Monitoring progress: Keeping watch

Observing and noting down aspects of the behaviour of individual children will help you to manage each child and the group as a whole. Jennie Lindon explains how you can fine-tune your focus

An early years team will want to keep track of changes in individual children as well as the dynamics of a group. There is no need to use time-consuming or unwieldy methods for this. It is possible to monitor changes in behaviour with straightforward techniques of observation and recording.

Using observation skills
Any monitoring of children's behaviour can only be as good as the observational skills of the team. Keep in mind the following points:

• It is important that everyone in the team is generally alert to children's behaviour. You need to use your skills of watching and listening in order to notice how children handle everyday events, and what seems to spark some children into behaviour that you then need to manage.
  
  
• Do watch out for positive behaviour as well as negative. Monitoring children's behaviour and changes needs to be grounded positively. You are on the look out for times to encourage a child, and notice how well they have managed, not just for logging times of tension or trouble. Perhaps you could focus on one or two children a week.
  
  
• Everyone in the team needs to be alert to automatic assumptions about individual children, groups of playmates, or particular kinds of play that are thought to be flash points. You may believe that 'quiet Peter' will never be 'the one who started the pushing over the bikes', or that trouble will inevitably come when Sally and Marie head for the computer area, but you need to keep an open mind. There will be times when the unlikely does happen. You also need to note the times when trouble does not erupt. For instance, perhaps you are watching Sally and Marie with a view to working out how to help them be careful with the computer equipment and work alongside other children in this area. This time they were both very co-operative. What happened to enable the girls to settle?

What to monitor?
In addition to general alertness, you may sometimes want to use more specific techniques to observe and note children's behaviour. Before you make any specific observations, it is crucial to be clear about the focus of your observation - especially if several team members could be contributing to a recording sheet or schedule.

You need to describe a child's behaviour in such a way that you all know what should catch your attention. For instance, it will not help to say that Effie is 'aggressive' or that Owen 'can't concentrate' and hope that this shorthand will guide the monitoring. Perhaps the main issue is that Effie deals with frustration by hitting and pushing other children. You want to get a perspective on this behaviour, so look at how often the incidents happen and whether there is any pattern to them.

It is also more constructive to look for the opposite behaviour to a problem, since this takes you to what you would like to encourage. For instance, perhaps Rory seems very anxious and resists trying anything new. Rather than logging all the times Rory is 'anxious' and refuses a minor challenge, you could note every occasion when Rory is willing to extend himself, even a little way. Perhaps he goes one more rung up the climbing frame, or he hands over the money to a stall holder on your trip to the market.

How to keep track
You have a range of options, depending on the behaviour you want to monitor. So long as you are clear about the focus of any observation, you could make a note of each relevant incident, jotting down the time and brief details. For example, several team members could observe Effie. It may be useful in this instance to use the ABC approach: antecedent, behaviour, consequence. When the team get together after a few days, they can pool their information. There may be useful patterns to highlight which incidents seem to provoke Effie most easily, and what tends to follow on from an incident.

Some behaviour can be counted over several days. For example, a team may want to assess whether Dolan's habit of biting is very serious - or is it more that she chooses times of the day when handling the repercussions is especially difficult? A note of when, where in the setting and whom Dolan bites can be considered, along with how often she bites.

Sometimes it can be more appropriate to track an individual child. Perhaps four-year-old Owen does indeed seem to have a very short attention span. His key worker might like to check if the child is more able to settle down to some activities than others. The key worker can discretely track Owen, noting where he moves and stays, and for how long. A paper layout of the indoor and outdoor environment can help this observation. The lines drawn to track Owen's movements over the morning session may show that he returns regularly to the construction area. Perhaps this will hold his interest and he could settle here with some adult support.

Using observations
Any kind of monitoring needs to support your ongoing work with a child and promote a positive perspective. Observations of individuals or groups of children must never be treated as evidence of how 'awful' they are. Any discussion also needs to consider not only the child's behaviour, but also some overview of adult reactions and any useful changes that might be made in the learning environment.

The observation can be used to ask:

• 'What is happening?'
  
  
• 'Is there a pattern?'
  
  
• 'Are there times of the day, areas of the setting or particular events which tend to set off more troublesome behaviour?'
  
  
• 'Is the focus of concern as serious as you thought, and what hints have you gained for a way you could improve the situation?'

Perhaps the observation shows that Peter does sometimes start pushing over the bikes, but his ability to look innocent and sad has deflected any criticism. However, recognising that turn-taking over the bikes is a serious frustration for many children, Peter's key worker could raise the whole issue in circle time as a problem for everyone to consider. As a result, a group decision is made to try out the 'egg-timer' way of regulating turns.

As a result of monitoring, the team may also realise that Effie receives most adult attention at the times of trouble and drama. So thought needs to be given to ensuring Effie gets attention when she is behaving well. Nobody meant it to happen, but the team realise that she is being treated as the 'naughty child' of the group.

The tracking of Owen might show that he is fascinated by the garden and spends a lot of time lifting stones and watching little creatures. The monitoring might have shown that Owen concentrates really well when he is outside, but is at his most fidgety when he is required to sit still for any lengthy periods.

Feedback to children
Your monitoring of children's behaviour can help you and your colleagues and be shared positively with parents. But it is also worth considering appropriate ways to share what you have learned with the children themselves. For example:

• Rory could benefit from positive feedback from his key worker along the lines of, 'Look how well you climb up one, two, three, four rungs! Last week you would only go up to number two. Well done, Rory!'
  
  
• Sally and Marie need to be told, 'Thank you both. You're being so grown-up with the keyboard. I haven't had to tell you not to bash for ages.'
  
  
• Peter and the other children will benefit from being part of a discussion about bike turn-taking, such as, 'I think it's working much better with the egg timer. What do you think?'

Constructive feedback can help children to manage their own behaviour and also to feel noticed for the efforts they have made.