PB4L - PLD Staff Meeting with Linda Ahokava

PB4L is all about teaching behaviours that we want students to present as opposed to focusing on behaviours not appropriate.  Our school began our PB4L journey last year and we have implemented a variety strategies to reinforce behaviours that contribute to a school environments that are positive, caring and safe.  Our school culture has grown partly as a result of the implementation of the PB4L programme and this includes a spin off with positive staff relationships by way of collegiality and support.
PB4L focuses on teaching expected behaviours.   The introduction slide to our session read:
 If a student doesn't know how to read, we teach.
If a student doesn't know how to swim, we teach.
If a student doesn't know how to multiply, we teach.
If a student doesn't know how to behave, we punish. 

The systems we have put in place include:

• giving students tokens for displaying PB4L during class time or in the playground. The tokens are valued as 'house point' and the points system is collated throughout the term.
• the winning house are rewarded at the end of each term with a treat of their choice - e.g: colour shirt day & pizza.
• giving students assembly awards for displaying our school values of Manaakitanga, Whanaungatanga, Tukumarie, Ako and Rangimaire.
• if students are recognised as consistently displaying the school values, they will receive a values badge correlating to the value they are displaying. 

The benefits we have seen since we have put PB4L in place are:

- Improvements in academic engagement & attainment

- Improvements in behaviour

- Improved school & teacher capability

- Improved teacher confidence & satisfaction

- Improved school climate and perceptions of organisational health and safety

- Improved relationships between staff, students & whanau/ community

- Improved targeting of students for specialist service referral

- Reduced major disciplinary infractions

- Reduced teacher reported bullying behaviour

Understanding Behaviour - Responding Safely (UBRS)

Responding to behaviours is a tricky part of teaching.  Teachers hold the power to make or break situations that are emotionally charged and can either contribute to a culture of harmony or an atmosphere of fear.

We are often torn between our beliefs in justice and our knowledge of the students we teach.  Picking your battles becomes a catch cry parked at the forefront of classroom management.   Experience, both personally and professionally makes dealing with emotionally charged incidents clearer to read and therefore easier to foresee and respond to.   Reflective practice plays are huge role in developing teacher's understanding of behaviour and teachers must consider the importance of really knowing their student's values and beliefs as well as their own.  

Our staff participated in UBRS training.  The modules covered during the programme included - Understanding Behaviour, Encouraging Ready-to-Learn Behaviour, Responding Safely, and Reflection and Embedding.  Throughout the day, staff shared thoughts, ideas and experiences of behaviour incidences and their responses to them.  We watched videos and gave opinions regarding handling different scenarios and we talked about preventative measures.  

The main messages I received throughout the day was the importance of knowing your students well, setting up sound classroom systems and expectations with your students and developing strong working relationships with them.  Teacher's reactions and understanding how and why we manage situations the way we do is important too.  A strong culture of shared values around behaviour expectations also adds to the atmosphere and environment of the school.

One of the take homes I got from the day was the 'Zone of Regulation'.  Walking students through the zones, getting them to examine and understand how they feel and act within each zone is a positive step to developing self management in stressful situations.  This same idea relates closely to the Mana Enhancement programme we have used with students who sometimes struggle to understand why they feel the way they do and how they react to those feelings.

When entering into todays workshop, I thought the messages were going to be all about 'how to restrain a student' in situations of crisis.  While restraint was talked about and examples given, most of the day was spent examining behaviours, reactions and pre-empting them.  It was a valuable day of training and reflection, with a lot of sharing, reflection and laughter.  Well worth it!