Keeping your child in mind (Reducing parental conflict)

Keeping Your Child in Mind is a programme that has been developed by Family Links specifically to work with parents or carers who have either different parenting styles, changes or breakdowns in relationships.  It aims to help the parents or carers understand how their relationships impact on their children and how working with positive, respectful communication you can support children and reduce the impact.

This two-day training course is for practitioners who wish to be able to support parents to focus on relationships within the family. In particular, the influence of parental relationships on children when there might be conflict or tension.

There is no cost for this training. We ask that you utilise the programme via delivery to parents at least once a year over the next 3 years and provide us with basic information about the number of parents supported each quarter along with data and analysis. There will be a service level agreement and we will assist you with:

• documents
• promotion
• planning
• supervision
• evaluating

We would also ask that all feedback/evaluations be shared with us.

Dates and times

Courses will be added once available.

All sessions will run from 9am to 4:30pm. 

Booking

For more information, or to book your place contact Megan Beasley on 07824 321996 or email megan.beasley@buckinghamshire.gov.uk. 

What's covered in the course

The key aims of the sessions are to support parenting through developing the relationship between parents/carers and children by:

• Exploring the importance of positive relationships within families.
• Developing parents’ understanding of the importance of the 4 constructs to support their parenting.
• Developing parents’ understanding of the impact of their interpersonal relationships on children and young people.
• Promoting positive approaches to reducing parental conflict.
• Providing an opportunity for parents to share their experiences with others.

On completion of this training, you will be able to:

• Demonstrate group facilitation skills.
• Outline the impact of adult relationships on children and young people.
• Relate this to appropriate parenting styles, skills and strategies.
• Describe the importance of the Family Links 4 constructs to support parenting.
• Deliver the Keeping your Child in Mind programme to groups of parents and/or in one-to-one sessions with parents.

Training for professionals to deliver the Nurturing Programme and other courses to parents and carers. 

The Public Health Service, Local Authority and Centre for Emotional Health are partnering to provide extensive training and support. This training is for professionals working on the front line with parents in Buckinghamshire. This three-year project aims to improve the early support for parents on their:

• parenting
• family relationships
• emotional well-being

This offer is open to everyone who signs up to the Family Hub Network.

Buckinghamshire have been delivering support using this evidence base since 2019. Further information can be found on the Centre for Emotional Health website.

The Nurturing Programme (for parents and carers) 

The key elements of The Nurturing Programme are the four constructs to:

1. develop the understanding of emotional literacy
2. support emotional regulation

These four key elements are:

• self-awareness
• appropriate discipline
• appropriate expectation
• empathy.

These Programmes are delivered over 10 weeks to parents and carers of primary-aged children. Each week, sessions cover different topics such as:

• praise
• time to calm down
• managing conflict
• improving communication

The Nurturing Programme is evidence-based and universal, connecting and building trusting relationships. It is a relational programme which focuses on:

• strengths
• partnership and supporting personal power
• our emotional strength to get our needs met and make choices in our lives.

The course understands the impact of trauma. It applies this understanding to the facilitation of all Nurturing Programme groups and to the training to deliver these. All the parent groups are facilitated by two Parent Group Leaders. They are both trained by The Centre for Emotional Health in the specific programme.

Benefits for staff

Trained staff will become confident in the facilitation and delivery of the course values and content.  It will upskill staff to build relationships with families and provide consistent approaches to aid families’ needs and work with children.

Emotional literacy ethos is key to supporting emotional regulation and development in our children and young people.  This is the centre of the course content. Skills learned can be transferred to everyday tasks. These skills can help staff interact with children, young people and their families.

Peer supervision groups will support staff with delivery and create a key network of support. These are delivered over Microsoft Teams once a term.

How the training works

1. There is no cost to the training. If a place on the course is cancelled under 2 weeks before the course is due to run, full payment will be required.
2. A service level agreement will be signed to agree the following:
   1. One group to be delivered per year.
   2. Evaluation data is recorded from attendees and facilitators and shared with us. (You will be provided with documentation to complete this).
3. Training is face-to-face over 4 days. The training runs from 9am to 4.30pm. Attending in person is mandatory. Training includes the parent group leader training and the Nurturing Programme training.
4. Once the 4-day training is completed, there is an option to attend 1-day training on other parenting programmes such as:
   1. Talking Teens
   2. Keeping your Child in Mind
5. There will be several cohorts over the 2 years, with 16 places per cohort.

Training dates

Current training dates available are:

Course 1 (2025)

• 25 June
• 26 June
• 2 July
• 3 July

Course 2 (2025)

• 16 September 
• 17 September 
• 23 September 
• 24 September 

Future training dates will be made available. 

Book a place

To book your place or find out more information, contact Lisa Ratcliff at Lisa.Ratcliff@buckinghamshire.gov.uk.