Child Practice Reviews sometimes highlight situations where the practitioners involved in the case failed to take a child-centred approach. A failure to focus on the child as an individual can result in the marginalisation of their experiences, wishes and feelings about their situation.
The following have been found to assist practitioners maintain a child-centred approach:
1) See and speak to the child
This requires practitioners to facilitate the child’s ability to participate. For a young child this may be through play or activities. For an older child through communication support or advocacy. The aim is to try to establish trust so that the child can be open and honest. Particular attention should be given to any particular needs the child has, for example their communication system.
2) Find out about their daily lived experience
To identify and meet the needs of a child at risk of harm it is necessary to understand what a day is like in their lives, their feelings about their day and what they would like to change. It is also important to know how the day changes at weekends, holidays and when different people are caring for them. It is only by understanding their daily lived experience that practitioners can appreciate how abuse or neglect is affecting the individual, their needs, areas of resilience and the risk factors.
3) Establish what the child would like to see change in their daily lives
To understand the child’s desired outcomes, it is important to know what they wish to achieve and what matters to them, it is also important to establish how the child wishes their daily life to change. This provides practitioners with understanding as to how the child perceives the abuse or neglect, they are experiencing, its impact and the personal outcomes they hope to achieve through professional intervention.
4) Ensure that wishes do not override best safeguarding interests
It is important to take the wishes and feelings of the child seriously. However, whilst the child’s right to be heard should be central to any approach their best interests should always be paramount even if they are different to their wishes. For example, a young person who is being sexually exploited may wish to continue to see their abuser when it is not in their best interests to do so.
Further information:
www.sheffkids.co.uk, (Accessed 29/7/2019) for worksheets practitioners can use to gain insights into a child’s wishes and feelings.
www.socialworkerstoolbox.com, (Accessed 29/7/2019) also provides free resources and tools any practitioner can use to communicate with both children and adults.