A cry for help : the perspective and experiences of primary school children with challenging behaviour within the Cottonera area

Abstract

As a class teacher myself, I believe that as educators we seek to listen to our pupils. I hope that this study offers the reader the opportunity to listen to pupils manifesting challenging behaviour. It offers an insight into their perspective and experience and various aspects of themselves and their lives that they might be influencing their behaviour. The children's perspective is presented in this study in order to provide a teacher and other professionals an opportunity to simply listen. I believe that through dedicating time to listen to children who are manifesting challenging behaviour helps us understand them more and thus cater for their needs. Ironically, this cry for help often takes the opposite form and comes out as antagonism, rejection or withdrawal from the people who are best place to help. In these instances the child is sometimes pushing those around him/her to the limit of tolerance and patience; this might be due to the fact that experience had taught them that everyone ultimately rejects them. This study is for anyone who wants to hear the perspective of children with SEBD and believe that they have something worth saying. Pupils with SEBD (Social, Emotional, Behavioural Difficulties) are often misunderstood and frequently labelled as subversive, over-represented and often excluded (Cefai & Cooper 2006).