Parents / Carers, We need Your Help Supporting Positive and Safe Play at School
Dear Parents & Carers,
At Ashburton Primary, we regularly review our data, including student wellbeing and behaviour data, to ensure we are providing a safe, supportive, and positive environment for all students.
Our behaviour data continues to reveal that physical behaviours (such as play fighting, pushing, or rough play), is our top behaviour concern, particularly during recess and lunchtime. While many of these incidents are considered low to moderate, we know that these behaviours can escalate and impact students’ sense of safety and wellbeing.
We acknowledge that we can’t control every situation or every individual within the school environment. What we can do is put strong, proactive and preventative measures in place to support positive behaviour and respond effectively when issues arise.
How families can support:
You can help reinforce these messages by talking with your child about:
- Playing safely and keeping hands and feet to themselves. This includes not engaging in play fighting and game plays such as tackling and wrestling. This is not weekend sport where some of these things would be allowed.
- Using words instead of actions to get a message across
- Safe actions vs unsafe actions
- What to do if a game becomes too rough (e.g. walk away or seek help)
- Being an upstander vs when not to get involved and to report to a teacher/seek help
As adults, it’s very powerful when we model these behaviours too, as actions often speak louder than words.
What we focus on at school:
- Explicitly teaching and revisiting safe play expectations from our Expected Behaviour Matrix (e.g. keeping hands and feet to ourselves)
- Teaching students to use positive strategies such as walking away, using words, replacement behaviours, emotional regulation strategies, or seeking help, which are also all explicitly taught.
- Increasing active supervision in key areas of the yard, guided by our behaviour data.
- Providing more structured play opportunities during break times, such as Lunchtime Clubs, Ashy Community Team events, and opening the library for different year levels.
- Recognising and celebrating students who demonstrate kind, safe and respectful behaviour.
When safe play expectations are not adhered to:
- All staff follow the Behaviour Management Flowchart see below, and Physical Yard Behaviour Steps (see below). The bottom line is, students who are physically inappropriate or unsafe in the yard during recess or lunchtime will receive an appropriate consequence to allow all other students in the yards the right to continue to play safely in the yard. The same message extends to all areas across the school.
Working Together
Our goal is to ensure every child feels safe, supported, and able to enjoy their time at school. We appreciate your ongoing support as we continue to build a positive and inclusive school environment.
Stay tuned for our next issue, based on our behaviour data analysis which is ‘Minimising Disruption to Learning in the Classroom!’
Kind regards,
Ashburton Primary School