Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

The Project will initiate regular meetings with parents and teaching staff to look at the child’s behaviour and help develop strategies for consistent partnership working between school and home. Parents call into the Project office on a daily basis to talk about issues and difficulties they may be experiencing in managing their children’s behaviour. We will take the time to listen and offer both emotional and practical parenting support. The Project also delivers a Positive Parenting course. This is designed to bring parents together in order to share experiences and find common solutions to managing behaviour. The Project Coordinator is trained to deliver NCH “Managing Children’s Behaviour” and this programme is extremely effective in improving parent and child relationships, and ultimately behaviour in the home and school.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

We make a point of discussing with young people why they refuse and have difficulty managing school. We will often find that they do actually want to be at school but do not feel comfortable in the school environment or confident in terms of their ability to learn. They may have been out of school for a prolonged period and have limited peer attachments or relationships with the teaching staff. It may also be the case that they feel that they have fallen behind and will not have the ability to do the work the rest of the class is doing. It is important to communicate these factors to the school and plan a flexible timetable which is not overwhelming and gives the young person the opportunity to engage with learning at a level which is suitable to them.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

Some of the children we work with need additional support to settle into the routines of school and gain the benefits which come from this. Our Nurture Groups demonstrate that with the right help such children can be successfully maintained in mainstream school. Nurture groups provide a safe and nurturing learning environment where each child is valued, understood and where they can develop a sense of emotional well being. They offer an experience of adults through which trust and confidence can be built and where learning can take place. The groups are most effective for children when a working partnership develops involving the school, parents/carers and the Nurture Group staff. This means that the Nurture Group approach can be applied and reinforced in other areas of the child’s life.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

The curriculum for excellence provides four equal parts to the development and education of our young people. I would suggest that the element of confident individual should stand apart and before the others. Unless we build a foundation of confidence and self esteem in a child how will they achieve their full potential and become responsible citizens?

Our education system needs to identify at an early stage those pupils who need support in terms of confidence and self esteem and to provide targeted intervention to set in place this vital foundation on which we can then build the curriculum for excellence.
YMCA Scotland is working with P6 age to achieve exactly this, receiving referrals of such pupils from local primary schools and monitoring them and their families as they progress through P7 and into high school.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

Our Nurture Class works with 6 pupils, all boys, who have the most difficulty in coping in the mainstream classroom. The Nurture Class is based in a room which is furnished to promote safety for pupils whose home experiences are often chaotic and distressing. The sessions are designed to allow the group to regress to a stage where they feel comfortable, happy and safe. This may involve playing with sand and water. The class is run jointly with the school and is staffed with one of our workers and one of the school teachers. The pupils do curriculum work in the class but only at a level which they can manage and engage successfully. In the afternoon the pupils return to their mainstream class. Key features of the sessions include consistency, learning to use language to express feelings, eye contact, encouraging taking turns and positive interaction. Nurture Classes can help pupils to begin to see schools as a place to experience happiness and success. Also, on becoming more secure emotionally they often find that their capacity for learning increases.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

I work within the primary schools in the north sector of Edinburgh.  I am a children and families support worker which means I support children at home and in school. One of the projects I have been involved in developing for the last 3 years are nurture groups.  This has been one of the most beneficial supports for children who have social, emotional and behavioural difficulties. We are currently trying to develop the nurture group model into transition work with Primary 7 aged pupils. I really believe a lot of schools need to adopt this type of model as a whole school approach in improving pupil involvement and citizenship.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

We give young people the time, attention and also space which is often not afforded to them within a mainstream school setting. In school the focus is very much on exams and attainment which can be to the detriment of some pupils who need extra and very specific support. We are fortunate in that we can offer young people one to one support and work intensively to improve their confidence and social skills. We also try our best to engage parents/carers in terms of the work their children have been doing. Receiving praise and recognition from parents/carers can only work to motivate them and develop their confidence further.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

The process used to deliver the xlerate with xl programme mirrors much of that described in A Curriculum for Excellence. In xlerate with xl, the learning process is 'active, challenging and enjoyable', 'not too fragmented or over-crowded with content', 'includes a wide range of experiences', gives 'opportunities for children to make appropriate choices to meet their individual interests and needs, whilst ensuring that these choices lead to successful outcomes', and the 'assessment supports (the) learning'.

Similarly, the values promoted through the xlerate with xl programme mirror those outlined for the curriculum in A Curriculum for Excellence. xlerate with xl aims to 'enable all young people to benefit from their education' and supports them 'in different ways to achieve their potential', it values the 'learning and achievement of all young people', and promotes 'high aspiration and ambition', emphasises 'the rights and responsibilities of individuals', helps young people to develop 'concern, tolerance, care and respect for themselves and others', and is fundamentally focused on giving 'young people the confidence, attributes and capabilities to make valuable contributions to society'. In addition, through the programme's focus on enterprise, and its documented achievements in contributing to the Determined to Succeed strategy, xlerate with xl is clearly demonstrating and working to the shared agendas of Determined to Succeed and A Curriculum for Excellence.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

We were recently involved in running a whole class programme in a Primary school looking at relationships and how to get on better with others. For us this is crucial, if pupils can’t manage relationships in Primary school where they have a fixed class and one teacher then the chances of them running into trouble with peers or staff at High School greatly increases. One exercise involves drawing two human silhouettes and using these as props to tease out with pupils what they understand as important qualities people have and why these qualities help people maintain friendships. Another approach we use during these sessions is role play. Role play is a fun and safe way for pupils to look at different scenarios, different ways to manage them and how and why people react in specific ways.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

We find that peer review is a useful exercise to build confidence and emotional well being. We will ask young people to comment on one another related to what they see as their strong points and also areas which they need to develop. Each member of the group is asked to listen to the comments of their peers about what they do well and also areas which they need to work on. This tends to be a really positive experience which works to improve their confidence and ability to relate to others and manage themselves.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

The young people referred to Include Me have highlighted an increase in confidence as a direct result of attending the programme. This ranges from having the confidence to participate with peers, the confidence to express opinions with adults, the confidence to take part in physical outdoor activities and ultimately having the confidence to stand in front of an audience of adults to present their work and experiences of the project. Through the programme the group participate in activities that are personally challenging, for example overcoming fear of failure, overcoming anxiety of the unknown (for example a speedboat trip from Glasgow to Dumbarton) and their fear of not being accepted by others.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individual

Parents/carers can sometimes expect us to take their children away and “fix” them. We work intensively with parents/carers to reflect on their behaviour and interactions with their children. We look at the way in which communication and relationships can influence the way their children interact at home, in the community and at school. We try to motivate parents to change and encourage them to adopt more positive strategies to parenting. We highlight that positive interaction with their children to improve the home environment and to also improve the way their children manage themselves and relate to others while at school.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

Pupils often find it difficult to verbalise why they are angry with another pupil, with a teacher or even one of us. We can sit down with them, really listen to what they have to say and unpack what they are feeling. Speaking through how a situation has arisen and identifying how they could better manage themselves so it is less likely to happen in the future can bring clear benefits. We have pupils who are referred to us in S2 who are continually sent out of class but as they progress through the school it happens less and less. This is no doubt part of growing up but I think giving them the opportunity to reflect on their behaviour and suggesting more suitable ways of acting also helps. We will often use role play to aid this process.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

We are running a whole class support programme (Creative Approaches) in two schools at present. It is specifically for classes where there are significant relationship difficulties between children. The eight week programme which explore oppression in the classroom, is about improving the emotional literacy of pupils, raising emotional intelligence, and helping them to relate to others, manage themselves and be self aware. In one session pupils are asked to think of animals which might represent some other pupils in the class. Some might represent a pupil(s) in the class they like and others who they do not get on with. They are then asked to write what they would like to say to these pupils (animals) in speech bubbles and to also write what they think, or hope, the response might be. So, it might be something along the lines of ‘I don’t like you because you say nasty things about me’ and the response could be ‘sorry, I did not mean to hurt your feelings’. It’s about raising the pupils awareness of how their behaviour can affect other people and also having a better understanding in terms of how they can interact more positively with their peers and use appropriate language to talk about feelings.

Working with young people to support them to be confident individuals

The Teacher Parent Pupil Project (TPPP) is attended by referred pupils, their parents/carers, a teacher and a group worker from our project. We set the group a task which focuses on positive communication and support. For instance, we will ask everyone to pick one person from the group and tell the rest of the group two specific things which they like about them. It is an opportunity to give and accept praise and to learn how rewarding this is. It definitely works toward giving those involved a greater sense of emotional well-being and I would say it also enables those involved to relate more positively to others and manage themselves. It has knock on effects for teacher pupil relationships and we also hope that the lessons learned help to improve interaction within the living environment. At the end of the session the pupils go back to class and the parents can stay on to offer each other support and discuss their own experiences. Having the session at school and with a teacher is helpful because most of the time parents only ever come to school to hear about the problem behaviours of their child. This gives a clear positive purpose to pupils, parents and teachers working together.