Ordinarily Available Inclusive Provision

Relationships

What are relationships?

Relationships refers to the ability to make and maintain positive and trusting connections with adults and peers which enable them to feel safe and secure.

  • Identification – what you may see in the child or young person

    • May find it challenging to develop positive, trusting relationships with adults and peers.
    • Constantly seeks connection with a safe adult during both learning opportunities and unstructured times of the day.
    • Does not always trust that an adult will meet their needs and keep them safe – they avoid asking for help or struggle to accept help, avoids seeking comfort, etc.
    • Demonstrates hypervigilance and does not respond to adults offering support to feel safe and regulated.
    • Finds it difficult to maintain relationships with trusted adults without feeling the need to push away.
    • Struggles to repair relationships when things are difficult and does not always respond to a restorative approach.
    • Does not always communicate worries to a trusted adult, when upset.
    • Finds it difficult to express information about themselves to develop a connection with others, for example sharing common interests, identifying shared likes and dislikes.
    • Is unable to maintain secure peer relationships.
    • Doesn’t feel a sense of belonging to any peer group and has inconsistent friendships.
    • Finds it difficult to communicate what makes them feel happy and sad within relationships and struggles to say ‘no’ when needed.
    • Is not always able to show awareness of other’s feelings and needs within relationships.
    • Does not always reflect on strengths and difficulties within different relationships or resolve difficulties with any level of insight or self-reflection.
    • May appear isolated and alone or withdrawn, avoiding interaction with others.
    • May find it hard to allow others to influence them, may need to feel a sense of control in order to feel safe.
    • May be inappropriately affectionate and overly familiar towards known adults and strangers.
    • May struggle with separation from their caregiver.
    • May experience challenges with peer pressure and may find it difficult to avoid high risk behaviours, for example smoking or vaping, substance misuse, unsafe sex.

  • Planned provision in school

    Based on need, some of this provision will be effective.

    • Be curious about attachment needs. Attachment Based Mentoring can provide children and young people with a significant adult in school who will become a safe base and is able to provide relational support through coaching and mentoring. Co-ordinate support through relational support plans which outline who the child’s significant adults are and what they will do to provide protection, connection, understanding and care.
    • Develop the use of responsive co-regulation plans, to ensure all adults understand their role in supporting regulation.
    • Ensure the child or young person feels respected and valued and has a sense of belonging. Actively listen and seek individual pupil voice, to gain their views and act on these.
    • Provide planned, ongoing opportunities for a purposeful dialogue with trusted adults. Talk Mats can be used to support (see resources section).
    • Provide regular, consistent and predictable check-ins with trusted adults, which involve feedback, guidance and instruction as well as opportunities for self-monitoring and reflection – this may link to feedback from school report systems such as Class Charts or Class Dojo.
    • Ensure regular opportunities for meaningful connection with a trusted adult (this could be the class teacher). Set aside dedicated time to ‘be’ with the child. Play, talk, listen, show empathy and help them to express and process feelings. The child or young person needs to have repeated experiences with a safe adult.
    • Hold the child or young person in mind. Plan deliberate opportunities to show them that they are ‘held in mind’ – this could be both drawing a symbol on your hands that match, asking the child or young person to look after a resource or small object for you which you will come back for, etc. Refer to thinking about the child during times when you aren’t together, for example ‘I thought of you on Saturday when I heard that your football team had won’.
    • Use transitional objects to maintain a connection with parent carers or key adult when they are not present, for example hanky with a scent, key ring, note or spray of perfume. The Invisible String storybook can also be used to support this concept.
    • Regularly let the child or young person know that they are thought about, known and will be remembered in daily interactions. Reflect on shared experiences together.
    • Ensure positive endings and transitions. These may be supported by creating a special learning journal that contains successful moments and memories with key adults. Use visuals to help the child or young person understand that the team of adults or key relationships can remain, new ones can be developed, and this is alright. If you know that the child or young person will be working with a new significant adult, arrange an opportunity for the three of you to meet to set and settle that new relationship within the secure base of their present relationship.
    • All adults adopt an attitude of PACE (Playfulness, Acceptance, Curiosity, Empathy) towards the child or young person.
    • Adults are aware of their body language and may stand to the side of a child or young person rather than facing them or standing over them.
    • Notice when a child or young person has done something kind or friendly. A ‘friendship book’ can be used to record successes; it may also include when others have demonstrated positive friendship behaviours. This can help to establish a clear understanding of what ‘friend’ and ‘friendship’ mean and creates opportunities to recognise when things go well.
    • Planned access to peer support, for example ask an older peer to act as a mentor in the playground or dining area or identify friends who can walk to and from school with the pupil.
    • Planned opportunities to develop child or young person’s mentalisation, for example understanding how their own thoughts and feelings may differ to others. Examples include barrier games or use of books. For younger pupils, read and discuss stories that involve multiple perspectives, for example, Handa’s Surprise, Rosie’s Walk, Voices in the Park, and Tadpole’s Promise. For older pupils, read books with multiple narrators.
    • Draw on previous learning and experiences. Consistent key adults, who know the student well, explicitly reflect on previous incidents alongside them, including situations when the child or young person had made positive choices or demonstrated positive behaviours; for example ‘Remember when…, you did really well to….’ Alongside this, create a bank of resources that can be used to reflect on previous situations, for example looking back over a previous comic-strip conversations to identify similarities.
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