Coming in the future
The ChildCalm education programme
The ChildCalm programme will bring the science and ethos of CalmFamily and apply to raising children aged 5-12 years. Like our other programmes, we will have highly trained consultants offering bespoke consultations to educate and support parents with children aged 5-12 years, and a programme of workshops and courses under the ChildCalm brand. We will cover:
- Calmer discipline
- Education, learning and development
- Managing emotions including anxiety
- Key brain development leaps and difficult stages
- Supporting your child's relationships
- Creating and maintaining boundaries for physical health including sleep, eating and technology use
Key elements of parenting 5-12 year olds
We do not believe in one right way to give birth. We believe that birthing people need to know the facts, with evidence and without bias, so that they can make the right choices for them.
Whether you are interested in medical management, Hypnobirthing, yoga and mindfulness, active birth, or anything else, we seek to educate you on all of these and more, so you can choose.
Hypnobirthing, mindfulness and yoga for birth are all about relaxation of the mind and body to optimise your body's natural birth processes. boo boo
Seems pretty obvious that you need to breathe during birth, because breathing is always important. However, most people do not realise how essential breathing is for something like birth, and how humans don't often breathe well. We will teach techniques that are well-researched to physically support your body through birth.
The most important factor in informing birthing people is providing evidence-based, scientific education on how birth works, whether vaginal or caesarean. All birth is birth.
When you are giving birth, you need the right people around you, for you. We can help you navigate your team choices, and support you and them in preparing for your calmest birth in the moment.
One of the biggest factors in keeping humans calmer, is regulating their environment to nurture their senses and reduce stress. In birth, this is not just nicer, it is essential to make birth happen.
Birth is physically demanding on your body, a bit like running a marathon, trekking up a mountain, or competing in a sporting event. It is important to your success that you learn about how to use your body during birth to be effective, and that you practice a little, building your natural resilience beforehand.
With this knowledge you will offer bespoke consultations to educate and support parents with children aged 5-12 years, and a programme of workshops and courses under the ChildCalm brand (with membership of the community). These include:
- The calmer discipline workshop
- The developing child workshop
- Managing your child's worry workshop
- 7-9 year brain leap workshop
- Supporting peer relationships workshop
- Navigating technology workshop
- The ChildCalm full course
Core CalmFamily modules
A relatively quick module that takes you through the history, structure, values, approach and programmes within CalmFamily, including information about our projects in development.
In this module you will gain understanding of the social, legal, political, historical and anthropological concepts surrounding child-bearing, childhood and family life. You will also consider the complexity of the concept of family in our modern society and how this impacts practice.
A brief introduction to the body systems forming a basic understanding needed for other modules that involve discussion of things such as hormones and digestion.
A brief introduction to developmental neuroscience, the evolutionary process that created the human brain and factors influencing the development of the brain, and how motivation works.
This module provides the basic theories of developmental and social psychology including attachment, human needs, motivation and resilience.
In this module we look in depth at the science of the senses, looking at the most up-to-date concepts of the 5 external senses, the 3 internal senses and the balance of regulation.
In this module you will study the neurological and physiological processes of sleep, what is normal for humans and the issues society faces in this regard.
We will also look at the science of the different states of relaxation according to various schools of thought and research.
In this module we examine the basics of nutritional biology, human infant feeding, introducing solid foods, how humans intuitively eat, and the science of taste.
This module covers the fundamental principles of the CalmFamily frameworks for:
- Calmer relationships
- Trouble-shooting human needs
- Mental regulation
- Sensory regulation
- Emotional regulation
- Repairing relationship ruptures
- Learning and development
Everyone who joins CalmFamily to educate and support for a calmer future is a leader. In this module we explore what this means, how to do this authentically for you, and what bravery really means, especially when you rarely feel brave. We also talk about some important business stuff that is practically very helpful.
Child specialist modules
We call this module zero because you will dip in and out of this as you go along. This amount of reading is not possible for everyone so we do not insist that it is complete for certification.
To complete this recommended, but optional module, you will read ten excellent books and answer specific, short answer, questions on them that will hopefully expand your thinking, understanding and learning.
If you aren’t able to read any of the books, it is a good idea to ask a colleague or friend to summarise it for you in a quick chat so that when parents ask about it, you have some knowledge and can talk about it.
Brief summary:
- Brain development from 5 to 12 years
- Psychological development from 5 to 12 years
- Social development
- Applying motivation theory
- Developmental divergences
- Physical development from 5 to 12 years
Brief summary:
- Communication and language development
- School
- Play, exploration and risk
- Technology
Brief summary:
- Meeting the basic needs
- Troubleshooting human needs
- Emotional regulation
- Repairing relationship ruptures
- Sensory regulation
- Foundations of development
Brief summary:
- Meeting the basic needs
- Troubleshooting human needs
- Emotional regulation
- Repairing relationship ruptures
- Sensory regulation
- Foundations of development
Brief summary:
- Supporting sleeping issues
- Supporting eating issues
- Supporting elimination issues
- Managing physical development
Brief summary:
- Friendships
- Siblings
- Sex and relationship education
Brief summary:
- How play changes
- The many forms of education
- Starting school
- Managing school and teachers
- Supporting self-directed learning
Brief summary:
- Understanding what is behind behaviour and attitude
- Taking a calm approach
- Praise and consequences
- Motivation
- Playful parenting practices
Brief summary:
- Adverse childhood experiences
- Building resilience
- Understanding sadness in children
- Understanding worry in children
This final module, alongside your face-to-face training days, will prepare you for being a child specialist consultant. You will gain a good understanding of the ChildCalm programme, of our principles and approach to facilitating learning for families, and you will have the chance to re-visit material covered in the face to face training.
Following completion of your interactive training, whether in-person or online, you will use your knowledge and the content of these modules to complete a short assessment in collaboration with a director to become certified and begin work as a consultant.
Once certified you will continue to have our support, and that of the community, and always have the opportunity to sign up with a CalmFamily mentor for more intensive support.
