• mixed family with social worker

    Commission Us - Reducing Parental Conflict

Home is where the hurt is but school is where it shows: recognising & managing signs of inter-parental conflict within primary & secondary schools.

NEW Half-day and full-day workshops for primary and secondary school teachers, educational support staff and counsellors.

To enquire about this workshop, please contact: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Evidence reviewed by the Early Intervention Foundation shows that young people who are exposed to conflict between their parents that is frequent, intense and poorly resolved are likely to suffer increased levels of anxiety, depression and aggression; in addition, they may struggle to achieve at school.

Understanding and learning how to recognise and respond to young people’s distress, as well as how to engage with parents affected by relationship difficulties, is therefore crucial if we are to protect their children’s mental health and promote their well-being.

Schools and teachers have been identified by the Early Intervention Foundation as an important access point for detecting young people’s difficulties relating to inter-parental conflict within the home, particularly as it is often manifested in problematic behaviour and adverse social relationships within the school environment.

The Government has recently announced plan to roll-out mental health first aid training in secondary schools; this training will not however include a focus on impact of inter-parental conflict on children, even though a survey of over 42,000 children being seen in Children and Young People's IAPT services has shown that 'family relationships problems' are the biggest single presenting factor, being implicated in over 50% of referrals. This new workshop's focus on the impact of inter-parental conflict on children is therefore timely and will be an important complement to the Government's training. 

This half-day or full-day workshop is specifically designed to:

    • help staff better recognise the signs of inter-parental conflict, as well as learn how to respond to and engage children and their parents affected by it;   
    • enable school teachers, educational support staff and counsellors to gain a fuller understanding of the nature of inter-parental conflict and expand their skills in dealing with pastoral issues;
    • show how to limit the negative impact of inter-parental conflict on young people;
    • provide members of staff with opportunities to explore their own particular challenges relating to the impact of inter-parental conflict on children and young people within the school environment.

    The workshop will include material on:

    • the links between inter-parental conflict and children’s mental health and life chances, with particular focus on the impact of how conflict is managed and resolved;
    • understanding the dynamics between couples, including the conscious and unconscious reasons partners choose each other and how their idea about relationships, and their own experience of school, may get re-enacted;
    • looking at how family relationships influence child development;
    • inter-parental conflict and how it affects children;
    • looking at the family/school interaction system;
    • case studies;
    • techniques for working productively with parents.

     

  • Facilitators will include:

    • Honor Rhodes, OBE, Director of Strategic Development, Tavistock Relationships;
    • Dr Damian McCann, Consultant Family & Systemic Psychotherapist & Couple Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist;
    • William Walker, Social Work Consultant to Parents as Partners, and
    • Steve Mulley, Deputy Programme Manager and Groupworker, Parents as Partners.

     

  • ‘This Tavistock Relationships workshop was an urgently useful, practical discussion of how to respond to the fall-out of parental relationship problems. As a teacher and pastoral leader, I now feel better equipped to deal sensitively and productively not only with the children but also with the issues that the parents might bring to meetings or conversations.’

    Verity Smith, Head of House and Teacher (Pastoral), Highgate School

    To enquire about this workshop, please contact: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

    Costs

    Half-day - £500 total fee, max of 10 attendees
    Full-day workshop - £900 total fee, max of 10 attendees
    Venue - the course is delivered on site

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