Restorative Practice
This page outlines how restorative practice and relational engagement inform our work with neurodivergent individuals, focusing on building trust, safety, and meaningful connection within support and justice settings.
Restorative Practice Overview
Restorative practice is fundamentally about the health of our relationships. Instead of focusing solely on rules broken or punishments deserved, it asks: who has been affected, and what do they need to move forward? It creates an accessible space where every voice is heard and valued.
By prioritising dialogue and personal accountability, we move away from a culture of blame toward one of understanding and repair. This approach ensures that individuals take responsibility for their actions while being supported to resolve conflict in a way that is meaningful for everyone involved.
In justice and support settings, this builds a foundation of trust and safety. It establishes predictable, respectful environments where restorative conversations can happen naturally, fostering a stronger sense of communal belonging and shared agency.
The Heart of Restorative Work: Relational Engagement
Relational engagement isn’t just a step in the process; it is the foundation that makes restorative practice possible. By focusing on safety, trust, and connection, we create the necessary environment for people to participate meaningfully, reflect on impact, and take accountability.
- Building Trust: Establishing transparency and predictability to bridge communication gaps.
- Creating Safety: Ensuring emotional and psychological safety for honest, vulnerable dialogue.
- Collaborative Approach: Empowering individuals by involving them in decisions that affect their lives.
- Meaningful Connection: Moving beyond institutional barriers to see the person behind the label.
- Mutual Accountability: Rooting change in a sense of responsibility to others rather than just rules.
How the Project Works: Restorative Mapping to Enable Engagement
Circles Inside uses a structured engagement model that maps specific restorative principles and processes against commonly observed neurodivergent traits. This approach recognises that disengagement from the prison regime is often a response to unmet need, misunderstanding, or lack of clarity, rather than unwillingness to engage.
Rather than relying on compliance-based expectations, the project focuses on creating the conditions in which engagement is possible and sustainable. Restorative practice provides a clear, relational framework that supports predictability, clarity, and self-agency, which are critical for neurodivergent individuals navigating custodial environments.
Fair Process as the Foundation for Engagement
A core principle underpinning delivery is fair process, which emphasises:
- Engagement – involving individuals meaningfully rather than instructing them
- Explanation – ensuring people understand what is happening and why
- Expectation clarity – making expectations explicit, predictable and achievable
For neurodivergent individuals, unclear expectations, unexplained decisions and inconsistent communication can quickly lead to withdrawal or refusal. Applying fair process consistently supports trust, reduces anxiety, and increases willingness to participate in activities and services across the prison regime.
Understanding Behaviour as Communication of Unmet Need
The project explicitly frames behaviours that are often labelled as ‘negative’ or ‘non-compliant’ as potential expressions of unmet need. This includes needs relating to emotional regulation, communication, sensory overload, processing time, or perceived injustice.
Delivery is informed by an understanding of the Compass of Shame, recognising that shame responses such as withdrawal, avoidance, anger, or blame can be amplified for neurodivergent individuals in custodial settings. Rather than escalating responses, facilitators use restorative approaches to:
- slow interactions down
- reduce perceived threat
- support reflection and re-engagement
This framing supports sustained engagement by reducing cycles of disengagement, exclusion and escalation.
Mapping Restorative Principles and Processes to Engagement Needs
The project uses a defined set of restorative processes and skills, applied both proactively and responsively, to support engagement. Examples include:
- Anxiety, withdrawal, isolation → Check-in / check-out; consistent relational contact – builds familiarity, predictability and trust
- Difficulty processing information → Explanation and expectation clarity – reduces confusion and supports participation
- Emotional dysregulation → Restorative enquiry; paced dialogue – supports regulation and reflection
- Sensitivity to power and authority → Working with, not for or to (social discipline window) – reduces resistance and withdrawal
- Shame responses (withdrawal, anger) → Compass of Shame awareness; non-judgemental response – prevents escalation and supports re-engagement
- Group anxiety or fear of participation → Circles with clear structure and turn-taking – enables safe participation and voice
- Conflict or rupture → Restorative meetings (proactive or reactive) – repairs relationships and supports continued engagement
These processes are not used as interventions or corrective tools, but as engagement mechanisms that enable individuals to remain connected to activities, education and support services within custody.
Proactive and Reactive Use of Restorative Processes
Restorative processes are used both proactively and reactively to sustain engagement over time:
- proactively – to establish safety, clarity and routine before difficulties arise
- reactively – to repair relationships and support re-engagement following moments of difficulty
This flexibility is essential for sustaining engagement, particularly for individuals whose needs and capacity for participation may fluctuate over time.
Key Principles of Restorative Practice
These core principles inform all our relational work with neurodivergent individuals in justice and support settings.
Curiosity not Judgment
Approaching situations with a desire to understand rather than to label or punish, fostering genuine insight.
Collaboration
Working together with individuals to find solutions that work for everyone involved, ensuring sustainability.
Safety and Predictability
Creating environments and processes that feel secure, consistent, and easy to navigate for all individuals.
Voice and Choice
Ensuring individuals have a genuine say in the processes that affect their lives, promoting empowerment.
Repair over Blame
Focusing on how to make things right rather than who is at fault, prioritizing relationship building and trust.
Respect for Neurodivergent Communication
Valuing and adapting to different ways of expressing and processing information with patience and empathy.
Relational Accountability
Being responsible to one another within the context of supportive relationships to drive meaningful change.