Deputy News Behaviour Curriculum
St Joseph's Primary School
St Joseph’s Behaviour Curriculum 2027
As we move into the second half of Term 4, our planning for the new school year is well underway. After careful consideration and reflection, we are excited to share that St Joseph’s is beginning a new chapter in how we support positive behaviour. In 2027, we will introduce a revised behaviour framework and a new Behaviour Curriculum. Over the following years, we will continue to build on this work, embedding these practices so they become part of “the way we do things” at St Joseph’s.
What is a Behaviour Curriculum?
At St Joseph’s, we believe good behaviour does not happen by accident – it is taught. A Behaviour Curriculum is a planned, whole-school approach that explicitly teaches students what positive behaviour looks like, sounds like and feels like across a range of settings. A behaviour curriculum is a shared partnership between home and school based on a shared language, consistent expectations and a common commitment to helping every child flourish.
Why teach behaviour?
Our approach draws on contemporary research into positive, school-wide behaviour, as well as the work of Tom Bennett, a former teacher and lead behaviour adviser to the UK Department for Education. In his review Creating a Culture (2017) and his book Running the Room (2020), Bennett argues that we cannot assume children arrive knowing how to behave in every school setting. Instead, behaviour should be taught, practised and reinforced like any other subject, and a school’s culture, designed on purpose, and not left to chance.
In practice, this means:
clear, shared expectations and routines, explicitly taught to every student;
staff modelling and practising these routines with students, and re-teaching when needed;
consistent language and responses in every classroom and space;
recognising and celebrating positive behaviour, not just responding to poor choices;
home and school working together, using the same language.
Choosing our cornerstone values and behaviours
To anchor our new Behaviour Curriculum, we would like to identify a small set of key values that will form the foundation of behaviour at St Joseph’s. These words will replace our current school rules (Respect for self, Respect for others and Respect for the environment). They will appear in our classrooms, our daily routines and our conversations with students, and, we hope, at home too.
As part of consulting our school community, and alongside feedback from our students and staff, we invite families to complete the very brief survey linked below. We would love to hear which qualities you would most like to see in your child, and in every St Joseph’s student.