Best Practice

Safeguarding: Six ways schools can identify and respond to physical abuse

Safeguarding Pastoral issues Mental health Pupil wellbeing
Around 1 in 14 children in the UK have been physically abused and school safeguarding procedures must be able to spot these children and intervene. Elizabeth Rose advises
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Schools play a pivotal role in safeguarding children from all types of harm. Staff have the opportunity to build trusted relationships with children and families, educate them on what healthy relationships and effective parenting looks like and should have the expertise to identify any signs that a child may be being abused or neglected.

The starting point for staff training is often ensuring that there is a clear understanding of four key types of abuse – physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect. Sharing relevant data and statistics in an effective way in order to highlight the scale of the problem can support understanding of these issues.

The NSPCC regularly publishes briefings on a range of different types of harm, and recently has updated its briefing discussing the prevalence of physical abuse in the UK (NSPCC, 2024).

Using this as a starting point, this article will consider what leaders and staff in school can do to work together to prevent children from physical abuse.

 

What does the data tell us?

According to Working together to safeguard children (DfE, 2023), physical abuse is “a form of abuse which may involve hitting, shaking, throwing, poisoning, burning, or scalding, drowning, suffocating, or otherwise causing physical harm to a child”.

Physical harm may also be caused if a parent fabricates or induces illness in a child. The recently published NSPCC statistics tell us that:

  • Around 1 in 14 children in the UK have been physically abused.
  • Concerns around physical abuse have been identified for around 1 in 10 children who are the subject of a Child Protection Plan or on a Child Protection Register in the UK.
  • There were more than 200,000 offences related to child physical abuse recorded by police in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland in 2022/23.

The briefing itself also provides further details on the provenance of the data and some of the common characteristics among children who have experienced physical abuse.

It is important to note that there may be more children that experience physical abuse than we see reflected in these figures because some children may not report their experiences.

 

How can schools identify and protect children from this type of harm?

As Keeping children safe in education (DfE, 2023) tells us, child abuse is complex and cannot often be covered by one definition or label alone. A child may suffer different types of abuse or neglect simultaneously, for example. For the purposes of this article I will focus on physical abuse, but the following points could pertain to a wide range of harms.

We can see from the statistics above that physical abuse affects many children. Staff in all schools have a responsibility to understand that “it can happen here” – to use a commonly used safeguarding phrase – and to keep in mind that a child or children that they currently work with may be suffering physical abuse.

This foundational understanding supports wider safeguarding work within the school and should be built on with effective practice, including:

Training for staff and governors: As well as understanding that physical abuse may be affecting children in the school, staff also need to understand the indicators of this type of abuse and, crucially, what they need to do if they are worried about a child or children. Governors must understand what should be in place and they must be confident in asking questions to check staff knowledge and understanding. Training should revisit the four key types of abuse regularly (not just annually) and staff should be reminded of signs to spot and their responsibilities throughout the year.

Reporting routes: Consider the range of reporting routes in place in school. Although there are barriers to children disclosing abuse, physical abuse is the second most commonly mentioned form of abuse in both contacts to the NSPCC helpline and Childline counselling sessions, which could indicate that children may be able to identify and speak out about physical abuse more readily than some other forms of abuse. Do all children have opportunity to disclose abuse to a trusted adult? Is there a range of ways for them to do this? Are children with SEND or English as an additional language (EAL) well supported to seek help? Consider student voice too – how do you know that children understand how seek help and that they are able to do so?

PSHE delivery: PSHE is crucial in keeping children safe both now and throughout their lives. Teaching children what a range of different safe and healthy relationships look like helps to equip them with the skills to understand their lived experience and making it clear that they can and should report concerns in school is vital. It is important to consider student voice here too. Do children feel that the PSHE curriculum provides them with the information they need to identify risk or harm and seek help and protection?

Record-keeping is accurate and detailed, including actions and outcomes: All safeguarding concerns should be raised in line with school policy and recorded accurately, in chronological order. Sufficient detail is essential to support in spotting patterns and, in many cases, this will be the way that concerns are identified rather than through a direct disclosure. It is important to regularly review and audit files. Designated safeguarding leads (DSLs) could choose a record to discuss with the school safeguarding team and consider if it tells the full story, if there are any patterns not yet identified, if anything has been missed, if all actions or outcomes have been recorded, and if anything else needs to be added. It is also important to consider within this process whether there is a clear understanding and reflection of a child’s lived experience, and if not, why not?

Use of data: To continue the point above, data from children’s records can be used to identify trends and patterns. Does behaviour data indicate that a child may be suffering abuse? Are there any patterns of attendance that could indicate a concern? How does your safeguarding data inform your safeguarding curriculum?

Multi-agency working: If a child is suffering or may be at risk of suffering physical abuse then it should be reported appropriately in line with local protocols. Effective multi-agency working is essential to prevent a child being further harmed and a clear understanding of local processes is essential. DSLs should be clear on what, when and how to report and the timescales for responses to any referrals made. DSLs should follow up any referrals if they do not receive a response in a timely manner and escalate concerns using local procedures if they disagree with decisions made by other agencies. It is essential that there is tenacious follow-up if children are at risk and school staff and leaders should feel empowered to continue to raise concerns if needed.

 

Final thoughts

As I emphasised at the beginning, much of the above can pertain to a wide range of harms and highlights examples of effective safeguarding practice that could apply across the board. However, it is important not to lose sight of the distinct forms of abuse (in this case, physical abuse), particularly in regular staff training and in understanding some of the behavioural and physical signs that a child may be experiencing this type of harm. Schools may not always be able to prevent it from happening, but effective safeguarding practice will put staff and leaders in the best possible position to identify and quickly respond to any concerns of physical abuse to ensure children are protected.

 

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