Hopscotch believes children flourish best when they feel safe and secure and have their needs met by supportive practitioners who act as good role models, show them respect and value their individual personalities. Children are supported through co-regulation, where adults and children work together towards a common purpose, including finding ways to resolve upsets from stress in any domain and return to balance leading onto a path to self-regulation. The nursery actively promotes British Values and encourages and praises positive, caring and polite behaviour at all times and provides an environment where children learn to respect themselves, other people and their surroundings.
We implement the early years framework and our own curriculum to support children with their personal, social and emotional development. This involves helping children to understand their own feelings and others and beginning to regulate their behaviour. We support children to do this through working together with parents, having consistent approaches, structure, routine and age/stage appropriate boundaries. We help build confidence and self-esteem by valuing all children and giving lots of praise and encouragement.
To support positive behaviour in our setting, we aim to:
- Recognise the individuality of all our children
- Provide a warm, responsive relationship where children feel respected, comforted and supported in times of stress, and confident that they are cared for at all times.
- Understand that certain behaviours are a normal part of some young children's development e.g. biting
- Encourage self-regulation, consideration for each other, our surroundings and property
- Encourage children to participate in a wide range of group activities to enable them to develop their social skills
- Ensure that all staff act as positive role models for children
- Encourage parents, carers and other visitors to be positive role models
- Work in partnership with parents/carers by communicating openly
- Praise children and acknowledge their positive actions and attitudes, therefore ensuring that children see that we value and respect them
- Encourage all staff working with children to accept their responsibility for implementing the goals in this policy and to be consistent
- Promote non-violence and encourage children to deal with conflict peacefully
- Provide a key person system enabling staff to build a strong and positive relationship with children and their families
- Provide activities and stories to help children learn about accepted behaviours, including opportunities for children to contribute to decisions about accepted behaviour where age/stage appropriate
- Supporting and developing children's understanding of different feelings and emotions, self-regulation and empathy as appropriate to stage of development. This includes using strategies and naming and talking about feelings and ways to manage them
- Have a named person who has overall responsibility for promoting positive behaviour and behaviour support.
Our nursery rules are concerned with safety, care and respect for each other. We keep the rules to a minimum and ensure that these are age and stage appropriate. We try to involve children in the process of setting rules to encourage cooperation and participation and ensure children gain understanding of the expectations of behaviour relevant to them as a unique child.
Children who are displaying distressed/challenging behaviour, for example, by physically abusing another child or adult e.g. biting, or through verbal bullying, are helped to talk through their feelings and actions through co-regulation before thinking about the situation and apologise where appropriate. We make sure that the child who has been upset is comforted. We always acknowledge when a child is feeling angry or upset and that it is the behaviour that is not acceptable, not the child or their feelings.
We promote positive behaviour at Hopscotch by:
- Supporting all children to develop positive behaviour, and we make every effort to provide for their individual needs
- Never using or threatening to use physical punishment or corporal punishment such as smacking or shaking or use or threaten any punishment that could adversely affect a child's well being
- Only using physical intervention (where practitioners may use reasonable force to prevent children from injuring themselves or others or damaging property) or to manage a child's behaviour if absolutely necessary. We keep a record of any occasions where physical intervention is used and inform parents on the same day, or as reasonably practicable
- Recognising there may be occasions where a child is displaying challenging or distressed behaviour and may need individual techniques to restrain them to prevent a child from injuring themselves or others. This will only be carried out by staff who have been appropriately trained to do so. Any restraints will only be done following recommended guidance and training and only with a signed agreement from parents on when to use it. We will complete an incident form following any restraints used and notify the parents
- Never singling out children or humiliating them in any way. Where children are displaying challenging behaviour they will, wherever possible, be distracted and re-directed to alternative activities. Discussions with children will take place as to why their behaviour was not acceptable, respecting their level of understanding and maturity
- Never raising voices (other than to keep children safe)
- In any case of challenging behaviour, we always make it clear to the child or children in question, that it is the behaviour and not the child that is unwelcome
- Deciding on particular strategies to support particular types of behaviour depending on the child's age, level of development and the circumstances surrounding the behaviour. This may involve asking the child to talk and think about what he/she has done. All staff support children in developing empathy and children will only be asked to apologise if they have developed strong empathy skills and have a good understanding of why saying sorry is appropriate
- Helping staff to reflect on their own responses towards behaviours that challenge to ensure that their reactions are appropriate
- We inform parents/carers if their child's behaviour is unkind to others or if their child has been upset. In all cases we deal with behaviour that challenges in nursery at the time. We may ask parents/carers to meet with staff to discuss their child's behaviour, so that if there are any difficulties, we can work together to ensure consistency between their home and the nursery. In some cases, we may request additional advice and support from other professionals, such as an educational psychologist
- We support children in developing non-aggressive strategies to enable them to express their feelings and emotions
- We keep confidential records on any behaviour that challenges that has taken place We inform parents and ask them to read and sign any incidents concerning their child
- Through partnership with parents and formal observations, we make every effort to identify any behavioural concerns and the causes of that behaviour. From these observations and discussions, we will implement an individual behaviour support plan where a child's behaviour involves aggressive actions towards other children and staff, for example hitting, kicking etc. The manager will complete risk assessments identifying any potential triggers or warning signs ensuring other children's and staff's safety at all times. In these instances, we may remove a child from an area until they have calmed down.
At our nursery, staff follow the procedure below to enable them to deal with behaviour that challenges:
- Staff are encouraged to ensure that all children feel safe, happy and secure
- Staff are encouraged to recognise that active physical aggression in the early years is part of the child's development and that it should be channelled in a positive way
- Children are helped to understand that using aggression to get things, is inappropriate and they will be encouraged to resolve problems in other ways
- Staff will initiate games and activities with children when they feel play has become overly boisterous or aggressive, both indoors or outdoors
- We will ensure that this policy is available for staff and parents and it will be shared at least once a year to parents and staff
- Staff and parents/carers are also welcomed to review and comment on the policy and procedure
- If any parent has a concern about their child, a member of staff will be available to discuss those concerns. Working together can ensure our children feel confident and secure in their environment, both at home and in the nursery
- All concerns will be treated in the strictest confidence.
We encourage children to recognise that bullying, fighting, hurting and discriminatory comments are not acceptable behaviour. We want children to recognise that certain actions are right and that others are wrong. Bullying takes many forms. It can be physical, verbal or emotional, but it is always a repeated behaviour that makes other people feel uncomfortable or threatened. We acknowledge that any form of bullying is unacceptable and will be dealt with immediately while recognising that physical aggression is part of children's development in their early years. Staff will intervene when they think a child is being bullied, however mild or harmless it may seem and sensitively discuss any instance of bullying with the parents/carers of all involved to look for a consistent resolution to the behaviour.
By promoting positive behaviour, valuing co-operation and a caring attitude, we hope to ensure that children will develop a positive sense of self, have confidence in their own abilities, make good friendships, co-operate and resolve conflicts peaceably. These will provide them with a secure platform for school and later life.
We understand that children may use certain behaviours, such as biting to communicate their feelings and needs. Biting is a common type of behaviour that some children use to help them make sense of the world around them, and to manage interactions with others. It can be triggered when they do not have the words to communicate their anger, frustration or need. It can also be used to fulfil an oral stimulation need, such as during periods of teething or developmental exploration. Sometimes biting can be due to a Special Educational Need and/or Disability.
The nursery uses the following strategies to help prevent biting:
- Individual, one-to- one and small group times so that each child is receiving positive attention
- Quiet/cosy areas for children who are feeling overwhelmed to go to
- Stories, puppets, discussion about emotions and feelings including activities and stories that help support children to recognise feelings and empathise with characters and events
- Additional resources for children who have oral stimulation needs, such as, biting rings
- Vigilant staff that know the children well and are able to identify where children need more stimulation or quiet times
- Adequate resources are provided and, where possible, more than one resource or toy is sought to minimise conflicts.
Every child is treated as an individual and we work with families to support all children’s individual needs. With this in mind, it will be necessary to implement different strategies depending on the needs of the child carrying out the biting.
In the event of a child being bitten we use the following procedures. The most relevant staff member(s) will:
- Comfort any child who has been bitten and check for any visible injury. Administer any paediatric first aid where necessary and complete an accident form once the child is settled again. If deemed appropriate the parents/carers will be informed via telephone. Staff will continue to observe the bitten area for signs of infection. For confidentiality purposes and possible conflict, we do not disclose the name of the child who has caused the bite to the parents/carers
- Tell the child who has caused the bite in terms that they understand that biting (the behaviour and not the child) is unkind and show the child that it makes staff and the child who has been bitten sad
- Ask the child what they can do to make the ‘child that has been bitten’ feel better (this could be fetching them a toy or sharing toys with them, a rub on the back etc.)
- Complete an incident form to share with the parents/carers at the end of the child’s session.
- If a child continues to bite, carry out observations to try to distinguish a cause, e.g. tiredness or frustration
- Arrange for a meeting with the child’s parents/carers to develop strategies to prevent the biting behaviour. Parents/carers will be reassured that it is part of a child’s development and not made to feel that it is their fault
- In the event of a bite breaking the skin and to reduce the risk of infection from bacteria, give prompt treatment to both the child who has bitten and the child who has been bitten.
If a child or member of staff sustains a bite wound where the skin has been severely broken, arrange for urgent medical attention after initial first aid has been carried out. The accident protocol should be followed as usual.
In cases where a child may repeatedly bite and/or if they have a particular special educational need or disability that lends itself to increased biting, for example, in some cases of neurodivergence where a child doesn’t have developed communication skills, the nursery manager will carry out a risk assessment and may recommend immunisation with hepatitis B vaccine for all staff and children.