How and Why to Lead with Kindness

Being kind to children is often mistaken for letting them get away with things. One leader who ran his school this way was called a danger to the profession in a blog, while the school was judged outstanding in every category, behaviour included.

High challenge and high support go together. The social discipline window shows you where your own practice sits. Understanding toxic stress changes how you read a child who seems to be 'making bad choices', and PACE (playfulness, acceptance, curiosity and empathy) gives you a way to respond. And there's a hard question to take back to the staffroom. When a child is excluded, who is that exclusion really for?

It comes from a former executive principal of SEMH and alternative provision schools who has written a book on the subject. If colleagues are sceptical, start with the children your current system isn't reaching.