Positive Psychology for Teachers by Jeremy Swinson & Alex Harrop

Author:Jeremy Swinson & Alex Harrop [Swinson, Jeremy & Harrop, Alex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Classroom Management, Education, Educational Psychology
ISBN: 9781136622038
Google: RZR79YwIQf8C
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2012-10-12T21:01:54+00:00

Whole school interventions

There is no shortage of advice to schools on how they can improve the learning and behaviour of their pupils. Building a Better Behaved School (Galvin et al., 1990) is a good example and there are many others. While the guidance given in such publications is invariably very sound and, in the best examples, is based on a solid research base, there tends to be a dearth of evidence where the advice given is put into practice and scientifically evaluated.

Changing policy and practice in a large organisation such as a secondary school can be difficult. To be successful, it is important to involve all sections of a school community. Guidance was issued to schools (DfES, 2003) to encourage schools to take account of pupils’ views on behaviour through discussions with school councils (Macbeath et al., 2003). Osler (2000), Pearce and Hallgarten (2000), Read (2005) and Rowe (2006) all argue that whole school policies in which pupils are involved in their development are the most likely to be successful. Davie and Galloway (1996), Breen and Littlejohn (2000) and Lewis and Lindsay (2000) all emphasise that pupil involvement leads to a great sense of ownership of the policy by the pupils, who are consequently more likely to understand its underlying philosophy and purpose.

However, while there is evidence of pupil involvement in the development of anti-bullying policies (see Sharp and Thompson, 1994), accounts of pupil involvement in the development of whole school behaviour policies would appear to be rare.

The first author was a member of a multidisciplinary team that included an advisory teacher and an educational consultant and was managed by a member of the education authority’s advisory team. We were invited by the senior management team of a school that had come to a decision that it needed to revise its behaviour management policy. The initiative was aimed at developing school policy and improving behaviour in the classroom. It was hoped that by focusing specifically on pupil behaviour and involving both pupils and teaching staff in policy development that improvements in other areas, such as pupil attainments and attendance, might also be apparent.

The school was an 11 to 18 comprehensive school with a roll of approximately 1200. A high proportion of the pupils were on free school meals. At an initial meeting with the senior management of the school, we were told they were concerned about the standard of behaviour in their school, especially that of the Year 9s (13–14 year olds) and the impact that this had on the pupils’ learning.

The advisory team explained to the management that they did not wish to appear as ‘hero innovators’ and impose a new system, but, rather as Georgiades and Phillimore (1975) suggested, they would be seeking solutions from those who worked day to day with the problems. As a result, the team embarked on a series of consultations with the three key elements of the school: the parents, the teachers, and especially the pupils. The aims were to learn about the

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