Moving on From ‘Challenging Behaviour’

Every day, across the education and health and social care sectors, we support individuals with a widely diverse range of needs. And every day, we commit to providing the best care possible, ensuring that each and every person is equipped with the tools they need to thrive, and fulfil their potential.

Our roles are not always easy. We encounter difficult situations; some individuals need more support than others, and some may engage in behaviours that we could describe as ‘challenging behaviour’, or ‘disruptive behaviour’.

These phrases are not uncommon in our workplaces, are they? Words that describe how behaviour impacts on us, rather than the individuals we’re supporting.

However, it’s important to understand that the language we use has an enormous impact on our perceptions of behaviour. It has the power to influence – both positively and negatively – how we interact with, and support, those in our care.

The Team Teach philosophy

Here at Team Teach, our mission is clear: to help everyone understand and support behaviour in a positive and respectful manner. We aim to foster a culture of support within organisations, empowering professionals to recognise and respond to the individual needs of the children, young people, and adults they care for.

Central to this philosophy is the understanding that all behaviour is communication. In other words, no behaviour is intrinsically ‘good’ or ‘bad’, ‘positive’ or ‘negative’; rather, it is often just an attempt to express an unmet need.  By that rationale, terms such as ‘challenging behaviour’, ‘disruptive behaviour’ or ‘behaviours that challenge’ can be unhelpful, insofar as they attribute meaning that is not there and could inadvertently skew our approach to support.

This core principle of Team Teach’s values – that behaviour is a form of communication – should prompt us all to reflect on how we think and talk about behaviour in our organisations, and potentially reconsider the language we use to describe it.

‘Challenging behaviour’ focuses on the behaviour, not the person

Across all our different settings, we might use phrases like ‘challenging behaviour’, ‘disruptive behaviour’ or ‘behaviours that challenge’ to separate the behaviour from the individual, and to describe what we see. This language shows up in everyday conversations between professionals, is visible on policy documents and support plans, and, in most cases, is a well-intended attempt to avoid labelling individuals themselves as ‘challenging’ or ‘difficult’.

But this type of terminology can be problematic when thinking about the most effective approach to behaviour support. For example, when we say things like, “Kayla displays challenging behaviour”, we are training our attention on the behaviour, rather than the needs of individual we are supporting. Phrases like ‘challenging behaviour’ immediately draw our focus towards what someone is doing, distracting us from exploring the underlying reasons. As a result, we can end up managing the behaviour, rather than identifying the need, and supporting the individual with that need.