AfC SFC team support and supervision meeting notes

[Geoff James]

25/05/2021 13.00 – 14.00 session opens with the question “What’s going well? What have you noticed…..?”
Some team members were unable to attend … these brief notes are to help to keep us together. Our next Meeting will be in the Autumn term.

About starting a meeting; “Not there to go into school issues, building empathy, making the shift , not a therapist, was a teacher”

“Some members of my team who are in school now starting to deliver SFC sessions shocked the socks off the school and surprised the young people – two very very good sessions with two disillusioned young people – incredibly uplifting professional experience to break through that original cynicism, disillusion, disengagement – actually came into school to meet the SF Coach – went away from the session having been very reflective, the YP really happy about their sessions – shows a different side of this young person ….. a habit of thinking, ‘they won’t turn up’”

“Student with coat and hood up, by just saying for this session you can call me Laura, when we leave we go back to Mrs Ford — by just saying that the coat came down to the elbows, still there as a comfort but the shield was unpeeled.”

“Home visit, very very closed individual, when I asked her what’s your best hope of what do you like doing best she was really shocked, because I suppose everyone has always focused on ‘why are you school refusing, why aren’t you going in?” But to be asked that she suddenly smiled and actually started to talk to me about her art and the cooking she wanted to do – I’m not very practiced at it , but it was just act small steps .. and said I’d come to visit her this week to do more of it …. Coming straight off the training course, in time you … offered you this has got a structure this work but using the script in the first place ….. for me makes me more confident to have a script ….”

Discussion; Using the script …. “Talked about as a team the use of silence and reflective silence , encouraged everyone to rewatch the course video. Some people worried it wouldn’t be fluent … when you’re a bit stumped and getting an answer you’re not expecting.”

Talked about empathy and the polyvagal explanation of the internal bodily systems as a means of rapid, unconscious communication. Dr Peters (‘The boy who was raised as a dog’ – book) finding relationship was the first step in children;’s recovery from severe trauma and Dr Stephen Porges (Polyvagal Theory) laying out the how the bodily communication system works, where we assess and establish safety in relationships before we can start to think about anything.

More comments from the team;
“The pupil feeling heard from the very beginning – in schools usually start with the the idea that ‘I’m here to control and fix this’ but instead in SFC “You’re asking me, wow …”. It’s about feeling heard.”

Question; How do we bridge the gap between being SF and the teacher role? It’s about keeping young people in the picture, it means they don’t get dazzled by sudden changes in the relationship… at one time being the adult leader at another time being SF .

Summed up as being about clarity in your own mind to keep it clear to the child – just be explicit about it …

Another case: “Young person with ASD and mental health needs …. Lots of I don’t know to ‘best hopes’ question … eventually said ‘I find it difficult to focus’, prior to that replying that ‘everything is fine’ “ I have nothing ….’ ‘Everything’s ok inside and outside school’ to ‘what would be useful?” question becoming vulnerable and it only took ten minutes for the change to happen … staying with the moment of being positive, acknowledging how hard it was for him,

“It’s not about being a therapist and ‘fixing’ the situation but about the child finding their strengths and focusing on the positives and what’s going well”

“Giving the pupil time and space to feel truly heard – a protected time and space that they might not get at another time of their week, to feel that they’re really being listened to”.

“About resilience finding the elements of strengths within the young person, recognising it, identifying it, bringing it forward, looking at it and creating some strengths around it … saying that’s the hook you can hang on to to pull yourself forward by …. Very often children have met a lot of disappointment in their life”.

Sheldon’s question … “I’ve heard a few colleagues colleagues in schools respond to suggestions I have made about about SFC “they are past that stage I’m afraid” consider how to share better communications amongst both AfC and schools about what SFC actually is.
Discussion about this, of stories of success as powerful way of changing mindset, going from being stuck to shifting – “so how about this story, in one of our schools”. The assumption was the young people wouldn’t do it, and they did, and they joined in with the meeting and something useful came out of it … that’s what SFC is about, it’s about doing something so radially different by knowing that children have got resources that sometimes you don’t see and if you know that about them, if you know they’re hopeful successful and resourceful people you can depend on that and they’ll pop in”.

Sheldon’s comment – “I think that from an adult perspective it is important to let the young people know they are not being discarded and are not a lost cause and there is still hope – if we don’t think they can progress/improve it’s unlikely they will!”

Shirley is pulling evidence together of what’s working, then we can talk about it … stories, anecdotes to talk to colleagues about it.

Meeting closed at 14.00.

• This topic was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by Geoff James.

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