 Hello and welcome to Pukipondas, the podcast where I explore big questions with brilliant people. Today's question is, why do children need to feel they belong and how can adults support? And I'm in conversation with Sarah Dove. Hello, my name is Sarah Dove and I've been asked to describe myself, which is always a little bit chaotic. I've worked in education, I think for 18, 19, 20 years, something like that. And specialised in working with children at risk of exclusion. And I use that term very broadly, so not necessarily children at risk of permanent exclusion, but children that might be isolated from the education system for a whole range of reasons, such as health reasons. Sometimes it might be children that can't go to school, don't want to go to school for lots of different reasons as well. And I've been working in the sector for a long time, I really enjoy it. And if I'm going to describe myself, I think it'll be unfair to not mention that I'm a deep cat lover. And I'm just really interested in human nature, what people do and why they do it, and I really enjoy working with children. So yeah, that's me. That's you in a nutshell. I love it. And yeah, cat lover, we also have those who are listening. Mark is sitting on my lap joining in with the conversation. As always, anyone who's been to like any webinar or conference I've spoken at for about 18 months has met Mark. And so the question for today is why do children need to feel they belong and how can adults support. So that's our jumping off point. I've got a feeling we're going to go everywhere. But do you want to make a first stab at answering that massive question? Yeah, I like the fact that you tried to really easy question. That's fine. That's really helpful. So I think why the children need to feel like they belong. I think it is part of human nature. I think it is no different to adults wanting to feel like they belong to some type of group and being part of a community of some description or another. Whether or not that's their family, their friends or people they might meet in less than slubrous situations. I think for me, belonging encapsulates ideas about freedom and safety to express your identity and who you are in a way that's comfortable and nurturing. And if we looked at the idea of kind of human nature in particular, obviously I have to talk about Maslow, not like I'm paid to. But as Maslow's argument around the feelings of belongingness as being a central kind of tenant of human nature is key. And I think predominantly it's about being confident that you fit in and to be safe on who you are. And I think children are no different from adults in that way. And they might explore that concept of belongingness in different ways that adults might do. But their feelings of belongingness still kind of exist. And I think essentially we're, you know, we spoke about cats, didn't we? And cats aren't necessarily pack animals, but I think humans are. Humans like to have that feeling of being part of something bigger. And you do a lot of work now. And maybe you want to talk a bit more about your role here, but in alternative provision. And I think that's why I picked up on this idea of belonging, really, because I love alternative provision and people are far away. And it's in all those places that children and young people go when actually it feels like maybe they're not belonging anymore somewhere else. And the environment that you have to create there in order to try and help often kind of rebuild kids in quite a basic way and make them feel wanted. I don't know. I guess that's why this was the thing I wanted to pick up with you. But would you be happy to talk a little bit about that and about your, yeah, working in AP? Yeah. So predominantly because of the work is work with children at risk of exclusion. I've mainly worked in pupil fair units and alternative provisions. And this idea of belongingness became really key to me when I was researching for my PhD. And in that PhD, I spent I think six months in an alternative provision in one of the home counties and part of that was focus group meetings. It was in-depth interviews with children as well as participant observation. And one of the key features of that research was their feelings of belongingness in the alternative provision. And there was a kind of natural dichotomy with how they didn't feel like they belonged in mainstream. And we kind of explored that together about what does belongingness mean to you. And the children, they spoke about ideas about, again, about some children really strong that the AP alternative provision was like family. So they described, for example, teachers, she's like a mum to me was one of the things they spoke about. It was very sweet. And they spoke about those kind of regular routines that you have where you eat a meal together at lunchtime and like part of the family. And not all children felt strongly like that in terms of alternative provision, but they all named it as a community. And then kind of set in contrast to that where those bigger environments around mainstream where they didn't feel like they belonged. And so one child, for example, who told me that she had dyslexia, she spoke about the idea of being made to read out in front of other children and how that made her feel essentially exposed. And she used a phrase, but I'm not necessarily going to use in this context, but it's very derogatory for people with learning difficulties. And she says she was made to feel that way. And that she didn't feel like she was part of the school. And that was a kind of routine conversation of those children who had a way called self excluded. They might not have been permanently excluded, but stopped attending for emotionally based school refusal, for example, they might have electively home educate before they kind of appeared back in the admissions criteria. So those ideas of belonging were really key. And I wrote an article a while ago now, I think about three years ago, probably two years ago, the schools week and talking about. So often people castigate alternative provision improves as being these environments where children go who are poorly behaved, naughty, and often speaking about the kind of. It's the end for those children and I spoke about actually for some children is to start it's, it's the start of something new and for a lot of them is because they feel part of a community. You have to get that community right what you don't want is a community where, you know, behavior which is not conducive to society is encouraged or there aren't high aspirations or high expectations. But I strongly believe that good AP can really change children's lives, but also families lives who also may have had really poor relationships with schools for whatever reason. I went off on a massive tangent then. But the research was, yeah, I don't know. I don't know what question you asked to be honest. Sarah talks passionately about AP is the heading. Yeah, I did it. I thought that's my favourite role because I think the children have potentially been let down. Yeah. And I'm not saying let down by school or by family or necessarily by local authority or by anything, but by kind of mashing together of not kind of really understanding a child's needs or policies and processes which restrict the child's opportunities rather than seeing AP as part of a continuum of education and not and not every child will thrive in massive mainstream schools because they are bigger. Like the move from primary to secondary is huge for some of our children, especially autistic girls, for example, really hard for them. And how do we support when a child has found a sense of belonging? Like I'm thinking in particular, so if you've got that kind of more therapeutic nurturing environment that we often find in alternative provision, or perhaps you've got children who are really settled in a smaller, very community focused primary school and then they're going off to big school. How do we support them to kind of continue to thrive when they go elsewhere? I think it's hard and I think that's the kind of key moment between year six and year seven. And as a mum of a child who's just moving from year six to year seven during a pandemic and I was really mindful of that. She was in a one-form entry school. Transition is difficult. I think you need to start with trying to understand where the child is at wherever that might be and what things that they have found helpful from that small community group setting you know, rural setting, for example, and how can you, how can you mirror some of those aspects whilst also holding those high aspirations. So moving from one-form entry to a four-form entry, I think it has to be understanding that's really difficult. And sometimes transitions need to be slow. I don't think you can under, I don't think you can mitigate the importance of relationships about having that kind of key person they can contact. But also I find that some children find it difficult to ask for help, that they may not say that they need help. They might be, they might internalize it and actually rather keep quiet rather than saying actually I'm finding things really difficult. So almost having that permission of this is the person you talk to if things feel difficult or if you're lost, this is where you go. I know one school at the moment is using, I think, some additional funding and I'm sure there's many others about supporting that year six, the year seven transition for a week where no other children are at the school environment. So they get to know their teachers, they get to know the environment where there aren't, you know, six-formers plus year sevens. So they get to kind of experience it in a safer way that's a bit more kind of tailored for them. But I think in answer to your question, there is no magic bullet, I think, to support children. And so I produced a resource, it's just free on the website, a transition resource where I spoke to parents and carers and educationists around what did they find helpful for all transition and try to pull those things in together. And a librarian got involved, which was really interesting and spoke about libraries as a safe place. Yes. Because they're quiet and look, we're both surrounded by books. And it's that safe place where you can kind of immerse yourself, but they're quiet. They're often that restricted use, but, you know, they're not kind of like a classroom that is more open. You might only be allowed to go at certain points and that can be quite freeing. So. And there's rules, though. I always loved that. And I found this quite often when I've spoken to other autistic women in particular who got diagnosed later, but just basically spent the whole of school going, ah, often the library. You knew how it works. And usually there was a librarian there who was, you know, kind of similar to, and yeah, you knew what the rules were. It's a really safe place and often a really safe person as well. Exactly. She said there's there's very specific rules. So my daughter used to love libraries. Obviously, we haven't kind of enjoyed them for the last few years. And when she went into her new school, she was because of COVID, she couldn't do it, but being a library helper. Because there's particular rules you take books out. They're given at this time. And if you don't give them back at that time, then there's a fine and all those kind of very kind of rigid rules that she gets. And I think so even like breaking of rules can be quite difficult for autistic girls, I think. And where they don't know when to break them, when it's okay to break them. So one thing I keep on saying to my daughter is because she doesn't have a bedtime now because it's no school, what time can I stay awake till? Whatever you want. What? And I think she'd rather have that kind of actually know you need to be in bed by 10. She'd rather have that argument about the time than to not have a time. Which that's really interesting, actually. And I have to say in our house, my daughters are 11, they're just finished year six. And yeah, likewise, it's the holiday. But yeah, I think I just moved my time on and gave them a new rule. But yeah, they're comfortable with that. But I think it is interesting, isn't it? Yeah, I'm all about the rules. You talked a little bit there about how the relationship maybe is a key thing there, which feels like a very good radio two-styling link to your wonderful book. So you kindly sent me a copy recently of your book about behavior. But it's different than many books on behavior. It's different than all books on behavior, but different in that it is very much about this kind of relationship and nurturing kind of approach. And I wondered if you'd be happy to talk a little bit about why, why you wrote it and why you thought this was an important kind of contribution to making what difference you hope it might make. Why I wrote it is, you know, very basically someone asked me to, which sounds because I don't think I would ever thought that I would ever be in a position in which anyone would want to hear what I had to say really. And when I was growing up, going into home was a very unsafe place. I'll speak about it as the other incredibly unsafe space. It was violent. It was traumatic. You know, and I think aces in terms of adverse childhood experiences are a cliche and not necessarily helpful because, you know, I count mine and I go into nine 10, you know, without major issue. The school was my safe place. And I speak about sort of right at the beginning about why I wrote the book. And I remember, I'd already sorted out my apprenticeship to be a hairdresser, which is ironic because I'm not actually that bothered about hair. So I'm glad I didn't go down that route. And I got my GCSEs and I did all right. And I went to go and speak to new head of sixth form. And I think it's relevant. He knew because he had no expectation of me because I was not really naughty. But I was like I had like six inch spikes and stuff like that was kind of happy to not be at school. And he I asked if I could stay in the sixth form. He said absolutely. And I still speak to Mr. Brian and still talk about him obviously. And he's a great teacher. It was the belief in my ability. I think it was really powerful. And I could have easily been a few of those children in those book in the books I talk about. And I think one of the reasons I spoke about it is that when I was becoming a teacher and when I was a teacher, there was no book that I could pick up and go. What can I do in this circumstance? What can I do to really help what's going on within the classroom setting? And being a teacher is really incredibly hard because you're faced with 30 kids that may or may not care what you're teaching about, may not care about what you're saying or what you're doing. And how do you approach that? But in that class authority, the grants have children that are really struggling and they're not struggling because of you and your lessons not entertaining or you're not, you know, funny enough and all those kind of cliches. They're struggling because actually things are really hard for them. And I get that as well. And I remember trashing an art room when I must have been, must have been about nine or 10, trashed an art room. And actually I could quite easily been excluded from that. And it was because like so much was happening. And the art teacher just gave me like a pen and paper and I never spoke about it again. So there was those kind of aspects around, I wanted teachers to be able to have something that they could utilize and use. And so to that end, I wrote the book. And when I spoke to you briefly, like how do I feel about the book? I can't read it. I find it like I can't read it from beginning to end, because I still can't believe that anyone has asked me to publish a book. That's crazy. Also because the stories of all the children are true. And it's sad, you know, it's sad that children are in distress. And it's sad in the past and some of them may still be in distress and we still have children in distress. So if I can minimize that distress in any way, I will. And I should be writing a proposal for the second book about working together beyond the classroom. How do we work within a kind of multi-agency kind of aspect? Because schools are just one piece of a much bigger puzzle. Can we talk for a moment about imposter syndrome? Because I find it like mind boggling that you would say that you were surprised that anyone would want you to write a book or that anyone might want to read it. When I know you only, like since you've been a fully formed adult who has a huge amount of experience and wonderful, very practical ideas always to share. And I can't like I'm surprised you hadn't written before. I can almost have the opposite surprise if you're surprised if that makes sense. So why is that? Why the uncertainty about your? I suppose like, oh, I suppose that's complex. It's a complex question. Isn't it kind of imposter syndrome anyway? I think I'm the first person in my family to go on to finish school successfully. So not even get GCSEs or A levels, but just to finish school successfully. And some people might be following my younger brother's story, Warren, who's been released from prison last year and he's going to London School of Economics. And he's such a clever young man. I was going to call him boy. He's not a boy. He's a man, isn't he? Such clever. And he had obviously those feelings of how can I do this? Like, and he's going to London School of Economics to study sociology and have a year out of prison. So I think for me, because of a series of kind of being told that you're, you're not good enough and that and kind of living on that kind of that arousal level of fear for many, many, many years. I think does have a kind of fundamental impact upon how you see yourself. But also I think because I've had significant mental health issues. And that makes you question yourself, I think generally. So which is weird, actually, because I've had OCD and OCD gives you this magical power where you can like save people's lives, doesn't it? Which obviously I'm not very good at because I don't have magical power. So it's almost like the like trying to create kind of a resource to be better than you are. And I just think it's just, I don't know, like I just think it's just a process and I think having Tourette's syndrome as well. Like one of the things I talk about is I used to pride myself and my ability to be very exact about what I say. And then my Tourette's got worse after the birth of my daughter. And that really hampered how some people viewed me, especially like out and about and things like that. And I was also very overweight. I was eight stone bigger. And so I think all of those kind of factors kind of makes, oh, why would anyone want to employ me? And then I listen, this sounds terrible. And then I listen to some people speak like famous people that may be in governments and politics. And I think, oh my goodness, I'm probably all right. Yeah, I have to say there's nothing, yeah, that kind of helps to, because I always find it interesting for you, because actually there's a lot about our journeys that are quite similar, albeit it's exhibited in slightly different ways. But I have the, yeah, there's very similar feelings around imposter syndrome. However, I also have that similar thing of going and seeing other people speak sometimes. And it can be a bit like empress in new clothes, like there's someone in particular who I have seen speak more than once, who is published and everyone always raves about this person. And I've always come away really nonplussed and not understanding it at all. And even when I've been in the same room as all the other people and all the other people have gone on about how wonderful this guy is. And I'm like, I don't, I don't get it at all. I find that helps a little bit. I don't mean it's like, I have to say it's mainly kind of people that I will never meet and being on TV. So there's no one that you know. Don't worry, Ed, you Twitter, it's fine. It's not like someone did that. But also you like, I find that you learn so much from people as well when you listen to them. And you're like, oh my goodness. But also seeing other people's enthusiasm and encouragement for people that may not be perfect is really profound, I think. And that can really help. But I also made a decision. And it was when my daughter was four. It was quite a while ago now because she's coming up to 12. And it wasn't going to let my Tourette's stop me. And part of that was that my daughter and I went travelling together. We went to Romania together when she was four years old, just us two. We were picking away at the airport and we loved it from beginning to end. And then that was part of the I'm not letting Tourette's stop me do anything. And this is, you know, I'm going to do this and actually my difficulties are my difficulties. But actually I still have stuff I can offer and I'm not perfect. And I think that's okay as well. So like I say all the time, you know, you can buy my book, but there's lots of other books out there that are great too. This is not the panacea. You won't pick up this book and go, oh, everything is really meaningful. I mean, you might and that's great. Please write a review if you do. Generally speaking, it's about like collecting ideas and approaches. There is no one science fits all and not everyone is going to find me amazing if they hear me speak. But like, but equally not everyone's going to find me awful when I speak. I think it's really important though that kind of authenticity that you bring in like bringing your whole self to your work because I do think that there's not necessarily a lot of people who have the kind of experience that you have had growing up or that are living with, you know, like living with threats and managing that and OCD. You know, these things I do think I, yeah, it can be really worrying about whether this will undermine your credibility and it can make you fearful of being in this world. However, when you're able to stand up and give of your best self, then I think that is such important role modeling, even if sometimes it might be imperfect or messy, especially almost if it's sometimes a little, you know, a little messy. You're, you're expecting identical twins at the moment. Very excitingly. I can't like not address this in the in the podcast. I can't have you here and not talk to you about this. I guess it made me wonder a little bit like, what is your hope in terms of obviously your daughter's a little bit older and there's a bit of a gap there. Do you think the world has changed like and by the time your twins arrive, what kind of, you know, what do you hope might have moved on even just a little bit in terms of what their experience might be of the world and school and stuff. Such a good question. And actually, I think so interestingly enough, I've gone back into kind of maternity care and things like that. And I've gone, oh, not enough has changed. Not really. Yeah, yeah, really, I get really grumpy about certain things. And I was asked the other day, because this is what I tell everyone and actually we spoke about beforehand, I've got a shared placenta, which means all the babies have a shared placenta. I don't have any placenta belonging to me, my babies do, which means you have to have additional scans because there's several different kind of particular things that can go wrong with that. So the sonographer asked me, like, do you know what the implications of that were? And I said, yeah, he said, what are they? And I said, this, this and this. And he said, are you a little bit autistic? And I said, you can't be a little bit autistic. And I said, well, why did you ask that? And he said, because you seem to know quite a lot about it. And I said, because it's happening to my bodies and my babies. And there's that kind of bit about a woman knowing her place in the medical discourse that sadly seems to still exist. So there's those. So has things changed for my daughters? And what do I hope, especially around education? I think the biggest thing for my daughter, my oldest daughter, my only daughter at the moment, technically, is I think she felt, I think she feels incredibly lonely. May or may not be because she's an only child, she's got friends, but her internalization is that she feels lonely and she feels different. But it was interesting about twins. I think that is very unlikely to occur. And that's quite exciting in a way. Also it's unlikely to occur because they will have a big sister, even if there was just one of them, they'll have a big sister, which I think will help with that kind of loneliness. I also think in terms of education, so I was really struggled with different things around school, around that kind of, you know, she has an anxiety disorder and so on. She's really, really struggled. I don't want that for the twins. I don't know if that will occur, because I think there's often lots of blame on the parent about it as well. In other words, if I've made that occur, like, no, because it's attachment, because I'm, you know, it's like, no, it's not. It's just like how she is, about how she interprets the world. And I think mothers of autistic children often get that anyway. They get a lot of kind of blame about parenting. I think there's a refrigerator mother thing, wasn't it, about cold? Yeah, which I was thinking about the other day. I don't think enough has changed. And actually, I think in some ways we've gone backwards around inclusive education. And that worries me. Whilst I, you know, I sing the praises of AP and crew, I think that schools should also have the mechanism to be able to support children with a wide range of diversity. And I don't think it's about economics. I don't think it's about budgeting or money, because so much goes into special educational needs to fight parental choice. I think it's often a lack of belief in parents' experiences and a lack of trust about parents and what they're reporting. And that's why I want to write the next book working together, because I think there's, yeah, I don't think there has been enough change. And I think where the changes occurred, it's not one I'm necessarily particularly excited about for my children. So yeah, it's a bit negative, isn't it? I've just like thrown my children into like a dystopian educational universe. And all that depressing. Anyway, I think it's, yeah, it's a really difficult thing, isn't it? And I think, you know, the world is a really strange place right now anyway. And I don't think any of us can quite predict what's going to kind of happen next. I kind of, there's a little part of me that feels a bit hopeful about some of the changes that we've seen as a result of the pandemic that maybe might mean that, you know, are the world changes, but I'm not sure. I think going back to your point there about the twins never feeling lonely, it just really made me think of my daughters. So my daughters are both in the same year at school, they're actually second cousins by birth, but have been raised like twins. And the really interesting thing for us has been that they're such a unit and they're such close friends and so important to each other. That it has meant, you know, things like Lyra's only had her autism diagnosis really recently age 11, despite the fact that I specialize in this, because they're always together. And she's never like displayed a lot of the typical things you might expect because Ellie is the social glue and so Lyra's not seemed to have any of the issues we might have expected. And it's only when we'd split them that we began to see those issues. And likewise, Ellie struggles significantly with the academic side of things. But again, until they were apart, we didn't realize because Lyra would sit next to her and help her and they're such a great unit. And it's when I reflect on it, it makes me feel guilty as a parent for not realizing the individual challenges they have. But on the other hand, looking at them and thinking what an awesome pair they are. Absolutely, they each have each other all the time and they can fight like cat and dog, but they're so important to each other. And that's been for us a really interesting thing of the pandemic because they actually chose to be apart. And then during the course of the pandemic spent so much time together and actually went through almost like a regressional stage where they would like would often sleep in the same bed and that kind of thing. And then decided they absolutely wanted to be together and have asked to be in the same form group in the same school and everything when they go to secondary which. And there's something as, yeah, and I guess you'll find this with your twins that there's something as a mum that's really lovely about that they've made that decision. You know, I when they're very little and there is that temptation always wants to do things together but they kind of found found their own ways and kind of gone apart and always come back together which I think is. This is really important so people ask me a lot are you going to dress them identically and I'm like no one because I'm never going to be able to tell them apart anyway. Give myself extra work here but also they are their own humans and you know I probably have just one set of clothes initially and then just swap them over because that's fine but I don't want to the same. But yeah I'm not going to recognize them anyway but the idea of them being together but yeah so being safe and secure apart again is really important but I hear what you say about the mother's guilt the mother's guilt is huge it doesn't matter what you do. Whether or not you found it whether or not you kind of identified it really early you'd be told that and you're a parent that you know is too involved with your children's lives. See it late and then you blame yourself anyway. So it doesn't really matter what you do and we're going to feel guilty. You're right. That's the thing I think I've kind of started I think because I had significant mental health health issues when I was born that I've now come to a place going because we made to feel guilty for so many decisions. And some of those may have had an impact and I'm sure some of them did but also it goes back to those notions of good enough parenting you know my daughter does have a safe place where she feels like she belongs at home at least in that environment. And yeah you do the best with resources and circumstances that you have. Yeah guilt I think guilt is very much a kind of construct of parenthood I think which is sad really isn't it. Well and I think it's challenging as well like right from the moment that you are clearly pregnant people start trying to give you advice don't they and I guess you face this earlier than most would because I think you kind of you carrying twins and and yeah you definitely And when I'm vomiting outside places I'm like I'm pregnant I'm not drunk and pregnant and people when it's twins are they rather than saying congratulations they just say good luck. It's a really marked difference good luck okay. Yeah see you in three minutes. Yeah. Those are people give advice and some of it I listen to it some of it I ignore and that's you know if you go on Twitter anyway and you engage in any education educational discourse and it becomes very polarised and they like that as well everything is this or this actually there's a lot more kind of nuanced approach that needs to be taken for both of those discussions. Yeah and I get that that takes me kind of back to your book actually and I because I'd wondered about this like I have for a long time not been brave enough to really publicly have a view on behavior just because I don't like it when people hate me and and that might sound no but you know like I don't like it even when people like it's not the best position to be in is it. But when you start talking about behavior and I do actually have really strong views on it and I have started very much engaging with those views more now, but there is really polarised views on behavior and there's basically the kind of the kind of relational and kind and understanding and responding to need and supportive sort of approach and then there's the other approach and I just wondered whether you'd had any kind of backlash or difficulty following your book. So, no, surprisingly, no, none at all. And, and despite what Phil Beedle said about it which was very polarizing in terms of his opinion, and I'm a big fan of Phil Beedle because he was on TV when I was training to be a teacher so I absolutely delighted he read it. So, I walk a very particular line online and it's very intentional and the line is that you wouldn't, I don't think, be able to consider about what line that I sit in and I decided not that many years ago, not as many years ago as it should have been to not argue online. Yeah, because actually I get so invested in the arguments, I get so enraged that it's just not healthy for me. And that was after having an argument about whether or not a tortoise should wear a nappy. So, let alone about children. Yeah, it's literally reptile forums are a terrible place to be. And I intentionally, I mute certain words so I don't see certain words, but I would engage in conversation with people in a way that I hope is conducive and helpful. And I will present that conferences that are probably quite diverse in their opinion so I will. I've presented at Research Ed, which is run by Tom Bennett, but also lose the booths with Paul Dix. And I am because I want the voices the children I work with to be heard by all. And that's my kind of absolute positioning is that I want the voices of the children to echo beyond my own personal echo chamber whatever my kind of belief system is. And I do feel very strongly about things and if people come listen to me, they probably hear that. But actually, if you read, and I've got behind me, I've got Tom Bennett's book, I've got Paul Dix's book because there is no panacea. I've got my own book, I've got lots of books in between that take out what's helpful for you, but also don't lose your moral sight about what's healthy for children. And, and that's like, you know, I do the kids mental health chat on a Tuesday, which is well attended by psychologists, psychiatrists, parents, lots and lots of parents and teachers. And I'm very keen on making sure it's not a space that he's argumentative, it's collaborative. No, I haven't had any backlash to my face. I mean, there might be loads of kind of messages going, God, that looks rubbish. But the thing is, if they don't want to read it, they won't read it. So but no, so far, all my reviews are really nice, really nice. I'm really, I'm really pleased to hear that just that behavior can be such a, yeah, hot, hot button topic. Why does it matter to you so much that those voices are heard? That's not an accusatory question. I'm 100% on side with this, by the way, I just would love to hear about why, why? I think it's really easy to silence children's voices. My voice was pretty silent when I was younger for lots of reasons, different reasons, I wasn't able to speak out. And I don't want children to have that experience where their viewpoints aren't held. For me, it's a human rights aspect around children's rights and participation and beyond notions of being tokenistic. And those children that have spoken to me or, or I've talked or I've supported in various different ways, have, have told me something through their behavior, through what they've said. And I think that's really important that's heard. And I think because we can learn so much from children, often, you know, it's the cliches and it, you know, children are experts of their own experiences. Yeah, just like you're an expert of your own experience and so on. And sometimes people may not have ever had those kind of opportunities to hear those voices in more detail. And if it can help shift understanding to be something that is more inclusive, then I want to do that. And I don't want to close off those conversations with everyone. And actually when I listen to, you know, as I said, I don't agree with everyone. But also, is it going to be effective if I have a moan via the format of Twitter? No, I'd rather have a direct conversation with someone and actually this makes me feel really uncomfortable. And I have those conversations all the time in my day job going, I don't think that's appropriate or I'm not sure or holding people to account. But you know, how many characters we got on Twitter, that isn't all I'm going to do is get people's backs up. They're going to block me, they're going to mute me. Lots of people do that anyway. It's not helpful anyway. So no, no one's been horrible about my book. That's good. Clearly, because it's a really good book. I think there was well that you are quite a safety offline before we started recording. One of the things that I really like and really respect actually about the way in which you've written your book is that you don't actually say this is the way to do it. You share a wide range of experiences and say, here are some things that might help. And you're quite kind of open to the fact that different things will work for different people and that it's not all going to be plain sailing. And I think I think that is really, really important. But yeah, also hopefully less likely to evoke IRH responses. The only thing about not being controversial is that you don't earn as much money. If you're controversial, you get more people more interested in booking you for speaking and presenting and all those sorts of things or buying your book because what has she said, I don't have any of that. And that's hard as well because that kind of knowledge that my voice is maybe not loud as some people because I'm not controversial. But I've taken that deliberate line and I might revisit that line and go, oh, I'm not happy about that. It's now actually beyond the pale and I need to kind of speak up more robustly about X, Y, Z. I don't think we are there yet. I think we could be there in the future. So we've got the behavior consultation by the government at the moment. That would be interesting to see what comes out from there. But I would rather be consulted on that and write my particular views and spout a tweet that's kind of meaningless really. Yeah, I've got a lot of respect for that. And I think there's a lot to be said actually for engaging with different points of view rather than just living in an echo chamber. But as you say staying true to your morals and what's always asking the question, what's best for the children. We're coming to the end of our time, but I can't finish without asking you just to maybe explain so that people can go away and use this idea. You talk about your cornerstone of supporting children understanding behavior being around noticing, understanding and responding. And I thought that, you know, I always like to take these little bite sized bits out to share with people and that felt to me like a really powerful triad. And I wondered if you wouldn't mind just explaining a little bit about what you mean by that and how you use that in your day to day. Yeah, so I think quite often, and I've done it, I do all the time, you might notice something that's happened. And then you move straight on to responding. So you might notice, for example, that Liam is tapping his pen incessantly on his table all the time. And your response to that might be, you know, actually, Liam, if you don't stop tapping your pen on the table, I'm going to do XYZ. Liam continues because he doesn't notice or whatever. And then your response to that might then be further to, it could be a detention, it could be isolation room, it could be sending out things escalate. My idea was actually, you notice something first, then you try to understand it, then you respond. Because actually, if your response doesn't build in those concepts around understanding, then your response is meaningless because it may not kind of help or enhance the practice that's happening. Now, it could be absolutely that Liam is being a right pain and, you know, you've noticed he's banging his pen and he's banging his pen and you've understood it as actually he's trying to be annoying because of XYZ. Well, that's fine. And that has a different response. But it could be just that he doesn't even notice. It could be, for example, because OCD has to do it 30 times, obviously that's like at the end of this kind of spectrum. Or it could just be that he needs something to fiddle with. And, you know, like, sometimes I hold my pen during interviews and things like that and meetings. But without building in that key component of understanding, then your response is going to be at best ineffective. And it will become routineized rather than actually something about the individual child. So the idea is just notice, understand and then respond rather than kind of jumping ship, basically.