Assistant Principal
Megan Franklyn
Assistant Principal
School wide positive behaviours
Last week Sharon Lomas and I had the pleasure of talking to small groups of students from Years 1 to 6 about our school wide expected behaviours: Be respectful, Be resilient and Be empathetic. The students were absolutely amazing in articulating what these behaviours might look like in various parts of our school e.g: the learning spaces, the playground, the toilets and the community. They contributed their thinking using an app called padlet or for our juniors by writing on sticky notes. We look forward to our Wellbeing Priority Team looking at these to complete our school wide positive behaviour matrix which we will then share with our students, teachers and families and which will be prominently displayed in all of our spaces within the school.
Challenging Behaviours
The Royal Children’s Hospital explains that challenging behaviours in young children are common as they learn to develop socially and emotionally and learn rules, expectations and boundaries. Often challenging behaviours are children responding to feelings of anxiety, anger, being overwhelmed or not understanding how to process these emotions. They can also be caused by illness, lack of sleep, excessive screen time, poor diet or changes in family circumstance or routine. It is recommended that if your child’s behaviours are affecting the way they cope with life, or you are struggling to manage their behaviours it may be worth delving deeper to determine whether there is an undiagnosed developmental condition or mental health issue.
The following tips are from the raisingchildren.net.au Australian Parenting Website for promoting positive behaviour in your child.
Tips to encourage positive behaviour:
1. Give your child positive attention and spend quality time together
2. Be a role model
3. Tell your child how you feel
4. Catch your child being ‘good’
5. Get down to your child’s level
6. Listen actively
7. Keep promises
8. Create an environment for positive behaviour
9. Decide what’s important
10. Keep instructions simple and positive
11. Give children responsibility – and consequences
12. Give your child the chance to succeed
13. Prepare for challenging situations
14. Keep your sense of humour
Read about each of these tips in more detail here https://raisingchildren.net.au/school-age/behaviour/encouraging-good-behaviour/good-behaviour-tips These tips are also available in Arabic, Dari, Dinka, Hakha Chin, Karen, Persian, Simplified Chinese, Swahili, Tamil and Vietnamese.
Mandatory Reporting
As part of Kingswood Primary School’s commitment to Child Safety and protecting children, all of our staff, both teachers and education support staff have completed their annual mandatory reporting training. This ensures that all staff are aware of their legal obligations and further educates them on the four critical actions that should be taken when responding to a disclosure or suspicion of child abuse.
Action 1: Responding to an emergency
Action 2: Reporting to Authorities
Action 3: Contact Parents or Carers
Action 4: Providing ongoing support
If you have any questions about our Child Safety commitment and policies please look at the school documents section of the school website here:
http://kingswood.vic.edu.au/school-policy-documents/
In particular child safety code of conduct, child safe standards, child safety policy, child safety responding and reporting policy and procedures or you can contact me directly on 9551-1727.