Trauma informed Practice Training and Support – Early Start

We were commissioned to provide trauma informed training to staff in the family contact centre. The centre provides supervised and supported contacts for children and families in LB Newham. staff consisted of experienced social workers and contact supervisors with backgrounds in Social Care, Early Intervention, Family Support, Early Years, Fostering and Youth Work.

This training and support was hugely relevant to this group of staff as we know that people who have had their child or children removed have often experienced trauma themselves, many remain unresolved and unprocessed. They then have to cope with the loss of having a child removed and the shame, guilt, anger and stigma associated with that.

The training had the following learning outcomes:

• Understand what Trauma Informed Practice is.
• Understand the values and principles that underlie Trauma Informed Practice.
• Understand the four principles of TIP – Recognise, Respond, avoid Re traumatisation, build Resilience.
• Understand how Adverse Childhood Experiences contribute to the need for Trauma Informed Practice.
• Consider the behaviours that practitioners see in children, young people and families that they work with and reflect on the underlying needs
• Understand and appreciate the relevance of SAMHSA’s six key principles of a trauma informed approach.
• Explore the key principles which support a trauma informed approach (empathy, trust, collaboration, safety, empowerment) and consider what Early Start do to promote/support these
• Recognise the positive impact of demonstrating unconditional positive regard
• Understand how to articulate knowledge and understanding in your practice & report writing
• A follow up day was provided to take this a step further with the following outcomes:
  • Understand secondary and vicarious trauma and the impact that this has on staff and the wider organisation
  • Explore how to respond to it and prevent secondary and vicarious stress
  • Explore the concept of resilience and consider what supports building resilience in our clients and ourselves
  • Understand what promotes recovery and your role in this (as well as boundaries around your role)
  • Practice skills in applying unconditional positive regard in creating and promoting excellent relationships with the client and how to transfer this skill to working across professionals
  • Explore the use of language using a trauma informed lens and consider what this means for the Early Start Group
  • Consider how to apply a Trauma Informed approach in supervision and case management.
  • Knowledge related to being trauma aware when planning & preparing for sessions.
  • Action plans for self and service/setting.

 This really made me think about children and families through a different lens.

I really took a lot from the video clips and group discussions.

The group work on what fight/flight/freeze look like was particularly helpful