Attitudes, values and behaviour

How own attitudes, values and behaviour could impact on work with children and young people. Everyone has a different attitude ad has different values compared to other people but that is what makes us different. When you start to work with children you realise that it is not always necessary to be aware of them because you know that if you do act out on these attitudes, it will have an effect on the children and you wouldn’t want them to copy your actions if you know yourself that they are your own and should not be forced onto others. Every adult that we meet on a day to day basis will have a different attitude to mine and more than likely will have different values and mind sets on everything. When it comes to being around children you have to be wary of the things you are saying and the actions you take because children are like sponges, they absorb so much information and tend to copy what an adult does as they see us as role models.

If we show a negative behaviour and show that we are negative to certain people around us such as if we were different to someone who has a different race or religion to us, then we will influence children to be the same way which is not a good thing as young children don’t know the differences between right and wrong. As teaching assistant it is our duty and responsibility to always respect others and accept them for who they are. The only way we can do this is if we sit back and think about our own beliefs and attitudes so we can learn not to judge others on the basis of their race, gender or religion etc… If we think about it we know ourselves that we would not like it if this happened. In my setting I work with Autistic children so I always have to be very careful what I say as anything I do say they will take very literal and most likely repeat exactly what I say and the time I am saying anything. I always have a good positive behaviour and I never discuss personal matters in front of the children.