Training, learning and development

At Fostering London one of our key Values in our Statement of Purpose is that ‘Everyone in Fostering London needs to be learning’. As part of this: ‘We recognise the challenges and complexity of foster care and the need to provide effective, ongoing learning and development for foster carers and staff so that we are reflective, skilled and confident’.We provide this is a variety of ways:

Skills to Foster – 3 day preparatory training prior to approval.
Training, Support and Development Standards (TSDS) training – 7 training days over about 10 months that are attended by new foster carers and applicants and support them to complete their TSDS portfolio and achieve their regulatory TSDS certification.
Monthly Core Training that is repeated on a Tuesday and a Saturday, compulsory for foster carers and also open to applicants, support network, panel members and staff. These are all linked to the TSDS outcomes and the National Minimum Standards expectations.
Monthly Support Groups, also on Tuesdays, for foster carers and staff only and includes update information relating to fostering as well as discussions, sharing and problem-solving around current achievements or issues for carers.
Online training – which is provided twice a year for foster carers
Individualised training and support – this is provided within supervisory home visits mainly. Any additional training or support is agreed with foster carers as part of their bespoke Professional Development Plan relating to the children and young people that they are fostering. This will included more advanced training for carers who have completed all the core training.

Core Training

These are the current courses that are part of our Core Training programme:

Safer Caring
Health and Safety
Online Safety
Child Sexual Exploitation Awareness
Paediatric First Aid
Attachment and Transitions
Anti-Bullying Strategies
Stress Management parts 1 to 4
Foetal Alcohol Syndrome
Special Educational Needs and Disability parts 1 and 2
Children Moving On
Exclusions
Placement Stories
Assertiveness parts 1 and 2
Trauma and Emotions
Challenging Behaviour parts 1 and 2

Online Training

We have provided the following online courses recently:

Trafficking, Exploitation and Modern Slavery (Refugee Council)
Pathways to Extremism and the Prevent Programme (Virtual College)
Child Protection(NSPCC)
Managing Sexualised Behaviour (NSPCC)

Training Reward Scheme

As we value continuing professional development so much, we have a reward scheme in place where our foster carers and applicants can earn £10 vouchers at regular intervals for their attendance at training and support groups and any online training that they do.

Training Reward Scheme

Here are some of our recent voucher winners!

Training Photos

Here are some of our recent training photos: