Trusted bonds
Positive relationships across the school community create trusted bonds which underpin anti-bullying practices. This approach:
- Creates a respectful environment, modelling how people should treat each other;
- Nurtures children and young people and places their needs at the heart of school life;
- Ensures that pupils feel welcome and are confident they can approach adults and feel listened to and valued;
- Helps adults to get to know the young people in their care and spot changes or when things aren’t quite right.
Relationships are:
Actively nurtured: In schools of all sizes, staff actively build relationships. Senior leadership members are visible, creating a welcoming environment both for families and pupils. This includes welcoming pupils at the start and end of the day and chatting informally with families.
Teaching staff understand the importance of relationship building and take the time to get to know their pupils.
All teachers greet their pupils at the door of the classroom and talk to them about their day, hobbies and interests.
Pupils have enjoyed this and feel that this small step has helped them get to know their teachers better and made them more approachable.
Non-teaching staff such as librarians or catering staff also play an important role in providing pupils with a range of trusted, approachable adults with whom to build relationships.
Schools have been supported to develop a whole school approach by local authority initiatives, such as Renfrewshire’s Nurturing Relationships Approach (RNRA).
It provides an implementation process which has helped the staff develop nurturing relationships in their classes and across the whole school.
We have found that RNRA has helped us give support to parents where anxiety or conflict is an issue at home.
Defined in policy: reward schools recognise the need to change their approach and have moved away from having a behaviour policy which seeks to manage or punish, to creating a relationship policy built on listening, understanding and respect.
Pupils, families and staff have been involved in anti-bullying policy rewrites which link relationships with nurturing and attachment and strongly contribute to reducing bullying.
This work supports a culture and ethos of inclusion and respect for all in school.
We have a strong values and relationship-based approach in all we do which is crucial in making positive change when it comes to anti-bullying work.
Our young people as individuals are at the centre of all we do.
Case study: Rochsolloch Primary School
Through the development of a Positive Relationships Policy, children have developed coping strategies to help regulate behaviour and manage their emotions.
Investing in relationships is key to staff recognising pupil changes in attitude, motivation or engagement with tasks or their peers. When talking about behaviour with children, discussions are more constructive and consistent.
Older children created Kindness Booklets to share with younger children.
Children across the school were engaged in considering what kindness is.
Showing and explaining kind behaviours led to children being more aware of what kindness looks like, sounds like and feels like.
Embraced by pupils: Children and young people want to play a part in supporting their peers and helping them feel included. Schools create opportunities for friendship building, buddying and more formal peer mentoring. Senior pupils are often trained to support younger pupils, such as through peer mentoring or play leader programmes.
Our peer mentoring programme allows young people to build a relationship with a trusted senior pupil helping them with friendship skills, assertiveness skills, conflict resolution and problem solving and communication skills. It has encouraged some young people to express concerns surrounding bullying in school.
Extended across the school community: One of the challenges faced by schools is improved engagement with families. Improving relationships helps parents and carers to feel welcome and included, supports them to understand and have a voice in anti-bullying approaches, helps to mirror practices at home and school and provides role models for positive relationships. reward schools welcome parents into the school environment and listen to and respect their views. Schools create opportunities for pupils to engage with their wider community and develop bonds and understanding beyond the school gates.
We noted that our feedback came mostly from female parents and carers, so we organised a Donuts and Dads afternoon to entice our male parents and carers to come in. This was not a one-off and is the start of a regular session. We want to ensure everyone is aware that they have a voice in what we do. We are a whole school community and want it to continue to run as such.
