Non Verbal Interventions

- Body posture and teacher movement around the class

Examples of gestures:

• hands raised for quiet
• a pointing finger (can be shaking )
• the shaking head
• hands on hip
• sitting on the front of teachers desk
• thumbs up

Examples of facial expressions:

• raising the eyebrow
• closing the lips tightly
• looking puzzled
• a smile (can have several meanings!)

These do not directly confront the student but allow the teacher to express disapproval. If eye contact is not limited to a glance the child will think a response is required

Verbal Interventions for Controlling Behaviour

- Initial verbal interventions should be exploratory, non-confrontational and related directly to the behaviour or the work.

- These interventions serve to cue the child back to the task in hand

The repertoire could include :

• Do you have a problem with the task?
• Okay lets go through the task again
• Do I need to go through the task again?
• I can't remember saying you had to do that?
• Can we all get on? ( eye contact )
• Please continue as asked
• Could we please continue?

If the initial intervention does not cue the child back to work then a more intrusive tactic has to be used.

Non Verbal

- combining gestures from above

• Repeating initial cue slightly firmer
• Short non-work orientated discussion followed by work cues
• Invalidate using humour followed by work cueing
• Make clear statement regarding agreed working practice
• Praise other students for complying with the stated work task

If the more invasive interventions don't acquire the required behaviours then to maintain standards in the classroom more overt forms of intervention should be introduced.

• Stop the class and restate task
• Rearrange seating
• Close books and sit in silence.
• Give options and restart
• Reward the compliant and satisfactory students

Lessening the effects of challenging behaviour in the classroom is essential for the delivery of the curriculum.

Good behaviour can be achieved by listening to and talking to the disruptive student appropriately following difficult behaviour.

Strong subjective condemnation does not help. e.g. It’s always you, you're evil, I'm fed up with hearing your name

It simply alienates the student and prevents positive progress, setting up barriers between student and adult.

The adult should adopt a

How do we cope with insolence, rudeness and abuse at various levels of intensity ?

Do we reject abusive students and see them as undeserving of our care ?

Are these adult attitudes curative, does the student change his/her behaviour as a consequence of these responses ?

The answer is not simple because for some adults who are sometimes

Because to work effectively with these students the adult has to balance his/her approach and be objective about the effectiveness of a whole range of tactics.

A good manager of children rewards where ever possible by being assertively positive (always within clear appropriate boundaries)

As these children are fragile they need constant reassurance

Consistently negative stances from managing adults only creates a feeling of rejection and alienation

Aggressive stances are sometimes required but only after considerable positive inputs