Positive Behaviour Approach.
St. Mary’s Special School takes a positive approach to teaching and modelling of appropriate social behaviours. This involves a variety of systematic information-gathering activities, e.g. ABC charts.

The approach of school staff in St Mary’s Special School is to decrease challenging behaviour by teaching and reinforcing appropriate replacement behaviours that serve the same function (e.g. teaching the student an appropriate means of asking for a break from a demanding task without resorting to challenging behaviour).

Within St Mary’s Special School all staff capitalise on learning opportunities throughout the day across all school settings to teach appropriate functional communication using whatever supports necessary (e.g. gestural/visual prompts; schedules of reinforcement etc.) in order to reduce as much as possible instances of challenging behaviour. The positive school ethos extends to all members of the school community adopting a positive, calm approach to challenges that may be encountered from time to time. Every effort should be made to ensure that the classroom and school environment is enriched with frequent opportunities for students and staff to encounter social praise and acknowledgement for achievements and to experience a varied schedule of activities to be enjoyed across the school day. There will be a focus on the positive behaviours of the child, rather than the negative. The health and safety of all students and staff is our priority. Our duty of care to others however, means that it may on occasion also be necessary to use physical intervention with a pupil who is putting him/herself or another person at risk of injury. Our Safety Interventions policy (CPI Policy) governs the use of the following practices. 

Safety Interventions seeks to promote a safe and productive workplace and educational environment for its employees and students. The aim is to provide guidance in circumstances where a pupil presents a serious risk of harm to themselves or others. Please refer to our CPI Policy, which has been approved by the British Institute of Learning Disabilities. CPI techniques may be prescribed as part of a
comprehensive Emotional Regulation Support Plan.

Emotional Regulation Support Plan (ERSP): Every member of the school community has a role to play in the development and implementation of the (ERSP). School staff work closely with parents and external professionals and in exceptional circumstances and where deemed appropriate and suitable, the School will engage with parents in the management of behaviours in the home. Speech and Language and Occupational Therapy (where appropriate) staff will also be involved to ensure the delivery of an eclectic approach. On-going data collection is employed to track the successful progress of the strategies within the plan.