achieving systemic change in foster care: the potential of ... · •long-term foster carer for...
TRANSCRIPT
March 27 2015
Head, Heart, Hands England Conference Friends House, London
Achieving systemic change in Foster Care: the Potential of Social Pedagogy
#HeadHeartHands
Pat Petrie Centre for Understanding Social Pedagogy
UCL Institute of Education
Social Pedagogy – Overview
Social Pedagogy as a system
Training and Education
Theory
Policy and Practice
Care & Social Youth Services
Services
Pedagogues
Work in
Education Health
Social pedagogy
Where care and education meet …
Nurturance…
Upbringing…
Supporting development…
Education-in-its-broadest-sense
Social pedagogy in practice
• Head – heart – hands
• The whole person
• Reflection
• Sharing the same living space and everyday activities with others: Doing things WITH not TO people
• Human rights, social agency and potential
• Understanding the difference between professional, personal, and private matters
• Team work and valuing the collective
• Being a good role model
Recent UK developments
• Research – late 1990s>
• Training courses
• Degrees
• Pilot schemes
• Head Heart Hands: Social pedagogy in foster care
• Etc . . .
To sum up
• Policy, practice and theory that
address social issues by ‘educational’ means
• A foundation concept across services
• An ethical and theoretical approach to practice, training and policy
Melissa Green Director of Operations The Fostering Network
Head, Heart, Hands – Overview
Programme aims
• Demonstrate the impact that introducing a social pedagogic approach can make to foster carers and the lives of the children they foster
• Improve the outcomes for children in care and contribute to them being able to fulfil their potential
Social
pedagogy is well
established across
Europe…
…but looks different in
every country…
…our job is to find out what it might look
like in the UK.
Head, Heart, Hands across the UK Orkney
& Aberlour
Joint site
Edinburgh
Capstone
South West
Staffordshire
Hackney
Surrey
The programme is being funded over four years by:
• Comic Relief
• Esmée Fairbairn Foundation
• The Henry Smith Charity
• The John Ellerman Foundation
• KPMG Foundation
• Man Charitable Trust
• The Monument Trust
The Head, Heart, Hands learning and development
Taster Day
Orientation Days
8 Day Core Couse
Ongoing momentum activities supported by site social pedagogues and the social pedagogy consortium
All Learning and Development designed by
the social pedagogy consortium
Learning and Development Word cloud
By the end of the programme we will:
• Understand what social pedagogy means in a UK context
• Have demonstrated what needs to be in place in order to introduce social pedagogy into foster care in the UK
• Be able to show the difference working in a social pedagogic way makes to the outcomes for children in care
When you teach a child something, you take away forever his chance of
discovering it for himself – Jean Piaget
Teaching a child how to live in the world and reflecting on our role
Social Pedagogy in Action
Nicola Hill
Nicola Hill
• Long-term foster carer for Hackney since 2010
• Look after siblings, a boy, 12 and a girl, 15
• Author of two books, Pink Guide to Adoption and Proud Parents, published by BAAF
• Member of Tower Hamlets’ fostering panel
• Member of DfE expert panel on improving permanence for looked after children
• Member of APPG on looked after children
Haltung – what we believe in
• Respect • Co-operation • Doing your best • Thinking about others • Our impact on the world • Building relationships • Building resilience • Reflecting and learning • Positive experiences and opportunities
Key thinkers
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau – facilitate opportunities for learning
• Paulo Freire – working with each other, developing consciousness
• Cannan et al – to prevent or ease social problems by providing people with the means to manage their own lives or make changes in their circumstances
Putting it into practice
• Sunday lunch – cooking chicken casserole, A has hissy fit about packed lunches – wants smoked salmon bagels
• Show her that we have enough food but agree to take her shopping
• What can I teach?
• Co-operation, impact on the world, building relationships, building resilience, reflecting and learning
Techniques
• Diamond Model – positive experience, relationship building, wellbeing, empowerment, holistic learning
• Common Third – doing an activity together that the child helps to plan and builds our relationship
• Reflection – what else might be going on – avoiding revision??? Control issues.
Shopping expedition
• Planning menus for the week • Looking up recipes • Writing shopping list • Taking bags and walking, chatting • Checking out prices, getting good value • Letting her make decisions • Queuing • Walking back with heavy loads in the rain • Unpacking • Next week we’ll order online!
Social Pedagogy in Supervision
• Using 4-stage reviewing cycle
• Upset about a LAC review
• Facts – reliving what happened
• Feelings – emotional responses
• Findings – analysing what went on
• Futures – applying learning, looking at options for moving forward
Reflection
• Looking at our own experiences of education
• What influenced our achievements
• What motivated us
• What impact this has on our expectations of the children
• What we see as our professional role
• What we think professionals expect of us
• How we can empower children to achieve
• Relax, trust them, guide them and try not to nag!
Communication
• Looking at the messages sent, how they are received
• How we give feedback to the department
• The level of communication we want to feel respected and valued
• Learning all the time about how to improve our communication
• Johari’s Window – increasing open space, what is hidden, blind spot, unknown
Further information
• Email [email protected] to sign up to Head, Heart, Hands newsletter published by Fostering Network
• Search previous copies under ‘Freya Burley blogs’ on www.fostering.net
• Join Social Pedagogy Momentum Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/groups/social.pedagogy.momentum/
Programme aims
• Professionalising Foster Care
• Improving Outcomes for fostered children
• Social pedagogy = non-hierarchical
Our training for foster carers and staff
Level 2
Level 1
Taster Day
Photo: kay la la (via flickr)
6TH MAY 15, Lea Hall Social Club, Sandy Lane, Rugeley,
WS15 2LB
and
4TH NOV 15, 61 Elmwood Drive
Blythe Bridge, Stoke-on-Trent,
ST11 9NX
Always 9.30 am – 3 pm
Lunch will be provided
Get an overview about where social pedagogy comes from and what it is about! Find out how Staffordshire has introduced social pedagogy in residential, fostering and adoption. Meet staff and foster carers who have been trained in social pedagogy and use it in their practice! Meet Pat Petrie a UK academic who has researched social pedagogy extensively.
• LEVEL 1 (Orientation
Days) - 9.30am-3pm
• 22nd & 23rd June 15 at
Seabridge
• 8th & 9th Sept 15 at
Blackheath
• 10th & 11th Nov 15 at
Rugeley Rose
• 3rd & 4th Feb 16 at St
Peters Church, Tamworth
• Level 2 (New)- 9.30am-3pm
• 5th & 6th Oct 15 at
Seabridge
• 9th & 10th March 16 at Blackheath
Including foster carers in facilitation
(b)e Safe – embrace modern media
Developing a love of language and reading at home - A Common Third approach to support Foster Carers to enable children and young people to develop a love of books and language
Opening Mary Poppins’ Bag!
Opening Mary Poppins’ Bag!
• A workshop written and developed by and for Foster Carers, in partnership with a Pedagogue and Education Mentor from the Virtual School
• Based on our own philosophy for supporting reading and language for the children in our care.
• Links, where possible, to good classroom practice.
• Provides ideas, recommended books and authors.
• Includes fun Common Third activities attached to each book, for Carers and children/young people to try at home or outside the home
Opening Mary Poppins’ Bag!
For example:
“Working with Education” Training for Foster Carers
Foster Carers worked with the Virtual School and Training Team to review and update the “Working with Education” Training delivered to all new Carers and also existing Carers, and brought in models of Social Pedagogy (ie: The Diamond Model).
From April 2015, this new Training will be jointly delivered by Foster Carers in partnership with the Training Team
Lessons learnt
• Foster carers are key activators to make social pedagogy sustainable
• Foster carers are often an untapped resource
• Enabling and releasing foster carers broadens and strengthens the training and development offer
Thanks for your attention! Auf Wiedersehen!
Head, Heart, and Hands: evaluation of the impact of a national demonstration programme to improve the quality of foster care
Evaluating Head, Heart, Hands: Emerging evidence
Head, Heart, Hands Practice Exchange Day March, 2015
Lisa Holmes and Sam McDermid Centre for Child and Family Research, Loughborough University
The evaluation at its broadest
The evaluation is exploring the impact that Head,
Heart, Hands has on:
Children and young people in foster care
Foster carers
Those who are supporting them
How does the idea of social pedagogy become a
reality in fostering in the UK?
47
Overview of the evaluation
• Complimentary and overlapping modules
• Baseline and two follow up data collection points
Module 1: Impact on children and young people
Face to face interviews children and young people
Analysis of management information systems data and
additional case file information
Includes an analysis of costs
Module 2: Impact on foster carers and on practice
On-line survey and interviews with foster carers
Chaired group discussions with practitioners
Face-to-face interviews with social pedagogues
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Overview of the evaluation
Module 3: Impact on the system
Drawing on implementation science literature
Case studies (includes face-to-face and telephone interviews)
Interviews with programme managers
On-line survey with practitioners
Outputs to date
One analysis of the impact of Head, Heart, Hands on Children
and young people and their foster carers (May 2014)
Analysis of implementation issues at Baseline and Time 2
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The evaluation team
Centre for Child and Family Research
Evaluation Lead
The Colebrooke Centre for Evidence and
Implementation Implementation and Knowledge
Transfer lead
National Care Advisory Service
Oversight of peer researchers
Janet Boddy, University of Sussex
Expert Consultant
50
Social pedagogy as a way of practice
An approach or a method?
Two discourses
The learning journey will these conceptualisations change over
time?
‘Doing it already’
Both positive and negative
Validating tacit knowledge
Confidence
Re-affirming of the role of foster carers
Does this validation have any impact in the longer term?
51
Reflections on social pedagogy
Different levels of engagement
Engaged Adopter
Cautious optimist
Defended Sceptic
52
Social pedagogy within a context
Assimilating social pedagogy into existing practices and
language
Social pedagogy as a way to change the wider system
How ‘ready’ is the wider system for social pedagogy
The importance of the role and support of supervising social
workers
The importance of a (perceived) commitment from the system
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Implementation issues
Turning an idea into a reality
Issues identified not unique to Head, Heart, Hands or
social pedagogy
Maintaining momentum
Increasing the ‘spread’ of social pedagogy
Resources
54
Costing work:
Approach to costs
Costs, cost effectiveness and sustainability as key part
of any new innovation
‘Bottom up’ cost methodology: the child is the unit of
measurement
Link costs to needs and outcomes
‘Costs savings’ vs. ‘Costs avoided’
Too early for robust evidence on costs
Indicative examples
55
Indicative examples of where costs may be
avoided
Building capacity in the system
Recruitment and retention of foster carers
Improved relationships between foster carers and their
supervising social workers
Supervisory visits
Complaints
Placement stability
Improved outcomes
Specialist placements or interventions
56
Example: Placement stability
The costs associated with placement change, range
from £250 to £1,500 per placement change
Costs of changing placement increase incrementally per
placement change
Costs of placement change for a child with a history of
placement instability: £4,500 per placement change
Impact of cumulative costs over time
57
Example: Carla’s story
58
Estimated social care
costs for the 19 months
prior to the introduction of
Head, Heart, Hands
Estimated social care costs
for the 19 months following
the introduction of Head,
Heart, Hands
Social care processes Cost (£) Cost (£)
Process 3: Maintaining the Placement 72,357 72,357
Process 2: Care Planning 749 749
Process 6: Review 2,476 2,476
Complaints 24,900 1,700
SP intervention (higher intensity) - 7,209
SP intervention (lower intensity) - 2,067
Total cost for the period 100,482 86,558
Next steps
The cost calculators for children’s services
Uses routinely collected data to calculate the costs of different care
pathways over time
Brings cost data together with data on outcomes
Data to be collected
Two years prior to Head, Heart, Hands
Four years of programme period
Whole looked after population
Comparative analysis of costs and outcomes
Analysis of interviews with children and young people, and foster carers at
time 2
Repeated in time 3
59
Contact Details
Sam McDermid
Senior Research Associate
Centre for Child and Family Research
Loughborough University
01509 228 365
60
Lisa Holmes
Director
Centre for Child and Family Research
Loughborough University
01509 228 878
Questions and reflection
• Share your thoughts and reflections on what you’ve heard today
• What questions do you have
• What one action will you take home with you today?
Thank you
#HeadHeartHands