Managing Challenging Behaviour

In responding to challenging behaviour the response should always be proportionate to the actions, be imposed as soon as is practicable and be fully explained to the child and their parents/carers. In dealing with children who display negative or challenging behaviours, staff and volunteers might consider the following options:

• Time out – from the activity, group or individual work.
• Reparation – the act or process of making amends.
• Restitution – the act of giving something back.
• Behavioural reinforcement – rewards for good behaviour, consequences for negative behaviour.
• De-escalation of the situation – talking through with the child.
• Increased supervision by staff/volunteers.
• Use of individual ‘contracts’ or agreements for their future or continued participation.
• Sanctions or consequences e.g. missing an outing.
• Seeking additional/specialist support through working in partnership with other agencies to ensure a child’s needs are met appropriately e.g. referral for support to Children’s Social Care, discussion with the child’s key worker if they have one, speaking to the child’s school about management strategies (all require parental consent unless the child is felt to be ‘at risk’ or ‘in need of protection’).
• Temporary or permanent exclusion

The following should never be permitted as a means of managing a child’s behaviour:

• Physical punishment or the threat of such.
• Refusal to speak to or interact with the child.
• Being deprived of food, water, access to changing facilities or toilets or other essential facilities.
• Verbal intimidation, ridicule or humiliation.

Staff and volunteers should review the needs of any child for whom sanctions are frequently necessary. This review should involve the child, parents/carers and in some cases others involved in supporting or providing services for the child and his/her family, to ensure an informed decision is made about the child’s future or continued participation. As a last resort, if a child continues to present a high level of risk or danger to him or herself, or others, he or she may have to be suspended or barred from the group or club activities.

PHYSICAL INTERVENTION

The use of physical intervention should always be avoided unless it is absolutely necessary to prevent a child injuring themselves or others or causing serious damage to property. All forms of physical intervention should form part of a broader approach to the management of challenging behaviour.

Physical contact to prevent something happening should always be the result of conscious decision-making and not a reaction. Before physically intervening, the member of staff or volunteer should ask themselves, ‘Is this the only option in order to manage the situation and ensure safety?’ It is good practice to ensure that if you have to physically intervene in a situation with a child/young person, it is in the least restrictive way necessary to prevent them from getting hurt, and used only after all other strategies have been exhausted.  Studies have shown that, where this is the case, children and young people understand and accept the reasons for the intervention.

THE FOLLOWING MUST ALWAYS BE CONSIDERED:

• Contact should be avoided with buttocks, genitals and breasts. Staff/volunteers should never behave in a way that could be interpreted as sexual.
• Any form of physical intervention should achieve an outcome that is in the best interests of the child whose behaviour is of immediate concern.
• Staff/ volunteers should consider the circumstances, the risks associated with employing physical intervention compared with the risks of not employing physical intervention.
• All forms of physical intervention should be proportionate to the behaviour of the young person and the nature of harm/damage they might cause –i.e. the minimum force needed to avert injury to a person or serious damage to property – applied for the shortest period of time.
• Staff/volunteers should never employ physical interventions which are deemed to present an unreasonable risk to children or staff/volunteers.
• Staff/volunteers shall never use physical intervention as a form of punishment.
• Physical intervention should not involve inflicting pain.
• Where children are identified as having additional needs or behaviours that are likely to require physical intervention this should be discussed with parents/carers and where necessary the club will seek advice from or to work in partnership with external agencies (e.g. Children’s Social Care)  to ensure that a child or young person can be supported to participate safely. This may include asking for the provision of a suitably trained support worker/volunteer or accessing staff/volunteer training in physical intervention.

Any physical intervention used should be recorded as soon as possible after the incident by the staff/volunteers involved using the Incident Report Form and passed to the home county/country Welfare/Child Protection Officer as soon as possible.