Children Essay

1.1 Explain how legislation, frameworks, codes of practice and policies relating to positive behaviour support are applied to own working practice. The aspects of my role within our setting are regulated by our policies and procedures which have been written with current legislation such as the Children’s act. These policies and procedures cover promoting positive behaviour and we all follow that as our code of practice as this is an important area to both us and all our children. We focus very much on praise for good behaviour, respecting each other and each other’s feelings, helping each other and if they cannot do something but try we give praise for trying. We feel that a child’s behaviour is reflected in how much they feel valued within our setting, we make sure the children have planned activities for them to experience and we allow the children to have their say and we change and mould activities letting the children take the lead and let the activity free flow and it ends up being a lot of fun. We do have a set of house rules which we feel are realistic and very set around house rules that would apply in their own home. We try to be consistent in enforcing these house rules which very much includes our own daughter, we make sure she is included in following the house rules the same as all the other children that we look after. However all children will have times where they misbehave and for this we have several strategies, depending on the age and stage of ability of the child but we find that they work well for us. * Distraction- We will remove the child from a situation and give them an alternative activity or we ask the child to help us with a special task and tell them we need their help. * Ignoring- Depending on the situation we may ignore the bad behaviour as we feel it is being done to get a reaction, we do find this more common with our own daughter too. * Discuss with child- We will take the child to one side and talk to them about why we will remove them from the activity if they continue even though we don’t want to do that but we want children to understand that their actions have consequences, we are always very careful that we explain that it’s their behaviour that we don’t like not them. We also talk to the child about how they are feeling maybe not at that point but we return to it later on to see if anything is troubling them that they want to talk about * Time Out- Removing the child from an activity or situation and giving them some quiet time, maybe even some TV time if this is what their prefer to do, we find that some children burn out and just need some short time on their own or with a friend to chill out and relax We will never smack, shake, or hurt a child in any way and we will never humiliate a child ever We would always discuss the situation with the parent on collecting; we have never had a situation where we have had to call a parent/carer to collect the child but if the situation needed it we would do that. We have found that some children get quite distressed if you tell their parents about their behaviour and this can actually have a negative reaction so we will catch the parent before the child knows they are here and speak to them in private in our lounge about the situation, confirm how we dealt with it at the time and the outcome and that we have dealt with the behaviour at the time that it happened. 1.2 Define what is meant by restrictive interventions. There are a number of forms of restrictive intervention’s, the first one is physical intervention where you have to intervene such as if two children were having a fight and you wanted to break them up then there is a good chance that you will need to separate them to calm them down. Social intervention is another form of restrictive intervention where you can deal with the situation with speech, body language and facial expressions. Social intervention is also used in the setting for example the stair gates to stop the children climbing the stairs, the safety straps on the high chair so they don’t fall out. 1.3 Explain when restrictive intervention may and may not be used. Practitioners will always look for the best possible way of dealing with situations that may arise, unfortunately that’s sometimes not the case and there are times where Restrictive intervention may be required when a child is showing signs of unreasonable behaviour and everything has been taken into account of trying to reason with them, intervention may then be used, but any forms of intervention are best used as a last resort as its always best practice to communicate in a positive way but strongly depending on the circumstances and situation i.e. any injury that may have been caused by a child to another could have been an accident and therefore intervention of any kind may not be required on this occasion. 1.4 Explain who needs to be informed of any incidents where restrictive interventions have been used. It outlines in the EYFS that one intervention that can be used however rare that it is, can be that of a physical one, it is used to manage a child’s behaviour and it must be recorded and the parents must be informed on the same day as the incident occurred. Our own policies and procedures state that any intervention that has been required will be discussed with you at the time of pick up, written in their handbook if they have one or a phone call will be made on that day by us informing the parents of the incident and how it was dealt with at the time. 1.5 Explain why the least restrictive interventions should be used when dealing with incidents of challenging behaviour. I think it’s always important for people who look after children in whatever role they may do to be positive in sometimes difficult circumstances, I don’t mean we should praise bad behaviour far from it but we need to show positive reinforcement of some nature in order for us to get the best out of young people , negativity won’t bring out the best in people and will only give them a sense of despair and lack of self-confidence, positive feedback will hopefully bring them the confidence they need in life to go from strength to strength so I feel it’s always important to concentrate on what they can do well and not what they can’t do right. For all parties involved in situations of bad behaviour it’s important if possible to diffuse situations and to try and talk things through to a resolution with the child involved, with safety in mind. 1.6 Describe safeguards that must be in place if restrictive physical interventions are used. With health and safety in mind there are environments that need to be safe if any physical intervention is required, safety to all is priority in this situation and as unfortunate as it may be, if a person cannot be calmed down by any other means as previously discussed a situation may escalate and turn physical. It’s important that all children are safe and therefore removed from the setting and placed with other practitioners in another room away from the threatening behaviour of the individual concerned. If any unfortunate event does take place it’s important that the room is as safe as possible to avoid any injury to all involved, remember we are still looking for a peaceful and positive ending here and a physical situation is really the last thing anybody wants.it needs reminding here that its best if 2 practitioners are on standby as witnesses may be needed if things got out of hand and if anything was ever required from a medical point of view. 2.1 Explain the difference between proactive and reactive strategies. These are both at each end of the spectrum, a Proactive strategy is about us preventing a situation that we perceive may happen , a reactive strategy is something that hasn’t happened yet and something we may have to react to, a negative situation that we may have to turn into a positive one. 2.2 identify the proactive and reactive strategies that are used within own work role. To use these strategies’ it’s about us seeing, hearing and being aware of situations almost in a psychic form that may develop in our setting, for us to react and respond in a way to prevent something we feel may happen, as it may have happened before so will it happen again?, this could be any type of issue or situation and any act that is carried out by a child such as crying, aggressive behaviour, smacking, biting, arguments , an example of a situation that has occurred with us in our setting are as follows, a proactive and reactive example of the way we work would be to plan an activity when 2 of the children that are involved in this don’t get along very well but we want them to feel included in the groups activity ,it’s our job to understand what happened previously when we did this activity and the cause of the situation in the first place we can then implement ch ange for next time and see if there is any change in the behaviour of the child or children if resolved then fine, if not it’s up to us again to look at the cause and then try another method , methods used in situations like this would be to: Use our knowledge in order to avoid escalation, containment, use diversion as a strategy, use mediation, challenge and explain to children the consequences of their actions, support children and help them resolve situations to a positive end. 2.3 Explain the importance of identifying patterns of behaviour or triggers to challenging behaviour when establishing proactive or reactive strategies to be used. Like I’ve touched on earlier it’s about identifying the early warning signs that triggers children to cause disruptive behaviour and for us to intervene and preventing it from escalating further, it’s usually in our case quite easy to spot as you will see situations from time to time where you may find a child can start something and others will follow and do the same thing , an example of this would be where a child has been given something to do but has no interest in what they are doing, with nothing to do they begin to run around the play area and cause other children to do the same, it’s up to us to identify and intervene with this before it happens , a warning sign can sometimes be a change in their mood and other causes are as follows. Boredom – give them something to focus on. Lack of choice – it’s so important for them to them to be stimulated make sure there is plenty of choice in terms of things to do. Frustration in not being able to do something. Lack of attention – make sure we communicate with them and show positive feedback if their doing something well. Disruption and noise – make sure of a calm environment. Too many children doing an activity – move make sure there another alternative activity A difficult one to identify is sometimes when they’re not well, all children are different and react in different kinds of ways, some will communicate and engage well and some wont. 2.4 Explain the importance of maintaining a person or child-centred approach when establishing proactive strategies. Challenging behaviour can be an individual thing and not all children react in the same way or react at the same level there can be different degrees in the severity of the behaviour. When dealing with inappropriate behaviour it’s important that each child is handled as an individual and not as a group, this shows that we are capable of adapting to each single case and it must be noted that a technique that may suit one child may not suit another, treating the children as individuals is also gives them a sense of value as they are treated as individual young people. Like we’ve said often despite the circumstances a positive spin on the situation is always a good one to end with. 2.5 Explain the importance of reinforcing positive behaviour with individuals. All people like to be praised and look for approval its only human nature and children are no different, to be positive as a person comes from positive behaviour itself, it’s always what we strive for and to be as a person, it’s vital that we show encouragement, praise and to be positive when they do something well if children are not praised for doing something well or they don’t get encouragement in a positive way they will look for attention in another ways, this is usually from a negative point of view i.e. they will start to show challenging behaviour in order to get a response this is most certainly what we don’t want ,as its not only bad for the child in question but the practitioner will find frustration in the fact that the feeling they now have could come across to the child in a negative light and that was something they were trying to avoid initially. You can now see that reinforcing positive behaviour is a good thing and the children mirror th is situation by acting appropriately well and in a positive light. 2.6 Evaluate the impact on an individual’s well-being of using reactive rather than proactive strategies. The use of a reactive approach towards a child is more of a negative one I feel, as an incident has already occurred and there will be a consequence for the child’s action, whereas a proactive approach is more of a positive one as it outlines from the start the behaviour that is expected from them, children as they are need constant reminders of good positive behaviour and if a proactive approach wasn’t used in the first place and an incident has occurred , the reactive approach after the incident has taken place can make the child in question feel a sense of confusion ,they may feel ashamed, humiliated and a whole host of negative feelings even if they are expressed in a positive light.