R4

Positive interactions with students:

Staff at Yarrabah will always remain positive and calm when interacting with students. Staff will build positive relationships with each student by genuinely interacting and understanding each child's likes and dislikes (student profile). Repeated and frequent interactions are essential to establishing positive relations with students.

Staff will model how to interact with others ensuring opportunities each day are made to explicitly teach positive social skills.

On the occasions that staff are required to communicate behavioural expectations to students, reference to the school rules and values will be made. On the occasions when a student is exhibiting challenging behaviours the following is recommended:

1. Know their disability.

If a child has an ASD diagnosis as an example, it is good to learn how in particular they are autistic. 

2. Lower our own arousal level

• Pause – this allows you to appraise the whole situation and the risks through actual assessment rather than imagination.

• Take a deep breath – helps oxygen get to your brain and connect with your logical problem solving faculties.

• Lower your tone of voice and speak slowly. Again, this enables calm breathing and lessens the conflict / challenge / demand to the child who is in a greater stress and danger mode than you are.

• Check your body language isn't domineering or threatening to the child.  Sometimes just taking a step back or kneeling down to a small child takes away that extra threatening challenge.

• Check the sensory environment – take things away, turn things off, offer headphones, fiddle or comfort objects, time out of a sensory overloading experience.

3. Find a way forward that is active and positive.

• Change your demand to something the child can do at that moment.  Change the activity or break it into smaller chunks.  Add extra visuals (a whiteboard for diagrams, drawings, lists etc can be really useful to have by the child).

• Help the child calm down before trying to redirect or investigate the situation.

• Acknowledge how you think they are feeling "It seems that you are angry, can I help you feel okay?"

• Talk to the child about the situation, rather than get into 'verbal combat' about their behaviour.  They may need clear structure or choices (some may need this visually with symbol cards) .Eg. "After you've put the chair down do you want to go for a sensory break or have 5 minutes outside?"

• If the child needs help, is shouting out, refusing to do some work and you are busy with other children, make a mini 'appointment' with them.  Eg. I will come and help you sort out the problem after…"  And keep to your promise!

• Make a plan about how you can avoid the situation happening again or how it might be supported if it does.  Involve the child and communicate visually to them how the support will work

• We avoid the use of the word "No". This is often a trigger word for students.

 All students will be encouraged to interact positively with others when on campus and in the community. When students have demonstrated school rules or values, staff will praise students. Staff will also seek to interact with students when improvement and genuine efforts have been made. 

Communication with staff:

Staff are expected to model the Professional Working Agreement when communicating with other staff.

Key communications will be provided at whole school staff meetings and briefings at the beginning and end of each week (dependant on time fraction).  At these meetings, a focus will always include staff wellbeing and what has gone well.

Staff will use a range of tools to communicate with each other. All staff will open and read correspondence sent via email each day. The school uses Seesaw and Compass as the central communication platforms. Staff will learn how to use and contribute to use the platforms. Information related to student behaviour, student and staff wellbeing, daily organisation, meeting schedules, agendas, payments, reporting, timetables, absences, classroom planning etc will be placed on Compass.

• Leadership will allocate individual time to meet with all members of staff during the year.

• Leaders and teachers will provide feedback after observing lessons.

• Section leaders will attend regular meetings supported by the Assistant Principal and Principal once a month

• Section staff will meet once a fortnight. It is an expectation that all staff contribute during meetings. It is expected that all staff will be listened to. Disagreements will be managed according to the staff code of conduct and working agreement.

Reporting and Incidents of Concern:

Staff are to report incidents, behaviours, concerns and service referrals on Compass in a chronicle. Other general observations, such as communications with families, phone calls, and messages, should also be recorded in writing by the teacher on Comapss, for record-keeping purposes.

There are a number of policies the school has to maintain positive and consistent interactions with each other. Some of these include:

1. Workplace Behaviour and Social Media Policy

2. Equal Opportunity Policy

Communication with Families:

Working in partnership with the school council Yarrabah continually refines how staff communicate with families. We are very mindful that families require regular, open, respectful and transparent communication to maintain trust in the school and the staff working with their child. Yarrabah School has drawn on a number of sources to refine its communication strategy. KidsMatter, Respectful Relationships, SWPBS, Nurture School, Calmer Classrooms, Berry Street and the Australian Childhood Foundations Trauma-informed Practice supports have all influenced our current approach.

Communicating usingTechnology:

The school uses Seesaw as its prime tool for communicating what students are learning or involved in at school. We use Seesaw to write classroom notes, reminders, school-wide messages and individual correspondence. 

We also use Seesaw to share what is being learnt at school. This is done through photos, video, drawing, worksamples and teacher captions. This is the most important element. In our posts, we show and describe what the student is learning, how it relates to their learning goals or curriculum being studied and what outcomes they are demonstrating in the example. The key communication focus is how the video or photo links to the learning goals. By linking the photo to the learning goals or the lesson objective, families continue to be exposed to individual education goal language, learning more about how we are individualising the curriculum, and making it accessible to their child. We must be conscious of education speak in these posts. Its important not to overwhelm the parent with complicated terms, so being mindful of our audience is also a key component.

It's important that staff use Seesaw for positive communication, sharing learning, outcomes and engagement. All communications, related to reportable incidents, challenging behaviours, concerns over student wellbeing, and child safety will be reported to the school and families. These will not be reported using Seesaw. 

School Council Agreement for Seesaw Posts:

All staff follow the school council agreement when communicating with families using Seesaw. The agreement was collectively negotiated between family representatives on school council and staff in 2022. The agreement is achievable and has improved positive endorsement for effective communication in opinion surveys.

The agreement is:

Individual Communications: Two per week for each child (at least one academic focus and one other).

Group-Based Communications: Two per child a week, with at least one focusing on the group's academic achievement (most teachers post more than four posts per child a week).

This means every child will have at minimum, four examples of what they are doing each week that relates to the learning or the IEP goals.  

Compass:

Compass is used largely by the admin to communicate with families. Families will receive school reports, medical information, whole-school messages, excursion notices, risk assessment notices, camp information, school payment notices and booking notices. Families will also see a simplified version of the student's weekly schedule with any special events planned.

Communicating incidents or concerns with families:

Positive, open and honest communication will be delivered by the teacher focussing on events coming up, activities planned in the classroom or on the schedule, incidents that occurred, changes to routines planned, examples of students achieving their goals or working well towards their goals, social outcomes and personal outcomes. 

The teacher should refrain from using Seesaw or texts to communicate incidents, behaviours of concern, wellbeing concerns or medical concerns with families. These should be communicated face to face, over the phone or at an arranged meeting. In the case of a medical emergency or medical incident, they will be communicated immediately to the family, via the nurse's office.

All critical incidents will be reported immediately to the principal and assistant principal. All emergencies will be communicated promptly to families as set out in our emergency management plan.

Trauma Informed Communication with families:

A trauma-informed approach to engaging with families is an approach that recognises the impact of trauma on individuals and families and seeks to create a safe and supportive environment for them. This approach involves understanding the potential effects of trauma on a family’s ability to engage in services and being sensitive to the unique needs and experiences of each family. Families cannot engage unless they feel safe. This relational safety is the same as what children need to feel safe and connected at school. It may take time to build safety and trust because some families may not have experiences of positive relationships. We need to support families, to feel safe and to build relationships to be able to connect and engage.