Managing challenging behaviour

If you deliver sports activities to children and young people you may sometimes need to manage challenging behaviour.

What is the difference between misbehaviour and challenging behaviour?

Misbehaviour is a deliberate action that disrupts and stops the coach from running the activity safely or effectively. It’s a conscious choice and could put others at risk or cause harm to people, equipment or the environment.

Challenging behaviour is any action that is difficult to manage or puts the person’s own or others’ safety at risk. It’s often a response or way for an individual to communicate their frustrations or express distress.

You need to understand the difference between misbehaviour and challenging behaviour if you want to support and manage behaviour successfully.

Understanding behaviour

A child’s behaviour might be challenging for a reason. Understanding this can help you to support the child’s needs and put steps in place to help ease the behaviour and avoid potential misbehaviour, outbursts or meltdowns.

They may be neurodivergent, have additional support needs or a disability, or they might be experiencing one or more of the following:

• bullying or cyberbullying
• poor mental health, such as anxiety or depression
• difficulties at school with workload or exam stress
• problems at home, such as moving house, divorce, financial worries or loss of family member

If a child or young person needs additional support, this could come from a member of staff or volunteer, a family member, personal assistant or a carer who supports the child. Use a Support Carers' Agreement for the people who are not part of the national governing body, event or competition, but support a specific child or young person with a disability.

Setting boundaries and responding to difficult behaviour

Be clear about what behaviour is expected from staff, volunteers, children, parents and carers. Everyone should be encouraged to agree what are acceptable and unacceptable behaviours, before any activity takes place. Parents should help their children to understand how they are expected to behave.

If you’re worried about a child’s safety, mental health or wellbeing, tell the safeguarding lead and follow your organisation's policies and procedures. 

Your response should always be:

• proportionate to the actions you are managing
• imposed as soon as is practicable
• fully explained to the child and their parents or carers
• recorded - what happened, when, how it was responded to, and the outcomes or recommendations
• outline any support that would be helpful or needed to manage the behaviour in future

For further information see our involving children and young people guidance.

Early intervention

Responding early to any difficult or challenging behaviour is more effective than leaving behaviour to escalate or become disruptive. 

Listening to the child - have a conversation with the individual to hear their perspective and understand their behaviour.

Responding quickly - when unwanted behaviour is first identified, you can attempt to discourage the child from continuing, escalating or creating a pattern of challenging behaviour. This is their chance to change their behaviour before further action is taken. 

Reinforce acceptable behaviour - praise children and help them to identify what is acceptable behaviour. Help them find other ways of expressing themselves and their emotions. Remind them of your organisation's code of conduct or behaviour and the consequences of continuing difficult behaviours. 

Continued difficult behaviour

If a child is displaying difficult or challenging behaviours, consider the following options:

• time out – taking time away from the activity or session to calm down and reflect
• making adaptations to your session or activity - adapting the training session times and activities, explaining the activity clearly and helping different learning styles by demonstrating techniques
• behavioural reinforcement – rewards for good behaviour, consequences for negative behaviour
• de-escalating the situation – talking with the child and distracting them from challenging behaviour
• increased supervision by staff and volunteers
• contracts or agreements for the child’s continued or future participation and sanctions or consequences, such as missing an outing or match
• seeking additional or specialist support by working in partnership with other agencies
• temporary suspension or permanent exclusion – a last resort, after all efforts to address any challenge have been exhausted, in exceptional circumstances where that child or other children are no longer safe

Physical intervention

Avoid physical intervention unless necessary - it should always be a last resort, carried out in the correct way by trained adults. Staff and volunteers should always consider the risks of physical intervention to themselves and others. Ask your organisation what training is provided for this.

Situations where physical intervention might be necessary can include preventing a child from injuring themselves or others, or preventing a child from causing serious damage to property.

If you need to use physical intervention, you’ve considered the risks and have had training to make sure you avoid injuries or harm to everyone present, you should: 

• aim to achieve an outcome in the best interests of the individual whose behaviour is of concern 
• use minimum force required to avoid injury or damage to property
• use it for the minimum amount of time needed to avoid injury or damage to property
• follow your organisations’ policies and procedures on managing challenging behaviour
• use it only after all other strategies have been exhausted
• make sure it’s the result of conscious decision-making and not a reaction to an adult’s frustration
• record the incident as soon as possible using the appropriate reporting form and procedure

Parents should always be informed following an incident where a coach or volunteer has had to physically intervene with their child.

What parents and carers can do

• Talk to your child and their sport club or activity about their needs and provide any additional information that may be helpful for the sport to know
• Ask questions - does the sport or activity have codes of conduct or behaviour in place? Does the club or activity have safeguarding policies and procedures, how do they respond to incidents or bullying?
• Find out how the sport or activity respond to difficult behaviour, If your child's behaviour isn't acceptable, how will this be dealt with? What support is available? Who can you talk to if you have any concerns?

What your organisation can do

Your organisation has a duty of care to keep children and young people taking part in your sport or activity safe. You can:

• have conversations with the young person and their parents and carers to understand their behaviour, triggers, or situations that impact the individual
• set behaviour boundaries with codes of conduct, so that everyone knows what behaviour is acceptable and expected, and what isn’t
• develop and implement policies and procedures that support individuals and help your club to actively manage behaviour
• make adjustments to support children and young people displaying challenging or difficult behaviour that may be disruptive. These could include: 
  • increasing staffing
  • having regular breaks
  • creating quiet ‘safe’ spaces or a sensory room where children can calm down if they feel overwhelmed or upset

What to include in a managing challenging behaviour policy

Here are some of the things that you should include in your policy:

• codes of conduct for parents, children, staff and spectators
• appropriate supervision ratios
• guidance, support and training for your staff and volunteers
• a process for responding to unacceptable behaviour
• guidance on what will happen after an incident including debrief information - for example any action that has been taken and what support has been provided
• how your organisation will respond to 'high-risk' behaviours - this could include an increase of supervision and support, additional breaks, or allowing the young person to sit out of sessions and have time to regulate their behaviour
• assessment of additional risk associated with the child's behaviour – your sport or activity could put in place a support plan to help manage and support the young person
• outline the circumstances when external agencies such as, children's social care services and the police will be contacted about concerns, see our information sharing guidance
• circumstances when physical intervention could be required and how this will be carried out