By clicking through to this page, you have shown you already have this skill within your repertoire.
What is it, this key that can unlock even the most complex behaviours in time?
Curiosity. It’s what brought you to this page.
When we apply curiosity to a child’s behaviour we have the potential to see the behaviours as communicated clues instead of random, arbitrary actions or negative efforts made consciously towards creating harm to ourselves and others.
When we use our curiosity we go beyond universal approaches that may embed disadvantage and we start to meet individual needs.
With curiosity we can extend our skillset, develop our knowledge and help address systemic unfairness.
Curiosity means we don’t always have to be right, we just need to always be learning.
When we show ourselves to be curious we create the conditions for children to give us the information we need to know to help them improve their well being, safety and academic potential.
Curiosity can feel like a departure from the safety of routine responses we are familiar with. In the same way the child can also be familiar with a set of actions that serve a purpose for them but maybe be harmful for them/others/community. Curiosity bridges that divide and the power dynamic between the teacher and pupil means that only the adult can make that connection. Once that connection is made, real behaviour change can occur through a greater understanding of the child’s needs and therefore how they can be scaffolded to access what for others is second nature.
If you are interested in (or curious about) investigating more into behaviour please have a look at https://behaviour.semh.co.uk, a web app designed by this website to support curiosity into the potential functions behind a child’s behaviour.
Thank you for your curiosity today!
