����Vlog

Despite having been a teacher for 25 years, this past year has been a first for me. My colleagues and I are opening a new 125-place school in September for children with social, emotional and mental health needs, and the process has forced us to think long and hard about culture.

When you take on a new job, you walk into a school with an existing culture that you initially have to fit into, even if you’re the headteacher. All new leaders have to invest time and energy into working out what aspects of the culture they are happy with, what they can live with for now and what they feel needs urgent attention.

With a new school, the challenge is different. There is nothing to wrestle with; there is an absence of culture. This may seem like an ideal situation, but beware - here be dragons.

Developing the right culture requires careful planning, followed by deliberate and persistent implementation. Without this, you will develop a culture, but it will likely not be the one you want because it will grow by itself like mould in a damp corner.

This is why, from day one, leaders in our new school are setting out with their staff a shared language that cuts out what we feel are lazy stereotypes and pejorative labels; the types of expression that can unintentionally lower expectations.

This is not language policing or political correctness enacted by control freaks. It is a deliberate part of building the right culture before the school even opens.

Here are five examples of expressions we’re cutting out of our shared language in the hope of supporting a more inclusive culture.

Language to avoid for an inclusive school culture

‘He’s a feral child’

I loathe this phrase. Not only does it have subhuman undertones, it is also implicitly critical of parenting.

Perhaps the child has difficulties with self- and co-regulation or has skills gaps in social development. We can talk about any challenges in these terms.

‘She’s low-ability’

This is a good way to limit expectations, implying that there is an inherent ceiling to what a child can achieve. “Below age-related expectations” isn’t particularly helpful either, especially for some children with special educational needs and disabilities.

The only benchmark that should matter is the child’s own. Are they progressing compared with what they could do before? Comparisons with what other children can do should be irrelevant.

‘They’re just doing it for attention’

This often gets used when a child is being disruptive and there is no apparent reason behind it, so the thought is that the answer must be the child is seeking attention. Sometimes people suggest replacing “attention seeking” with “connection seeking”, but this doesn’t do it for me either.

I prefer William Powers’ perspective. He suggests that “instead of assuming that brains control behaviour based on sensory stimuli, it makes more sense to assume that brains adapt behaviour to control what stimuli it gets from the world”.

This can help to reframe what looks like attention-seeking behaviour as an attempt by a child to influence their environment in order to have their needs met more successfully.

‘He kicked off’

This can characterise what is a complex emotional response as a child making a fuss or choosing to misbehave.

Try “dysregulated” instead, as this will make it clear to staff that their job at that moment is to understand what needs have to be met, and how to support co-regulation.

‘They’re pushy parents’

I am in awe of many of the parents we work with because they have to battle a crushing bureaucracy to secure provision for their child that most of us get without asking. The label “pushy parent” attributes a negative characteristic to parents who are simply advocating strongly for their child.

If we understand that is where they are coming from then we have a better chance of working with them in partnership to resolve issues rather than painting them as overly demanding and unreasonable.

Jarlath O’Brien is the director of school improvement for a multi-academy trust of special schools in the south of England and the author of books on school leadership, behaviour and SEND

��

��