We hope you are going OK at this time. Thank you for the care and support you are providing fostering/kinship families and the children in their homes, as well as all the families in your churches and schools. So much work is going into changing the way programs are delivered, ensuring children and their carers/parents have access to new programs and understand them. As you would be aware, the children in our foster and kinship families, may be suffering more than most now. They are children that thrive on routine, structure, and familiar people, all of which are not present right now. For carers, access to respite care, babysitting, allied health, and childcare are also not available, so carers are working doubly hard to support the children in their homes. We encourage you to reach out to these families at this time and check in on them, a friendly phone call, bunch of flowers, or encouraging note could make a huge difference. Currently many organisations are offering trauma information, training, and resources for free. We have pulled these together for you and hope they are helpful for you, your leaders, other staff, and families in need.
FREE Trust Based Relational Intervention and Trauma-Informed Classroom Training
The Trust Based Relationship Intervention (TBRI) is (in my opinion) one of the best trauma training around the world! It was developed by Dr Karyn Purvis a foster mum, mum, grandmum, and respected developmental psychologist. TBRI training focuses on healing harmed children by earning their trust and building deep emotional connections to anchor and empower them.
Both the digital TBRI training and the training for Trauma-Informed Classrooms are currently free for the month of May. The training is designed to equip educators to help children from backgrounds of abuse, neglect and/or trauma to turn their classrooms into places that disarm fear, optimise learning and facilitate healing.
The four-part training will cover,
Trauma and the Brain: The impact of trauma at school
Empowering Our Students: Meeting physical needs
Connecting in the Classroom: Creating relationships that matter
Correcting Behaviour: Rethinking classroom management
You can access this free training below
Covid-19 Posters and Stories for Kids The Commonwealth Department of Health developed many great posters, infographics, and stories for children about COVID-19. If you are looking for resources to put around your church, school, or workplace you can access them all for free here: https://www.health.gov.au/resources Covid-19 Resources from the Australian Childhood Foundation The Australian Childhood Foundation (ACF) have developed some beautiful, fun, and friendly resources, booklets, information, and practical activities for families, educators and children. These are all available for free on its website, I recommend looking at the picture books "Many ways to share a hug", "Betrand the Bored", and "Matilda and Theo" to name a couple! They are also offering much of their training at discounted prices at this time. https://www.childhood.org.au/covid-19/ Emerging Minds Emerging Minds is a brilliant organisation that does research and provides information to the community on working with vulnerable children, families and communities. Most of their online training is free and of great quality. They are also quite short, so you can hop on and get some great information in an hour! The courses are available at: https://emergingminds.com.au/training/online-training/ Dr Nadine Burke Harris – Adverse Childhood Experiences We can also never go past Paediatrician, Dr Nadine Burke Harris’ TED Talk on Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). This brilliant talk explains how repeated stress of abuse, neglect, and parents struggling with mental health or substance abuse issues has real, tangible effects on the development of the brain and this unfolds across a lifetime. This talk is an impassioned plea to the medical fraternity, but really to all of us to understand the needs of these kids in our churches, classrooms and communities. https://www.ted.com/talks/nadine_burke_harris_how_childhood_trauma_affects_health_across_a_lifetime Book Review In each of these information newsletters we will review a book! There are so many out there, so please email us any that you have found particularly helpful in your work. Today we am starting with an oldy, but one that created a foundation of hope for our work and message that despite where a child comes from, a loving adult in their life will make a difference, even if it is a tiny one. "The Boy Who Was Raised by a Dog" by child psychiatrist Dr Bruce Perry. Dr Perry treated children faced with unimaginable horror and in this book he tells their stories of trauma and transformation. He explains what happens to the brain when children are exposed to extreme stress and trauma and reveals innovative ways we can all ease their pain so they can grow into healthy adults. Warning, the stories are tragic, but the lessons of courage humanity and hope are incredible and, we hope, encouraging in the important work you do.
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We hope you found this information useful and you have time to access these great resources and ideas. Please let us know if there are any others you find helpful that we can share in our next information newsletter.
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