Case Study: Sleuth - The Behaviour Tracking System

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Holte School is a mixed 11-16 comprehensive school situated in the Birmingham inner-city area of Lozells, one of the most socially and economically disadvantaged areas in the country. Multiple deprivation factors and high levels of crime increase the challenges faced by the school and community. Holte has 920 pupils on roll, a large majority of which speak English as a second language and almost half identified as having special educational needs. The predominant ethnic make up of the school is Bangladeshi and Pakistani (70%) and Black African and Caribbean (20%).

In 2001 behaviour at the school was judged satisfactory and note was made of rising fixed period exclusions. In subsequent years significant effort has gone into improving standards of behaviour and attendance. Behaviour at the school is considered a high priority, whole school issue which requires adequate resourcing. Good behaviour and attendance is now instilled as the baseline from which every student can thrive and achieve academic success.

As a result of the school’s efforts, in both the 2006 and 2009 inspections, they were judged outstanding for behaviour and in 2009 the school was judged outstanding overall.

During these inspections the school used the behaviour tracking system, Sleuth, to provide evidence of the significant improvements they had made in order to improve behaviour and to demonstrate they are working to address the Every Child Matters agenda.

Tom Vodden, behaviour management consultant for the School Software Company talks to Gordon Higginson, Lead Behaviour Professional and Deputy Headteacher at the school about their achievement and how they use Sleuth to contribute to their outstanding behaviour management.

Tom Vodden (TV):  What triggered the decision to use a behaviour tracking system at the school?

Gordon Higginson (GH):  We introduced Sleuth to simplify, standardise and streamline our recording process. A consistent and simplified recording mechanism is a key factor in improving the way we manage pupil behaviour. By recording the behaviour data in Sleuth we are able to very quickly produce a detailed chronology of the behaviour of both individuals and groups. The behaviour data is widely used in school and makes a significant contribution to the decisions we make about behaviour.

TV: In terms of your OFSTED inspections how has Sleuth contributed to your outstanding rating? 

GH: Significantly.  We were rated outstanding for behaviour and Sleuth most definitely contributed to that. We can feed into the SEF how we are positively using Sleuth to improve behaviour and we can evidence it and I have done so in two successive inspections.

We use Sleuth to identify trends and patterns in behaviour so it provides us with the opportunity for making early interventions.  We look at the data daily but we actually review and examine comparative data half-term by half-term, year by year

Also, I’ve said this before to a number of people, fixed-term exclusions here still remain fairly high and that gets picked up in inspections.  What I am able to prove by using Sleuth is that fixed-term exclusions do not tell you everything and, as a school, one of the ways we keep behaviour good is by having zero tolerance of certain extreme behaviours.  For those behaviours we don’t apologise for giving short fixed-term exclusions, but underneath that there is a year-on-year reduction in behaviour referrals and there’s a year-on-year reduction in referrals to isolation.  That’s clear evidence that individuals and departments are getting stronger at managing behaviour and doing it effectively.

TV: In terms of how this helps with your SEF return what kind of information might you use from Sleuth?

GH: We use Sleuth to provide the headlines for our SEF return. The school has now adopted departmental SEFs, so instead of doing an annual report to the Headteacher, we now do an annual SEF which we update regularly and that fits in with what is expected of the school generally.

In my departmental SEF, which would cover inclusion generally, part of that would be behaviour based on the data from Sleuth.  The main headlines from there would then feed into the SEF. 

When the SLT do the school SEF I just take the headlines to state the improvements we have made.  All these statements are backed up by evidence from Sleuth e.g. we can show Year Group X has a reduced number of referrals in this period.

We also enter things like the percentage of bullying incidents. That used to be a nightmare when we first had to report these incidents because we had to go through paper records.  Now at the click of a button in Sleuth we provide accurate data for things like bullying and racist incidents.

TV: So not only are you able to demonstrate progress using Sleuth but the process of tracking behaviour itself has directly led to decisions that have reduced incidents of certain types of behaviour?

GH:  Oh definitely. Things like allocation and reallocation of duty staff, areas of the school where there is a high frequency of particular incidents during unstructured time means we can allocate an extra member of the duty team.

TV: The Securing Good Framework requires a policy that is clear, consistently applied and continually monitored and evaluated.  What is it about your behaviour policy and whole school approach to behaviour that helped to achieve ‘outstanding’ for behaviour, twice?

GH: In terms of the securing good framework, the big mantra for me is about systems that are clear, that everyone understands and everyone buys into.  That includes pupils and staff.  Writing a behaviour policy is easy, you can get one on the internet but does it mean anything to your school?  Similarly, having a code of conduct and posters around your school – does it mean anything? Are staff involved in all stages of the process?

It’s very much for me about the systems being robust. Sleuth won’t do all the work for you. Record behaviour, fine, use it as a library of records, but it comes down to what you do with it, that is about the school systems you have got and how people buy in to it and also how the senior leadership make staff accountable.

Obviously behaviour won’t be “outstanding” every single day but if systems are secure, established and robust they can ensure that when things are less than outstanding they are dealt with consistently and accurately. Sleuth supports that whole school process and procedure.

TV: Looking at a specific area of the Securing Good Framework, for example alternative provision, would you use Sleuth to identify students and plan part time-provision or specific interventions?

GH:  Yes, the volume of incidents in Sleuth would warn us quite early on that there is an issue and lead us to put the standard school staged systems into place in terms of support and sanction, but there comes a point when we say we have got a ‘square peg in a round hole’ and that we need to look at something different.  We can review and breakdown the Sleuths in terms of which subject areas they are coming from and choose an appropriate course so we can make sure that any alternate provision accurately meets the individual needs of the student.

TV: Are staff proactive in using the behaviour data in Sleuth ?

GH:  Everything we do has a link back to the behaviour data in Sleuth. Whether it’s a meeting with parents, whether it’s a round-table discussion amongst staff about a student or a whole class, Sleuth will feed in to it in someway.

TV: So for example looking at staff.  Do you base CPD and staff mentoring on information in Sleuth?

GH:  We’re perhaps not as refined as we could be but the CPD coordinator has access to Sleuth data. It can be a sensitive area but certainly in terms of mentoring staff, I have looked at Sleuth to identify staff that may have a high number of referrals and worked with the Heads of Department to investigate why.  They may have a number of difficult classes so we can look at a better balance with easier to manage groups or see whether a few children can be moved up or down sets.

The Sleuth data is used on a monthly basis by all Heads of Department for their monthly meeting because behaviour is a standing item on the agenda of every department. So when they meet the Head of Department has the headline figures, numbers of incidents, that kind of thing, for the previous month with a print out of every incident.  They are then in a position to raise key issues within their department. That has been well received.  What we’ve found, and I’ve been to HoD meetings to praise our HoDs for this, is they’re welcoming the information and they feel actually as subject leaders “we have a key role to play in pastoral side”. Now pastoral leaders don’t just go around telling kids off, they are actually driving up standards as well in terms of academic performance, monitoring and tracking. HoDs welcome that empowerment. So there is clear evidence of pastoral and curricular staff having positive overlap in their roles.

The major incidents, out of class stuff, truancy and playground incidents are dealt with by the pastoral staff but they can now do that better because they are not dealing with the lower-level classroom disruption anymore because it’s being dealt with within the department.

TV: I know the Behaviour Support Team (BEST) use Sleuth. but has Sleuth had a role to play with other agencies, in terms of sharing collected data? 

GH:  With the growth of CAF and the CAF process it’s the kind of information that feeds really well into those pre-CAF and CAF meetings because you can constantly give updates, not just a general print out but a specific focus. You could just look at particularly difficult or extraordinary behaviour.

The Learning Support Centre (LSC) closely monitor students once they have returned to the mainstream from the LSC.  The data in Sleuth helps us decide who goes into the LSC and why, this may be for a number of reasons:

• To cushion their way back into mainstream school,
• It could be what we call a proactive-referral to try and prevent exclusion where they’ll go in for two or four weeks and that is triggered by Sleuth.
• If they have x amount of Sleuths the HoY is in a position to refer to the LSC.

When an LSC placement is set up we have the discussion with the parent or carer and share the data with them and then the LSC Manager has all the information they need when the young person starts. Now on top of that we need to be able to measure improvement and Sleuth allows us to do that.  We take external placements to help fund the LSC but because we can provide evidence of improvement it justifies what we do and shows we are adding value.

After an LSC placement we use Sleuth to measure the impact of the intervention.  A reduction in the volume of negative incidents or a rise in the volume of positive incidents, or both, will indicate that there has been a positive outcome from the LSC intervention.

TV: So an initial referral is triggered by Sleuth and then when they return to the mainstream Sleuth will help monitor how they are getting on?

GH:  Yes, and we will bring them back in for a day or more if we identify that their behaviour is starting to slip again.

TV: So using Sleuth is one way in which you identify vulnerable students and a need for support?

GH:  Yes and that’s why it’s called a proactive placement as we hope it never gets to the stage of, “There are so many behaviour referrals we’re going to have to exclude you”. So we’ll have some input with things like social skills, put them back into the mainstream and then track their progress using Sleuth.  The data in Sleuth triggers a lot of things for us, importantly we can be proactive and intervene early rather than always waiting to the point at which you exclude.

TV: Reflecting on practice and improving management skills, would you say that sharing behaviour data is encouraging Faculty Heads to reflect on how they improve behaviour within their own faculty areas and possibly how they support each other?>/span>

GH:  Indeed, more and more of our department heads are seeing the benefits.  Most of our departments are very proactive with their management of behaviour issues now and that is really helpful as it supports the pastoral leaders and allows them to deal with the more serious incidents.

In terms of what the year leaders can do, Sleuth is really helpful. They can see whether behaviour is happening in multiple faculty areas and step in quickly to deal with it.  If it is happening in a single faculty area, they can ask the faculty to address it.  It’s really important that the HoDs are involved as much as possible because, even though a referral has been sent, tomorrow the student will need to return to that class. What is going to change if you are not involved in the process of managing the behaviour? That is not to say staff should deal with it alone, but a referral is not enough. We need to empower teachers. What we have now got, rather than a pastoral person going up to a lesson to sort the problem out, the HoD might meet with the pupil and member of staff. They’re empowered because they are part of the process, the HoD knows what is going on and has supported it. It’s much more effective.

TV: In terms of the overall management of behaviour in the school, would you say Sleuth supports leaders in implementing a whole school system to address behaviour?

GH:  Definitely. It targets areas for development, highlights improvement and helps us to motivate pupils.  As well as demonstrating improvements by reductions in negative behaviour we also record positive behaviour.  This means we can target and identify pupils for reward activities.

We have an amnesty period when negative Sleuths are ‘zeroed’ in order to offer incentive to all pupils to perform or reform behaviourally and work their way onto a school trip.  This incentive is proven to work.  It’s important to recognise both the improvers and the reformed characters but we also recognise the best of the best who get it right all the time who get rewarded with a particular school trip.

Sleuth helps identify a number of things in terms of leadership that we can address and most importantly quickly identifies trends in behaviour so we can intervene early.

Holte School has improved considerably over the past few years. It is seen as a beacon of good practice in behaviour management locally and nationally. The Deputy Headteacher is called upon regularly to share good practice with other schools across the country. Improvements in behaviour have significantly contributed to the calm working ethos at the school. Results have improved and the school is seen as a model of excellent practice.

Sleuth has made a significant contribution to the outstanding Ofsted judgement on behaviour at Holte, supporting their systematic approach and providing evidence that this approach works and improves behaviour.

Since September 2009, for schools to achieve a rating of at least good in an Ofsted inspection, it is necessary to demonstrate that behaviour is improving and also that the school has a clear idea of how to improve it further.

Demonstrating improvements is straightforward for all schools that track behaviour using Sleuth. However, Sleuth will do much more than that, it will make your day-to-day behaviour management outstanding.