Communicating with Traumatised/Vulnerable Children and Adolescents: Talking so Children Listen and Listening so Children Talk

Delivered by

Christina Enright

Biography

Format options

In Person | Online

Duration options

3 hrs | 4 hrs | 6 hrs (1 day)

Variations

This training can be adapted to a diverse range of contexts, and further bespoke elements can be added on request.

Content Summary: 

Children and adolescents who have experienced or are experiencing trauma and adversity often have trouble communicating their thoughts, feelings and needs. This may be as a result of difficulty in perceiving or formulating how they feel or having the language to communicate.

Sometimes there are no words that feel fitting or adequate to capture the child’s experience.

This training is designed for anyone supporting vulnerable children to explore how children perceive the world, the difficulties they have with communication and how to help them to express their thoughts, feelings and needs either through language or creativity.

Learning Outcomes

As a result of attending this training you can learn about:

  • A child’s inner world – what children need to communicate about
  • How a child’s ability to communicate their thoughts, feelings, needs, desires etc may be impaired
  • How to listen so that children and adolescents talk and talk so that children and adolescents listen
  • How to support children who are withdrawn, shutdown or who struggle to perceive and express themselves to communicate their thoughts, feelings, desires, motivations
  • Using the arts to support children to formulate and express their thoughts, feelings, desires, motivations

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Bespoke Training

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Training delivered by

Christina Enright

RN, BSc Psychology, Dip in Family Therapy, MA Child Psychotherapy, Dip Clinical Supervision.

Over the past 17 years, Christina has worked as a psychotherapist with children, adolescents, birth parents, foster carers and adoptive parents. This followed on from 20 years working as a nurse in the NHS. Her experience includes the development of a multidisciplinary clinical service for families experiencing trauma and attachment problems who were reluctant to engage with main-stream social care and mental health services. From 2015-2017 Christina provided trauma consultancy to the clinical team developing a children’s service within the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) in the UK.

She also delivers training on child development, trauma and attachment both within the NHS and other education and social care systems across the UK and Ireland.  Her special interest is in early childhood development and the impact of trauma on a child’s developing capacities, functioning and behaviour. From her experience working with children who have endured developmental trauma characterised by neglect and abuse, she has found it necessary to use a comprehensive integrated approach in order to address the multiple complexities which such children present with.

Christina returned to live in Ireland in 2016 and currently works as a Developmental Trauma and Attachment specialist providing training, assessment and clinical interventions on behalf of Tusla Child and Family Agency and in independent practice with birth and adoptive families.