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Five-session mentoring course

Verbal disruption

Who it's for

Consider this course for a pupil showing:

  • Frequent calling out, talking over instructions, or commentary during quiet work
  • Behaviour that appears to seek peer attention or laughter
  • Disruption clusters around specific lessons or times, such as after break or in less-preferred subjects
  • Pupil is often unaware of how often it happens until it is pointed out

What it works towards

  • Build self-awareness of the frequency and impact of calling out or talking
  • Strengthen impulse control
  • Learn and use an alternative way to get attention
  • Self-monitor progress with support from the class teacher

The five sessions

  1. Session 1 My voice in the room Pupil can estimate, then compare to a real tally, how often the pupil calls out or talks in a lesson.
  2. Session 2 Impulse and attention Pupil can explain a simple stop-think-choose technique in the pupil's own words.
  3. Session 3 Getting attention the right way Pupil has an agreed alternative signal for getting the teacher's attention.
  4. Session 4 Practising self-control Pupil can rate their own self-control on an agreed one-to-five scale, and has a chart set up for the week ahead.
  5. Session 5 My classroom plan Pupil has an agreed, ongoing self-monitoring system shared with the class teacher.

A sixth session follows, without the pupil: the mentor writes the support plan and agrees next steps.

The approach, and where it comes from

This module uses self-monitoring and impulse-control techniques consistent with EEF guidance on personalised, low-key behaviour supports such as daily report cards, which have good evidence for reducing disruptive behaviour. It also responds directly to the findings of Ofsted's 2014 report Below the radar on the cumulative cost of low-level disruption to learning time, and to the DfE's Behaviour in Schools expectation that low-level disruption is addressed early and consistently rather than allowed to become routine.

Try it with a small group

Three weeks free, no card, up to three staff and ten pupils. Everything recorded during the trial carries over if you continue.

Start the free pilot

Or read the white paper, which sets out the evidence behind each of the twenty courses.

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