Loud and Proud about continuing to deliver mandatory training despite COVID-19

During the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve been continuing to ensure that our children and young people achieve the best possible outcomes. A key part of our ethos is training and development, and our Learning and Development team have worked hard to ensure that our staff receive their mandatory training and continue with their professional development.

All of our teams have been working incredibly hard to ensure ‘business as usual’ continues within the ‘new normal’. We are particularly proud that our Learning and Development team were able to facilitate our Positive Proactive Approaches course via video-conferencing tool, Zoom, in conjunction with our training partner, Simon Gower, from Clearsight Training. We are loud and proud that all of our residential and education staff who took part in the training passed with flying colours.

Positive Proactive Approaches training is a key element to the Attachment and Trauma-Informed Care model which Five Rivers devised, combining our Residential, Education and Assessment & Therapy service to truly make a difference to children and young people. The training is specifically trauma and attachment-informed, helping staff to identify, understand and respond confidently to behaviour that might challenge. It incorporates PACE (Playfulness, Acceptance, Curiosity and Empathy), and empowers staff to become inquisitive about children’s behaviour, considering it from a different perspective or context such as an unmet need or an attachment or trauma issue.

The training was well-received by all attendees, with one new starter commenting: “Although I haven’t started in my setting yet, this feels like the most relevant training course I’ve ever done. All of the topics covered were extremely useful and relevant, with fabulous examples to illustrate meaning and workable strategies for tough situations we might find ourselves in”.

Deputy Head of Residential, Chris Newman, said “It’s been great to see how quickly we were able to find alternatives to face-to-face training. We’re committed to ensuring that our staff have a strong basis on which to work with our children and young people, and offering a full training calendar helps to support them to deal with all sorts of situations and needs with knowledge of confidence.”