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  • Support for early career teachers
  • Education Development Trust
  • Year 1: First half-term: establishing a positive climate for learning
    • Autumn week 5

    Mentor materials

    Establishing and maintaining a supportive, inclusive environment

    Intended outcomes

    The intended outcomes of this topic are for Early Career Teachers to:

    Learn that:

    • A predictable and secure environment benefits all pupils, but is particularly valuable for pupils with special educational needs
    • Building effective relationships is easier when pupils believe their feelings will be considered and understood

    Learn how to demonstrate consistently high behavioural expectations, by:

    • Acknowledging and praising pupil effort and emphasising progress being made

    Activities

    Reflecting on learning (10 minutes)

    Ask ECTs to reflect on the impact of their action plan for a specific class last week:

    • Who did they speak to?
    • What advice/information did they give them?
    • How has this influenced their practice?
    • What are their next steps going to be?
    • What can the mentor do to help with this?

    A culture of trust and respect (15 minutes)

    Building positive relationships with pupils and creating a culture of mutual trust and respect benefits both the pupils’ and the teacher’s wellbeing and also has an impact on pupil outcomes.

    Pose the question: What steps do you take to build a culture of trust and respect?

    Discussion could include:

    • Learning names quickly
    • Treating pupils as individuals
    • Getting to know pupils
    • Listening to pupils
    • Responding consistently to pupil behavior.

    What steps could they take to further this? Together look at the two things below. How might these support a culture of trust and respect?

    • Ensure you follow up on anything you say you will do.
    • Contact at least one parent/carer a day with some positive news (this could be a postcard, email or phone call).

    Together, come up with two more suggestions for ways of developing this culture further. Select one, either from the suggestions above or from the ideas generated by the mentor and the ECT and plan how the ECT will implement this.

    A predictable and secure environment (30 minutes)

    Discuss what steps the ECT takes to build a supportive and predictable learning environment. For example:

    • How can they show that they have faith in all pupils’ ability to achieve? (e.g. speaking to pupils about their learning goals and giving them clear steps/praising the progress they have made)
    • How can they demonstrate that they value pupils as individuals? (e.g. getting to know pupils’ names)
    • How do they ensure a positive environment? (e.g. using least intrusive interventions)
    • How do they ensure all pupils can access the lesson? (e.g. sitting visually impaired pupils near the front of the class)

    Answers might include:

    • Conveying authority through behaviour (body language, tone of voice etc)
    • Developing pupils’ positive self-belief by encouraging and ensuring success
    • Drawing attention to evidence of pupils’ progress and recognising their achievements
    • Communicating clearly and accurately in spoken and written language
    • Adjusting to the communication competencies of all students, using available technology if appropriate
    • Focusing on managing learning rather than managing behaviour
    • Making reasonable adjustments for those with special educational needs.

    Together read the following point: A predictable and secure environment benefits all pupils but is particularly valuable for pupils with special educational needs.

    Ask the ECT what this means for their classes.

    All the strategies the ECTs work on in this module will help them establish a predictable and secure environment for learning. It is this that will allow all pupils to learn, including those with special educational needs.

    It is important to remember that there is no one size fits all strategy that will be guaranteed to work. The ECTs should find out more about each individual child’s needs, using the SENCO’s support to implement the right strategies where this is appropriate.

    The ECT should select one or two pupils they could support through the actions and strategies discussed in this activity and decide:

    • What will they put into place to make their classroom predicable and secure for those pupils?
    • If the pupil has special educational needs, what reasonable adjustments will they make?
    • Can you make an opportunity to have a discussion with parents/carers (this could be at parents evening) about the individual needs of the pupil and the reasonable adjustments you have made?

    Together set out the steps the ECT will take to support those pupils.

    Planning for action

    Ask the ECT when they will be putting these strategies into place. If possible, set up a time for the mentor to observe the ECT with a focus on establishing a predictable and secure environment. The mentor may want to focus on the two pupils identified in the previous activity and take notes to provide the ECT with feedback.

    In the next topic the ECT will be reflecting on observations they have carried out with the time assigned in self-study materials Activity 1.6. If they have yet to carry out the observations, agree now who they will observe and with which focus before the next topic.