Topic A: How to use the program

The program combines two basic elements: the Scorecard and the sessions. Besides – as a third and very important element – your reflections on what you learn during the training and how this learning affects your child care.

The Scorecard is made for the preparation for your coming work with the sessions and for your reflections on what you learn and how you develop your practise. The scorecard is a method that you use – together with your supervisor or social worker – to help you focus on the essence of your daily child care practise. With the Scorecard you are asked a number of questions about your child care practise, and by answering these questions you come to a more clear understanding of how you practise very good child care – and why this child care is good. But you also get the chance to see where and why there might be problems in the child care practise.

When you have answered and calculated your answers, you have the precise and clear platform for starting your work with the sessions.

A: Using the scorecard

Using the Scorecard to get an overview of your foster care is the first step in the program. While you use the training program you should sometimes go back and have a look at your Scorecard, so please keep the Scorecard in a safe place through the whole program. It will be an important document. If possible please take a photocopy of it.

 

  1. Please click the “Scorecard for foster families” and print it. Or you may have a copy of the scorecard from your supervisor or program trainer.
  2. Please take two hours – if possible together with your spouse – to write your answers to the questions and your thoughts in the Scorecard. The Scorecard is not an exam; it is your tool for analyzing and planning what you find important to work with while you use the training program. It will also give you an overview of your social network with professionals, family and friends. It is like “looking at the foster care child, your foster family and your social network like from a helicopter”. From this overview, you can decide what you want to work with in your job as foster caregiver.
  3. When you have answered all the questions, please follow the instructions for finding the average score.
  4. Then decide what you think is important to focus on while you use the training program – probably a lot of your questions from the Scorecard will be answered while using the program.

When you have completed the Scorecard, please return to this instruction and continue here:
 Two foster parents – father and son – filling out scorecards

B: How to use the 15 sessions

Writing your answers and thoughts – and discussing the Scorecard – have given you a general idea of your foster care and the child in your care. You have decided what you find important to work with and to know more about.

If you look at the homepage again, you will see the word “sessions” – please click “sessions”

  1. You can now click any of the fifteen sessions.
  2. When you have clicked a session, you can read texts and watch videos for information, ideas and reflections.

You can now work with each of the fifteen training sessions for knowledge, learning and inspiration. We recommend that you take a new session once every two weeks or once a month. You can always repeat a session if you find it necessary. We recommend that you work with the sessions starting with the first and ending with the fifteenth. We have planned the training so that you are taken from one step to the next, adding still more to your skills and competences.

What´s in a session?

Each session presents a topic (for example session 4 presents: “Understanding Basic Attachment Theory”) in texts and video to show you the professional experience and theory that is important concerning the topic.

In each session you will be asked to reflect, think and plan how to practice what you have learned. We ask you to be active and find your own ideas about how you can practice what you have learned. You know best how to use the knowledge provided in the program.

At the end of each session, you are asked to write down how you will try to practice your ideas and plans until you are ready to use the next session. A session will always suggest activities and ideas you can use.

When you have studied a session, you practice what you planned until the next session.

While you practice, you can take notes and use your mobile phone or a camera to make short video clips of your work with the child. We recommend that you keep a diary – often you can only see progress when you look back, and you will have a valuable set of notes to share with the foster child as it grows older.Whatever observations you write down or record, they must not be used by or seen by anyone who is not participating in the training program. They are confidential material for you and your supervisor.
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