Protective Behaviours NEWSLETTER
01273 411613 info@safety-net.org.uk www.safety-net.org.uk
Edition 5 Summer 2012 A safety awareness programme to promote safety and well-being for children, young people and families Welcome
Protective Behaviours network meetings
Our aim is to share information, practice and ideas about Protective Behaviours. If you have any examples of how you have been using Protective Behaviours please do email us. This newsletter is produced termly.
The network meetings are a perfect opportunity to get together and share ideas and practice around Protective Behaviours. Our next meeting is on Thursday 18 October:
Protective Behaviours training for health visitors and social work teams
Venue: Valley Social Centre Whitehawk Way Brighton BN2 5HE
The bulk of the trainings for HVs and SW teams have taken place with really good feedback particularly regarding the new Feeling Good Feeling Safe Workbook for one to one work. Hopefully participants now feel equipped to put PBs into practice and we’ll be contacting them over the summer to evaluate effectiveness of the training. Don’t Forget! There are still free PB trainings for anyone working with children & young people in Brighton & Hove. See our website for more details.
Protective Behaviours groups for parents ‘Feeing Good Feeling Safe’ The groups at Tarner, Roundabout and Moulsecoomb Children Centres continue once a term, with really positive feedback. Ofsted inspectors’ recent visits to Tarner and Moulsecoomb were able to talk to participants of a group and also sit in on a group. They and the neighbourhood service managers were very impressed and hopefully this contributed to both children centres’ outstanding ratings! We also have an amazingly inspiring video of 3 mothers talking about what they got out of doing the group, which we are currently editing to use for training, prospective parent attendees and to put on our website.
Time: 10.00 – 1.00 with lunch provided
To book a place, please go to the following link: http://networkmeeting-october.eventbrite.co.uk Sophie Shannon, SEAL and PHSE coordinator from Cedar Centre, will be explaining how PBs is used at the centre with children who have behavioural and learning difficulties. The meeting in June was packed with ideas and info! Charlotte Lench explained how she’d been using PBs in a group with adults from Scope and how she is hoping to develop this work, including doing a dissertation for her social work qualification. Esther Roe, early years visitor from Moulsecoomb talked about her one-to-one PB work with families. Using the new workbook has been helpful but she said that doing the programme in family homes is very different to group work in that it is harder to keep focused and boundaries can be blurred more easily. She has used an interpreter with a Tamil family which added some difficulties around meanings and translations of words such as ‘safe.’ We plan to contact Sussex Interpreting service about PB training for their service.
Protective Behaviours NEWSLETTER Edition 5 Summer 2012 page 2 A safety awareness programme to promote safety and well-being for children, young people and families Participation CYP participation worker, Emma Lacey carried out a community safety consultation at St Andrews Primary School, Hove with 60 children aged 10-11 years of age.
The children had fun drawing and being filmed as part of the consultation. These were shown to Central Hove councillor Andrew Wealls and PCSO Michelle Shepherd who later met with the children to report on how they had responded to their concerns. Action that has been taken includes; ensuring graffiti has been removed from specific areas in Hove and working with St Andrews church and other agencies to positively support street drinkers and the homeless. “I enjoyed the feeling of being heard and people taking action” Child Participant
We would like to thank them and the children for a wonderful project and take this format to other areas. Please email emma.lacey@safetynet.org.uk if you are interested.
The children’s concerns included; seeing street drinking and smoking, witnessing drug dealing, empty properties, street lighting, illegal graffiti, homeless people and van dwellers and dark alleyways. “You don’t know if they are a sensible drinker and have just had one or two or have had lots of alcohol and could shout at you”.
SNAP for Friendship A group of students from Hove Park School recently took part in SNAP (Safety Net Assertiveness Programme) sessions, adapting the techniques such as early warning signs, stop think go, helping hands and how to be assertive, with a specific focus on how to deal with friendship issues. Their top tips for other young people when dealing with friendship Issues are:
Be calm not aggressive if you argue with friends. It’s up to you who to be friends with! Don’t break up with friends just because other people told you to Be true to yourself! Think about all your options before you act! Use ‘I’ statements (I feel…) Excellent Advice