Positive Behaviour For Learning (PBL) has been adapted from the Positive Behaviour Interventions and Supports (PBIS) program developed in the USA.
Although impressed by the PBIS model, the Department of Education recognised that its focus on behaviour support needed to include overt emphasis on learning in order to appeal to NSW schools.
The PBL philosophy aims to improve outcomes for all students by creating sustainable school-wide, classroom and individual systems of support that acknowledge the link between positive behaviour and enhanced learning environments.
PBL provides students and staff at Galston Public School with a positive and proactive system for defining, teaching and supporting appropriate student behaviours.
Three core behavioural expectations are taught to all students through formal social skills instruction. These expectations are applied across all areas of the school. They are respect, responsibility and personal best. In understanding what these expectations are, how they apply to all areas of the school, and the clear consequences of not following these rules, students gradually learn to regulate their own behaviours. In order to reinforce positive behaviours, students are rewarded regularly and acknowledged through the school merit systems and assemblies.
PBL increases student engagement and learning by increasing ‘on-task' behaviours and decreasing distractions in the learning environment. The result at Galston Public School, which already has a positive school environment, is the improvement in student academic through increased teaching time and consistent expectations of behaviour.
The program is sustained through regional coaches who have helped participant schools transfer learning experiences in training sessions into practice in the schools. Coaching is essential in the PBL process to increase transfer of learning in the areas of needs assessment, evaluation, systems development and action planning.
PBL at Galston Public School assists our staff in the delivery of the highest quality learning programs and improving academic and behavioural learning outcomes for all students.
