There were six areas targeted for developments within an overall framework for improving the management of behaviour. These were identified as :

1. Purchase of Leeds Behaviour Database
2. Development of Core Behaviour Support Team
3. Employment of Non-Teaching Assistant
4. Development of Preventative Work with Identified Students in Years 7 - 8
5. Closer Liaison with Behaviour Support Team
6. Questionnaire and Checklist for Staff, Students and Parents

The first four of these were part of an integrated strategy to:

• reduce incidents of and referral for disruption
• introduce a clearly-articulated system for identifying and monitoring behaviours
• provide a behaviour support team in school to manage the behaviour of students and offer appropriate support to both them and teaching colleagues

The latter two areas were to complement the strategy by working more closely with the external Behaviour Support Team at the Year 6/7 transition phase and also to develop both staff and parents' awareness and expertise in managing behavioural problems.

The Project Leader was impressed by this programme for monitoring and evaluation behaviours, and initially she and a school secretary undertook training in its use. The version introduced (Version 4) monitors a range of behaviours (types of incident) and can provide, for example, individual student records on forms of behaviour, monitoring sanctions given and can provide analyses according to time, subject area and location. It is possible to analyse and evaluate school and year groups and individual behaviours.

The system was set up by the end of the Autumn Term and was considered to be `running well' by the end of the Spring Term. A further two staff also in-putted data: the Head of Lower School and Head of Upper School. Data was kept for all year groups.

The database has proved to be very successful in that there was a clear, objective picture of actual incidents of behaviour, maintained in a standardised format. It meant that staff could be provided with a clear picture not only of the nature of the behaviours, (for example that 60% of the occasions when a particular student was given sanctions for misbehaviour were for acts of defiance) but also the situations in which they arose and their frequency. This ability to present an objective statement provided staff with factual data in an area which is often emotionally charged. It was stated that this could `de-personalise' many situations where managing behaviour was an issue.

The personal records were also useful for presenting to the students themselves as the basis of counselling/advisory sessions. Again these were `facts' and the Project Director believed that presenting the record to a student reduced the number of potentially fraught, argumentative situations which can arise when students are confronted simply with an `oral' account of misbehaviour.

A major, unanticipated beneficial outcome was the fact that the system also improved relations with parents. The school operates a graduated sanctions system, whereby any noted misbehaviour means that the student is given a yellow slip. The system is such that, within any 12 month period:

• 6 yellow slips leads to a letter being sent home
• 12 yellow slips means that the parents are invited in
• 18 yellow slips means that there is a letter sent home and the student is called before a disciplinary committee or the governors

At each of these stages, after introducing the Database the letter home was accompanied by the individual report from the database. Parents often telephoned or otherwise contacted the school to express their concern and were more `positive' in supporting the school's discipline policy than they had previously been. The Project Director believes, again, that it was because the standard format, `a computer record' in some way defused the personal element and `somehow did not seem so subjective'.

The introduction of the Leeds Behaviour Database was considered to be very successful in supporting other more systematic approaches to behaviour management:

• providing useful information for staff
• providing personal records for pupils
• contributing towards more effective counselling sessions for pupils
• informing and involving parents in a manner which the majority find acceptable and objective.

Although expensive to buy and set up, the database was a long term investment and the system therefore can continue without further funding. The next `up-grade' will be sent as part of the initial expenditure and will monitor positive behaviours and rewards, thus reflecting the school's `balanced' approach towards behaviour management. (The initial phase only recorded negative behaviours and sanctions.)

In terms of achieving the success criteria identified at the outset by the school, which were:

1. improved and easily accessed database for EBD students
2. reduced incidents of and referral for disruption
3. reduced level of suspension and exclusion

it is clear that the first criterion has been achieved.

The second two criteria can only be judged after at least a twelve month period, and in fact, perhaps two to three year's statistics would be required. In view of all the other steps which the school is taking in regard to managing behaviour, it is unlikely that such reductions, should they occur, could be attributed solely to the use of the Leeds Database.

What the Database will provide, however, is the information which the school which the school will be able to use to monitor these incidents and levels and provide the data on which to determine whether or not the reductions take place.

The Project Director worked closely with pastoral staff and the Heads of Lower and Upper Schools to develop a team who could be available for identifying and counselling. Sharing experience and expertise among those primarily concerned was important. Central to this development were two aspects:

Firstly, project funding was used to employ a Support Assistant to work with the core team, particularly the Project Director, to support students presenting behaviour problems, especially disruptive behaviours. If a student was referred to the Project Director because of `behaviour' then the Support Assistant carried out three observation sessions, using a 5 minute time-sampling approach. These were usually in three different situations (e.g. where the problem had been identified, an academic lesson, a practical session). If, on the basis of the observations, it was agreed that there were some problem behaviours, then a one hour session was offered - usually by the Project Director - in which the information (and observation record) was presented and the student counselled and `talked-through' the situation. The aim of the session was to enable the student to clarify and understand the situation and determine `targets' to work on. The Support Assistant then offered support in lessons to reinforce the targeted behaviours. The number of lessons varied according to severity and frequency of the problem behaviours.

The particular Support Assistant was praised for her personal skills and ability to work flexibly.

This system was highly valued by the teaching staff who commented that it freed them to teach. In addition they felt the they `had been listened to', that is that their initial concerns and referral had been taken seriously, acted upon, and that the student was now `being managed '.

The original bid from the school had targeted students in Years 7 & 8 (Item D in the proposal) in particular, as working with younger students was seen as `preventative'. The Support Assistant was used particularly, at first, with these two year groups and the Head of Lower School regularly commented on the usefulness of this system, which also, as a result of discussion and the nature of the Support Assistant's interventions increased the range of strategies available to staff

Secondly, the Project Director who was also the school SENCO (Director of Learning Support) devised and instituted staged procedure for behaviour, (incorporating Individual Behaviour Plans) which runs parallel to the SEN Stages based on the Code of Practice (DFE,1994). There is an emphasis on :

• a staged procedure (moving up or down)
• documentation of perceived needs, difficulties, targets, intervention, monitoring and review

Whilst the scheme offers a parallel with the SEN procedures, and it is possible to have Individual Plans for both areas, this is an aspect which requires further consideration. The general area of the relationship between EBD and SEN is considered briefly in the main report. It is, of course, a fact that some students present difficulties in only one of these two areas; it is also true that many (possibly the majority) of students presenting EBD also experience difficulties in learning. A strength of the two parallel systems in Bramhall is that they allow some differentiation (e.g. Stage 1 for EBD but Stage 3b or 5 for learning difficulties). Nevertheless, there could be some issues of `compartmentalisation' and lack of an integrated approach which are at odds with the self professed `whole child' approach. When the project began, the management of both areas was under single direction and this facilitated coherence. However, were responsibilities for `Behaviour' to be separated from SEN then there may be a more fragmented approach, leading to confusion for staff, students and parents. Similarly two `parallel' staged procedures could lead to a low referral and identification of EBD under the `Code of Practice' SEN procedures.

Recommendation: the school reconsiders/takes further advice about the operation of procedures which separate EBD and SEN whilst building on the valuable procedures introduced in both the EBD and SEN policies and practices.

The success criteria for the employment of the Support Assistant were:

1. individual programmes fully reinforced in mainstream lessons

2. NTA (Support Assistant) supplies research material to core team on effectiveness of provision in the classroom

3. link established between specialist provision and the classroom.

Items 1 & 3 were successfully achieved. The second criterion was rather vague, in terms of both `research material' and `effectiveness of provision'. However, the Support Assistant was able to support individual students (although this may not have been systematically recorded) and staff whose `lessons' were thus supported _ found the approach valuable. They reported that students who may otherwise have been excluded from lessons were able to participate without disrupting other students/the teaching. This must be taken as indicative of success and this is confirmed in that although the employment of the Support Assistant was made possible only by the GEST project funding, the school has now found funding from its own budget to continue her employment.

These two year groups were the first to be targeted by the Core Team (and Support Assistant), and were given support as described above. The criteria that:

1. students respond to programmes by modifying disruptive behaviour and

2. by development of positive attitudes to learning

were believed to have been met in terms of supporting them in class, but longer term more objective data has yet to be taken from the Behaviour Database. However, the system means that this should become available and therefore the school can monitor this.

An important aspect of this work was the use of positive reinforcement. Where students met their targets there were `end-of term' rewards. Thus at the end of the Autumn Term, the reward was a visit to see the `Storms' playing ice hockey at the Nynex Arena and at the end of the second term, a member of `the Manchester Giants' basketball team held a training session.

The use of popular and `exciting / innovative' rewards may also have proved successful incentives and established a notion of privileges' rather than `bribes'.

The questionnaire approach was not developed. Instead two voluntary staff development sessions were held on managing behaviour, led by a member of the Stockport Learning Support Team. Staff reported that they felt more enskilled and that the sessions were useful.

The questionnaire which was to have been used (in the Summer Term, 1998) would have been based on the work of Archie McGlynn. However, the Project Director had also recommended that Peter Hook (currently the Head of Behaviour Support in Oldham) be involved as a consultant to determine the needs for whole school INSET on Managing Behaviour Problems. This may be taken up in 1998-9.

The objective here was to work with Stockport's Services to identify and respond to needs in this area at transition Years 6/7. This would have occurred in the Summer Term.

It must be recorded that the school's Project Director left the school (for a Senior Management promotion) after two terms and no single person replaced her position within the project.

However, it appears to be clear that the systems put in place will continue. These include:

• the Database (which will be extended)
• the development of a core Behaviour Support Team
• a staged process for managing behaviour
• the employment of a Non-teaching assistant (Support Assistant) to work within this system
• staff development
• Successmaker (also purchased with funding) which has proved successful for motivating and raising achievement of many pupils who may otherwise be disruptive or disaffected as a result of learning difficulties. This had not been included in the initial bid, but was introduced as part of the overall `preventative' strategy.

There is no doubt in the mind of the Project Director that the project was highly successful and that it provided an invaluable opportunity for a school to identify, take responsibility for and plan a strategy to `manage' issues relevant to disaffection and disruption.

All general questions and issues were raised and have been dealt with in the general report in order to maintain a more anonymous approach to the evaluation of the more general aspects of the project.