Our fifth annual Inclusion Matters conference continues an exploration of Resilience, focusing on the themes of ‘connectedness’ and ‘belonging’. We have brought together a range of practitioners to talk about the many ways in which schools can foster a sense of belonging, helping children and young people to understand their place in the world and enhance their resilience.
“The more that families, schools and communities can do to promote these principles in their everyday interactions the less likely they will need therapy” (David Trickey, Professional Responses to Potentially Traumatic Events, Manchester, July 2017)
THIS EVENT IS FULLY BOOKED
Programme for the day
08:45 – 9:30 Registration
Tea, coffee and Danish Pastries served on arrival in the Nave
09:30 – 12:45 Morning session
Resilience and Belonging: Universal Approaches
Helping children to understand their place in the world is a powerful protective factor. Schools have an important role to play in helping children to make sense of where they have come from: find somewhere they belong and learn how to form and sustain healthy relationships.
Conference will open with presentations from Barlow Hall Primary School and Longsight Community Primary School, local schools who have reached out into their communities in different ways and who have community values at the centre of their vision.
Keynote address: Anne Rathbone, Senior Training and Consultancy Manager, Boingboing-Resilience CIC
Anne Rathbone has 25 years experience in participatory approaches with young people in planning, commissioning and delivery of young people’s services and in participatory research. A final year part time PhD student with Professor Angie Hart at University of Brighton, who, with Lisa Williams, co-developed the Academic Resilience Approach and subsequent practical, evidenced resilience approaches. Anne’s work in Boingboing includes delivery of the Academic Resilience Approach training and co production of the Mental Health Guide for Schools - a resilience-based, whole school approach in partnership with East Sussex County Council.
Title: Promoting resilience through a whole school approach
This presentation will provide an overview of the Resilience Framework (Hart & Blincow, 2007) with a particular focus on the role of belonging in the development of resilience. It will explore how the Framework can be used to promote pupil resilience, via the Academic Resilience Approach (ARA). A whole school approach, underpinned by principles of pupil engagement, the ARA promotes evidence-based practice that integrates belonging and pupil voice as part of a holistic, asset based response to the increasing challenges to mental health and emotional wellbeing for young people.
11:15 Break
Tea/coffee and biscuits served in the Nave
11:45 Seminars (choose 1)
Seminar 1: Anne Rathbone, Senior Training and Consultancy Manager, Boingboing-Resilience CIC
Blackpool’s Resilience Revolution (This seminar is now fully booked)
This seminar will draw on the example of HeadStart Blackpool to illustrate the potential impact of a whole town approach to promoting resilience. Blackpool schools are at the centre of HeadStart’s “Resilience Revolution” (based on the resilience work of Prof. Angie Hart, University of Brighton). Practical examples of schools engagement in the Resilience Revolution will be explored. With practical examples of resilient impact, we will look at the potential for schools involvement in an area wide approach to transform the lives of children and young people, families and communities.
Seminar 2: Children’s rights within their educational assessment – how well are we doing?
Professor Kevin Woods, Research Co-ordinator, Manchester Institute of Education and Director of Doctorate in Educational and Child Psychology, University of Manchester, together with Joanne Williams and Leanne Taft
Kevin Woods is an educational psychologist and works at Manchester University as director of professional training in educational psychology.
There is continued interest in supporting the promotion of children’s rights in schools, but how does this look when it comes to assessment? To what extent does, or can, our current assessment practices (e.g. for SATs, GCSEs) promote children’s rights? Drawing on recent research, Kevin offers some ideas for how we might think about promoting children’s rights in assessment at school.
Jo Williams is a trainee educational psychologist in her final year of the doctorate in educational and child psychology at the University of Manchester, working in the City of York's Educational Psychology Service. She is passionate about children's rights, promoting mental health and supporting evidenced-based practice in schools.
"7 ways in which a children's rights-based approach supports resilience in schools and 7 ways to make it successful." Jo will present evidence that rights-based approaches can support schools to deliver positive outcomes for students and teachers.
Leanne Jackson Taft is a current Trainee Educational Psychologist at the University of Manchester and previously worked in secondary education. Her research and practitioner interests include children’s rights and the contribution of school psychologists to supporting community cohesion. The session will discuss ways in which Educational Psychologists and schools might develop their work to promote community cohesion.
Seminar 3: Building relationships with parents to enable resilience and well being
Emma Beresford, Director, Parental Engagement Network CIC
Emma has over 30 years experience of innovative work with parents as a teacher, a governor and a consultant for Manchester City Council. Over the past 7 years she has developed the Parental Engagement Network – a dynamic, specialist social enterprise supporting schools locally and nationally to develop their parental engagement through networks, training courses, funded projects, research and high quality resources . Evidence of the impact of PEN’s projects has recently been highlighted by a report produced by Oxford University as a result of a 3 year research project with the Sutton Trust and Esmee Fairbairn Foundation.
This workshop will bring together PEN’s experience of helping schools engage parents to promote well being and resilience particularly at points of transition . This includes developing relationships as children start primary school through the “mouse club” and home learning projects and supporting families as they leave primary school and start secondary school through the “Moving Up” project. Drawing on the result of our research project we will look at how schools can :
- Help build community and “belonging” for children and parents through peer networks of support
- Enable parents and children to do fun home activities together which can help to develop confidence, self-esteem, independence, and learning
- Provide information, support and modelling for parents to empower them and give them confidence to support their child’s healthy development.
Seminar 4: Creating a sense of school belonging for vulnerable pupils - how are we doing?
Dr Catherine Kelly, Dr Holly Craggs and Leanne Greenwood
Dr Catherine Kelly is a Professional and Academic Tutor at the University of Manchester and Senior Educational Psychologist, Bury Metropolitan Council
Dr Holly Craggs is an educational psychologist with a research interest in school belonging and managed moves.
Leanne Greenwood is a trainee educational psychologist with a research interest in school belonging and looked after children.
The social and academic benefits for pupils of a sense of belonging at school have been established but less is known about how this key protective factor is fostered, particularly for vulnerable pupils. How do schools create a sense of belonging for their pupils and what practices benefit more vulnerable pupils? Drawing on recent research, this seminar will suggest some ideas for how we might think about a sense of school belonging and how it can be promoted.
12:45 Lunch
Chef’s Choice 2 course buffet lunch
1:30 – 4:00 Afternoon session
Resilience and Belonging: Targeted Approaches
Keynote address: David Trickey, Clinical Psychologist, Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families
David Trickey is a leading Consultant Clinical Psychologist who has specialised in working with traumatised children, young people and their families since 2000. He continues to focus on direct clinical work and the supervision of other clinicians working with traumatised children and young people. He regularly offers training and consultation, he presents at international conferences, and he supervises doctoral research. He acts as an expert advisor to the police and as an expert witness in civil and criminal cases in the area of children and trauma. He is a tutor on the Core Skills Module of the London and South East CYP-IAPT course at UCL & KCL. In all of his roles he draws heavily on the published research literature, to which he has made a minor contribution.
Keynote: Professional Responses to Potentially Traumatic Events.
This presentation will describe Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and how it manifests in children and young people. It will then consider how the research-evidence can inform the response of professionals following potentially traumatic events, with a particular emphasis on what this might look like in the very real-world setting of schools.
2:35 Seminars (choose 1)
Seminar 5: What Makes a Traumatic Event Traumatic (This seminar is now fully booked)
David Trickey, Clinical Psychologist, Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families
This seminar will use the Cognitive Model of PTSD as a framework for understanding how children and young people are traumatised by events. It will describe how memories for traumatic events are different from memories for other events, and how these traumatic memories together with the lasting meaning of events can continue to cause children and young people distress and difficulty long after the events have ended.
Seminar 6: Building a place of Belonging; from board to delivery
Monika Neall, Impact Consultant, The Pebble
Monika Neall is an Impact Consultant and Coach. She works with organisations to help them make a bigger difference. Monika has designed training and consultancy to connect ideas to strategy and outcomes. She is the Chair of Governors at Alma Park Primary School and is a parent governor representative on Manchester City Council’s Children and Young People’s Scrutiny Committee.
Proactive ways for us to embed “belonging” into school policy and practice: "Sources of belonging double as sources of resilience, so for children who don't have that sense of belonging through trauma, violence, instability etc, this affects their core resilience. This seminar will explore the fact that schools can proactively become a place of belonging and consider how we as schools can find strategic ways to help find better solutions."
Seminar 7: Addressing the needs of international newly arrived children and families.
Dr Iyabo Fatimilehin, Director, Just Psychology CIC
Iyabo Fatimilehin is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and director of Just Psychology CIC, a social enterprise she co-founded in 2011 to address the psychological and mental health needs of children, adults and families with an emphasis on cultural competence, cultural diversity and social justice. Previously, she worked in the NHS for over 20 years and was service lead for an award-winning specialist CAMH service for BME children and families for several years. She works as a trainer, therapist, and consultant and provides expert witness assessments for the family courts. Iyabo has published journal articles and book chapters on issues of race, culture and ethnicity in relation to working with Black and minority ethnic children and their families and speaks regularly at national and international conferences. Iyabo is an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, has chartered status, and is a registered practitioner psychologist with the Health and Care Professions Council.
This seminar will focus on the key issues and experiences of children who have arrived in the UK in recent years. It will address issues of culture and migration and how these affect child development and family functioning. It will explore the ways that schools can respond effectively and sensitively to the needs of these children and their families whilst promoting inclusion and valuing diversity.
Seminar 8: Canine Assisted Learning (therapy dogs in schools)
Vickie Plumer, Director, Canine Assisted Learning
Canine-Assisted Learning provides animal-assisted intervention, activities and support to both educational and private environments. Our highly trained assistance dogs and therapists have a wealth of experience working with young people with special educational needs along with mainstream students. We take pride in the professional, unique service we offer and aim to be the leaders in Animal Assisted Interventions in schools in the UK. We are a member of the Society for Companion Animal Studies and we fully comply with their codes of practice.
Please note that Vickie's highly trained dogs will be attending this session
3:30 Plenary Tea/coffee and mini cakes served in the Nave
