsibility of the teacher to find a method of supporting these students and engaging them in a way that sets aside what issues they may have outside of the classroom to ensure that they are supported, safe and included in their education and that they are not disrupting the supportive, safe and engaging environment that has been set for the class as a whole.