Independent Thinking on Restorative Practice: Building relationships, improving behaviour and creating stronger communities (Independent Thinking On ... series)

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Remember the old joke about the pub on the moon that shut down because there was no atmosphere? How does your classroom compare? If your classroom or office was a coffee shop, would you be a regular? Having people leave your presence feeling better than when they arrived is one thing, but what about helping people feel better just by coming through the door?

Carlie has also facilitated a variety of mediation referrals for the Police, Corporate sector, Housing Associations and Charity Sector as well as complaints for the Local Authority and in-house as a HR process. Restorative practice is not about replacing traditional behaviour management systems in our schools. It’s certainly not about being soft or turning a blind eye to poor behaviour. It’s about elevating the culture of a school or organization so students are pulled in, not pushed out, about fostering a greater sense of community and communal ownership. Removing threats doesn’t mean we have created safety. For students to feel able to talk, you need adults who are willing to listen. In this way, a Restorative Approach is being authoritative, rather than authoritarian. An authoritative approach holds tenaciously to the school or organisation’s values and challenges members to demonstrate these values in all their interactions. And I mean all. Everything counts. In 'First Thoughts', Mark lists what this book is about: compassion, behaviour, change, children and young people, leadership, communities and collaboration. However, in my view he has missed something... This book is also about belief!He has worked for a number of local authorities, many schools and some research projects around the implementation of all things restorative. This has included the City of Leeds, where he has providing consultancy and modelled practice to develop a city-wide approach to Restorative Practices. The book shares advice on how to put behaviour right when it goes wrong in a more positive, less punitive way, and, more importantly, on how to get it right and keep it right in the first place. Furthermore, it advocates an approach that is collaborative, empowering and positive - and ultimately geared to improve motivation, engagement and independent learning in even the hardest-to-reach young people.

The idea is that with the above in place, there should be fewer issues with behaviour. But what happens when something does go wrong? After all, it is said often enough that the quality of a student’s learning cannot exceed the quality of their teachers. But I suggest that neither the quality of the teaching nor of the learning can exceed the quality of the relationship between the teacher and the learner. In a nutshell, it creates students who aren’t part of the audience, they are part of the cast. Or, as one school I work with puts it, not passengers but crew. A recently retired Police Sergeant her police role, latterly, was managing a dedicated team who worked with young people in a range of youth settings including Youth Offending Teams, Schools, Residential Care and within the community. Deb also managed a unique, multiagency funded Restorative Justice team supporting victims of serious crime through restorative processes. The work included writing and developing interagency policy and processes around both areas of business. The start of the day as students arrive can often be the busiest and most unsettled part of the school day. Getting involved earlier in the life of any problems can often help you have fewer problems later. Be more proactive and less reactive.Private. Do not share any private information with students, information that you’d only share with your loved ones is not the type of information you should be sharing.