Therapeutic care England : HOMES

Our foster families give children the love, care and stability they desperately need. Our fostering HOMES framework aims to build supportive homes for children who have experienced trauma and loss.

HOMES

H: Helping to build and maintain connections

We recognise that relationships and a sense of belonging within the fostering system is integral for young people, foster carers and the fostering team.

We aim to develop trusting, compassionate relationships and provide a high level of attuned, sensitive recommendations to support this process. One of the core principles of the framework is that foster carers, alongside the young person, are at the centre of the intervention.

We help foster carers to recognise the key role they have in developing the environment and relationships that can manage risk. This will then help the young person to feel safe and facilitate change.

O: Outcomes focused and evidence-based

We recognise the importance of ensuring that the service we provide is regularly evaluated and outcomes are monitored.

We capture each young person’s individual journey from the onset, measuring and monitoring areas of strength and difficulty, to ensure that Therapeutic Action Plans can be tailored accordingly. Such outcomes allow us to work towards realistic, collaborative goals, to notice change and to record evidence of overall therapeutic progress. This provides a forum to celebrate achievements and success.

M: Making sense together

From the onset, we aim to adopt a collaborative, curious approach when understanding our young people and their journey. To facilitate this, we value working closely with other professionals and agencies in order to develop a shared understanding of the young person.

We promote strong systems of communication, with a consistent plan and agreed way of supporting the young person. This approach can then create an inclusive, partnership way of working.

E: Empowerment and ‘working with’

We adopt a person-centred approach, where we work alongside our foster carers as a team. We aim to reduce inherent power imbalances with our foster carers, young people and staff; ensuring that communication is clear, honest and transparent and they're involved in decision-making processes.

It's important that we listen to the voices of our young people and foster carers, enabling them to collaboratively set realistic aims and expectations for their young person and the ongoing therapeutic work. This may include having ‘tough conversations’ at times and supporting other professionals to do this where appropriate.

In addition, we encourage our young people to be part of their care planning/Therapeutic Action Plan and support this process in an innovative and creative manner.

S: Safe, stable base

Action for Children Fostering recognises the importance of a nurturing, stable, safe environment for our young people, foster carers and staff. We understand that stability and security within an attachment relationship is fundamental for a young person’s emotional and social development.

We aim to welcome our young people into supportive, stable home environments. Providing a safe, stable base is also the crucial foundation needed to develop trusting and meaningful relationships in the future.

The team

Our multi-disciplinary team all work directly with the young person to support their Therapeutic Action Plan.

All of our staff are trained in attachment and developmental trauma and multiple therapeutic techniques such as PACE (Playfulness, Acceptance, Curiosity, Empathy). This aligns perfectly with our ethos of ‘connection before correction’ which promotes an understanding of the young person and their views on the situation before attempting correction.

Therapeutic training: HOMES

We make sure our foster carers are fully informed about the child or young person they will be caring for.

We know fostering is a big decision and understand that everyone’s situation is different. We’re here if you want to chat, ask questions or learn more.

Action for Children is a proud member of The Fairer Fostering Partnership, a group of charitable and not-for-profit fostering agencies who work tirelessly for children.

Learn more about The Fairer Fostering Partnership

At Action for Children Fostering, we provide safe, stable, supportive homes for children and young people who have a history of attachment disruption, abuse, neglect and trauma.

“We believe it's really important to ensure that our foster carers are fully equipped to deal with children in their care that may have complex needs as a result of trauma.”

Action for Children Fostering social worker

Our aim

We aim to provide safe and stable homes, where young people feel listened to and trusted.

We believe that it’s important to empower our foster carers, work collaboratively with them and involve them in decision-making, ensuring that they have the necessary resources and skills to meet the needs of the children and young people they care for.

We aim to establish joint goals and a common understanding through open, transparent communication, to respect the views of others and to ensure a learning culture and celebrate success.

Shared understanding

By developing a shared understanding of the young person, we provide a tailored plan to support their needs and build upon their strengths. The children and young people that we support have often had life experiences resulting in:

developmental trauma
histories of attachment disruption
neglect
ongoing attachment/relational needs
trauma-related needs
executive functioning difficulties
vulnerability within relationships
social communication difficulties (e.g. Autistic Spectrum conditions)

As a result, these children and young people may present with a range of complex and high-risk behaviours.

At Action for Children Fostering we believe that this open and shared understanding gives us the insight and opportunity to best support the needs of the young person and their foster carers.

Everyone of us develops into who we are based on our past experiences and interactions with others. For young people in care, who have experienced trauma, this is far from simple. How they behave is often a direct result of this trauma. It’s not their fault, it’s often not intentional and it’s not something that can change overnight.

Through our therapeutic approach we give our foster carers the skills they need to look beyond the behaviours a young person may be displaying, to understand the meaning behind these behaviours and to understand how best to respond in the moment. This may be to learn how and when it is appropriate to just let the situation play out and then how to talk and understand the young person’s emotions and how to gain their trust. There is no judgement and no blame in therapeutic parenting.

Working together

Developed in conjunction with Changing Minds UK, our unique training framework, HOMES, gives foster carers at Action for Children Fostering England the peace of mind to know that they've learned the necessary skills to understand and manage challenging situations.

“Our foster carers have access to exceptional training and supervision in therapeutic parenting, with access to professional clinical psychologists. We plan and deliver training with our foster carers to ensure their ongoing professional development.”

Action for Children Fostering social worker

Our collaboration with Changing Minds UK provides specialist psychological input to support our young people and their carers.

Together with their team of psychologists, our HOMES framework was developed to meet children’s trauma history and emotional needs using the latest, most effective approaches.

This service provides ongoing psychological consultation, formulation, training and guidance for foster carers and the wider care team. This is to ensure that a therapeutic, evidence-informed framework is used to support the young people and their carers.

Learn more about Changing Minds UK

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