Training transcript

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A video about what Early Support training offers to practitioners and families.

Headteacher, Oakleigh School, Barnet
"Training was central to getting everybody on board, everybody hearing in a multi-agency way, hearing the same messages, so that we all knew collectively together that it was, how we were going to implement it in Barnet, how we would work, and developing an appropriate training package for all professionals is probably the key thing that I found myself doing."

Sure Start Manager (SEN and Disability), Hertfordshire County Council
"What's important about Early Support training is that it helps you with that change of hearts and minds stuff, it helps you with thinking, 'actually what are the real benefits of placing the family at the centre of our planning and how do we do that and what is a helpful relationship?'. Many of those things are probably there in most of the early years practitioners, but the training helps to make those explicit to make them implicit and also we've done it in partnership with each other."

Consultant Paediatrician, GEM Centre, Wolverhampton
"As part of the key worker training, you learn about lots of things you wouldn't learn about normally, such as benefits, which ones to apply for, other people's roles as well, in a lot more detail, and it gives you a much better understanding of what other people do and what there is out there to support families."

Specialist Team Manager, Barnet Children's Service
"We also give people some training in the areas they felt less comfortable in, which is particularly chairing team around the child meetings and filling in the paperwork. And I think that because they have all done the training first, people go out to be a key worker with confidence."

Training Consultant, Early Support
"Practitioners have said they have had light bulb moments; some of those light bulb moments have been quite difficult, actually, for some practitioners, thinking, 'Oh I have been working for the last twenty-five years, in a way that doesn't work'. And it's trying to help practitioners to see that that's not the case, it's not that they have been working for the last twenty-five years in a way that hasn't worked, it has worked very well, but maybe all they need to do is think about what would work even better. And what would work even better is involving families as partners in this work.

Each of them has, the practitioners and families, will bring complimentary expertise to improving the lives of the children. And it's making sure that that does, the two elements of the expertise, do compliment each other, and that's what the training does, that's what practitioners have told us that training can do for them."

Parent Trainer
"As parent trainers we started out delivering a parent's slot within Early Support training. We moved on from there to become an approved trainer and work independently, and now offer the full range of Early Support courses, and other, nationally approved courses besides."

Key Worker Co-ordinator, City of York Children and Families Services
"We have parents attending training that we deliver to professionals and their presence was absolutely vital because their contribution to the discussion really made the training. And we had parents speaking at the training, giving their story of what it was like for them in the early days of having a young child with a disability."

Training Consultant, Early Support
"Training of any sort is very important if you want to make any changes. You want people to be in a position so they know what they're doing, why they're doing it, and training can do that."

Parent Trainer
"Parents workshops were designed to give parents that extra confidence to understand the system that they find themselves in, to understand the new language, and to sit at the same table as the other practitioners and to feel that, 'Yes, I am an equal partner'. The whole ethos of Early Support supports that for parents that whole confidence giving."

Thanks to the professionals who helped with the making of this film:

Jenny Grindley, Headteacher Oakleigh School, Barnet
Linda Fisher, Sure Start Manager (SEN and Disability), Hertfordshire County Council
Cathy Higgins, Consultant Paediatrician, GEM Centre, Wolverhampton
Barbara Ball, Specialist Team Manager, Barnet Children's Service
Kim Bevan, Training Consultant, Early Support
Kim Wooddissee, Parent Trainer
Marion Cavan, Key Worker Co-ordinator, City of York Children and Families Services

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