Abermain Public School has smashed their Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) program target for the first term of 2014, exceeding expectations on all fronts thanks to the commitment of the entire school community.
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The school was a part of the original pilot group in the local area to trial the PBL initiative in 2007.
Three fundamental values are the core of the entire program, with Abermain Public School focusing on ‘safety, respect and learning’ as a basis for behavioural expectations in the school.
The teachers make the effort to teach what these values look like when used in everyday situations so that the students can truly understand what is expected of them.
Assistant principal Debbie Bower is enormously proud of what the school has achieved in the last couple of years and attributes the success to the ongoing team effort by the school community.
“It has been the continuing commitment of the school, staff, students and the community to the program to achieve results,” she said.
The PBL is constantly worked on by their team made up of executives including principal Len Boughton, teachers, teacher’s aides and student leaders, with a great deal of support from the school’s P and C.
In Term 1, 2014, 97 per cent of students at the school are now performing within the positive field of the program expectations in the playground environment, an increase from 72 per cent from 2008.
The program is an ongoing data driven process, with the systems and policies within each school designed based on the specific school’s data.
One initiative that has come from the program is the PBL ‘Personal Achievement With Success’ (PAWS) Badges award system in which students are rewarded for fulfilling a student contract of good behaviour, awarded once a year when signed off by themselves and their teachers.
This week during Education Week there will be a special awards ceremony in which the PAWS Badges will be handed out to the recipients.
The school will also receive an award for the implementation of the PBL program at the region’s Education Week awards this afternoon.
A recent addition to the rewards system is the PAWS Plus scheme, giving students who complete their badge contract earlier in the year extra motivation to continue working hard and enforcing the school’s values.
Ms. Bower said it was interesting that the Year 6 class of 2014 were in kindergarten the first year that the PBL was introduced and have therefore been involved with the values instilled by the school program their entire primary school education.
“Students are more engaged in learning within classrooms, in positive outdoor activities in the playground and there is a certain feeling of calm and focus throughout the entire school,” she said.
To reinforce the values and expectations of the school, permanent signs are being installed at the front gates and throughout the school grounds.
Cessnock High School and all of its feeder primary schools are participating in the PBL program, so that when primary school students make the move to secondary school they have experienced similar expectations.
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Education Week runs from July 28 to August 1 .