Professional Practice
4   Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments    

4.4 Maintain student safety    
At graduate level AITSL states that teachers should "describe strategies that support students’ wellbeing and safety working within school and/or system, curriculum and legislative requirements". In demonstrating my understanding of student safety, and of creating and maintaining supportive and safe learning environments, I would like to draw on three underpinning elements for the holistic wellbeing of the child: physical wellbeing, emotional wellbeing and social wellbeing. It is also necessary to consider humanistic psychology theories in regards to basic human needs, particularly that of Maslow. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs suggests that there are five levels necessary for individuals to reach their maximum potential for success and wellbeing. This is demonstrated in the image below:
Maslow's hierarchy of needs
Image created by J. Finkelstein licenced CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons
Michael Hagerty (1999) describes Maslow and his hierarchy in the following statement:
The first need he labels as physiological, such as air, water, and sufficient calories and nutrients to live. The second need is safety, such as safety from assault, from murder, and from chaos. The third need is belongingness and love, including friends, a family, a community, and “having roots”. The fourth need is esteem, where a person is valued as a wise decision-maker, has a certain status and confidence. The fifth need is self-actualisation, where each individual makes maximum use of his or her individual gifts and interests, “to become everything that one is capable of becoming” (p. 250)

Hagerty, M. R. (1999). Testing Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: national quality-of-life across time, Social Indicators Research, 46 (3), pp 249-271. 
This hierarchy forms the foundation for professional practice when considering the safety and wellbeing of students in the school context, specifically responding to the first three levels of needs: physiological, safety, and love/belonging. How then is this reflected in teaching practice? The following evidence demonstrates my ability to recognise, support and maintain student safety, across all domains, in the school setting. 

National Safe School Framework Professional Development

The National Safe School Framework identifies nine elements for creating school environments that promote a culture of safety and wellbeing for everyone within the school community. These elements are as follows: Leadership commitment to a safe school, a supportive and connected school culture, policies and procedures, professional learning, positive behaviour management, engagement, skill development and safe school curriculum, a focus on student wellbeing and student ownership, early intervention and targeted support, and finally partnerships with family and community. Through the Safe Schools Hub I have completed online professional learning modules for pre-service teachers, giving an intensive introduction to the National Safe Schools Framework and its implementation - the PDF file provided is a number of journal responses from throughout the module. 
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Professional Experience Report Excerpt

Throughout my professional teaching experience I endeavoured to creative a classroom culture that supported and maintained student safety and wellbeing. This was achieved predominantly through the school's values education program, the Kids Matter program, South Australia's Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework, and through implementing the National Safe School Framework. This practice is reflected in two excepts form my final professional experience report. Furthermore, I have become familiar with the Keeping Safe child protection curriculum used in South Australian schools.