21st May 2012

• The Challenging Behaviour Foundation is currently offering FREE school-based training workshops on understanding and managing challenging behaviour. These are aimed at professionals (special school staff, short breaks providers etc.) and families caring for children with severe learning disabilities. The workshops are also suitable for those caring for children with autism and moderate to severe learning difficulties, but would NOT be relevant for those caring for children and young people with Aspergers/High-Functioning Autism.

  The training is delivered through two 4-hour workshops delivered by a professional trainer and a family carer co-trainer. In the first workshop, families and professionals learn to “understand challenging behaviour” in two separate groups. The second workshop brings the two groups together. In between the two workshops, everyone is given “homework”. In the second workshop, everyone shares their “homework” through discussion to create positive behaviour support plans for the children they have in common. Schools often use an inset day for workshop 1a (staff only), then workshop 1b (families only) usually happens the following day, and workshop 2 is about 4 weeks later (where both staff and families come together) so as many of the school staff as possible come along to that.

  Parents wishing to initiate training at their child’s school can email training@thecbf.org.uk or ring 01634 838739 and ask for Helen or Carina. They can then get information to share with their child’s school. You can also follow this link to go to the Challenging Behaviour Foundation website.

  Ideally, the workshops should be delivered in schools so that everyone involved in supporting the child can work together to support the child consistently. However, if parents struggle to get schools on board, then the Sheffield Parent Carer Forum would be able to host the training for parents only. Please contact us to register your interest.