Earlier News 2008
ICDP annual report 2008
YEAR 2009
DECEMBER
(Back
to Home)
Click: Merry Christmas and Happy
New Year
Click: ICDP calendar 2010
FIRST ICDP FACILITATOR IN FINLAND
Klara Shauman Alhberg is the first Finish person to receive training in
ICDP. Klara is a psychologist and works in the Family Centre in Paragas,
near Åbo. Her plan is to start spreading ICDP by training her
colleagues, including psychologists, teachers, pedagogues and family workers.
SWEDEN
A
short update from the chair of ICDP
Sweden,
Annelie Waldau (Annelie is on the photo above on the right, with Paul
Bergman on the left) : "ICDP Sweden has
been steadily increasing the scope of its activities. We have
signed agreements with approximately 100 ICDP trainers, who work mostly
in public service. We also keep a register of 1200 facilitators who were
trained in this country. This year we have translated and published
Karsten Hundeide's manual which is available from our webpage:
www.icdp.se In October we organized two conferences
which were attended by approximately 80 ICDP facilitators. They showed us how the ICDP program
has been implemented with many different
target groups. It became clear that ICDP represents an important and
creative process, which allows facilitators to truly make ICDP their
own;
the facilitators were clearly proud about their
involvement with ICDP. "
ICDP WITH THE ELDERLY
The
conference that took place in Stockholm on the 9th of October gathered forty ICDP facilitators
(photo above). They came to share experiences from their
pilot projects in which they applied ICDP with the elderly. The ICDP
program implementation with this new target group has produced positive
results and this work generated enthusiasm among the facilitators .
ICDP WITH PARENTS
The
second conference gathered facilitators who
implemented ICDP by working with different parental groups. The
facilitators explained how they used the ICDP program in their work with teenage parents, adoptive parents and parents from
minority groups.
ICDP NETWORK
MEETING GATHERS 7AFRICAN COUNTRIES
(back home)
Professionals from different African countries
travelled to Maputo to attend the "ICDP NETWORK MEETING", at which
they were invited to share about their ICDP project work.
The objective of the ICDP network meetings in Southern Africa is to
consolidate, strengthen and develop ICDP in this region through a
gradual transfer of competence and through sharing inspiration,
experience and ideas on how to best mainstream and implement the
psychosocial component in existing projects and programs for children
in need. This is the second network meeting and we were altogether 18
participants from six different countries. The countries were: South
Africa, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Mozambique, Ethiopia - plus Norway
and Portugal. Representative from the Norwegian Embassy was also
present. Representative from Lesotho were supposed to come, but were
prevented. This means that ICDP is now operative in seven different
countries in the region. Perhaps the most rewarding part of the
meeting were the informal contacts and the friendly atmosphere that
developed between the participants – exchanging experiences, sharing
meals, going out together and being inspired by the ICDP projects that were developed in
different countries.
Click here to read
the rest of "The Report from the network meeting in Maputo"
by Karsten Hundeide.
ICDP STARTS IN MEXICO
ICDP was
launched at the
"FIRST PAN-AMERICAN CONGRESS ON EDUCATION FOR PEACE" held on the 2nd,
3rd and 4th December at the University of the Americas, UDLA, Puebla,
México. Immediately after the conference there was an ICDP training
workshop attended by 25 professionals, including psychologists and social
workers
from government networks DIF Municipal and DIF Estatal , as well teachers from Luis
Amigo and Montessori schools. Click to see
photos of participants.
Role
play at workshop: caregiver's empathic approach towards the child
The ICDP methodology received very good
reception by all participants who set action plans for practical
implementation of the program in their respective organizations.
First of these projects started on the 7th of December in the child
protection
institution called Casa
Sueños, linked to DIF
Municipal. In Casa
Sueños all institutional staff working with 170
resident children will be trained in ICDP.
NEW ICDP DEVELOPMENTS IN GUATEMALA
The
implementation of the ICDP methodology takes place in marginalized areas
of the country, through cooperation with local organizations such as
Secretaria de Bienestar Social –SBS-, Aldeas Infantiles SOS, Fundazúcar
de Escuintla , Instituto Guatemalteco de Seguridad Social –IGSS- and
Plan International. ICDP
trained agents from
Fundazúcar applied
the ICDP methodology in 4 departments,
reaching 3700 families and 5516 children and integrating ICDP as part of their own program called
"Mejores familias" (better families). Plan International works with ICDP in over one hundred
communities, where they incorporated the ICDP program as part of their child
protection services. As result of ICDP positive changes were noted in
the relationship between adults and children in the participant
families. In some communities there were campaigns for peace which
promoted the 8 guidelines of the ICDP program. One of the remaining
challenges is to find ways of reaching the most abusive
families, who out of fear of being reported have not yet joined the ICDP
courses.
Photos
of group work from training workshops
The
latest
development is that
the local authorities in the municipality of Guatemala officially
adopted and inserted the ICDP program in their action plans for 2010 and
a new group of 30 professionals has started their process of ICDP
training
NOVEMBER
BRAZIL
In the town of Giruá ICDP has been implemented in 5 schools. This ICDP
project was sponsored by the Giruá municipality with the aim of helping children who are underachieving due to lack of
support from their home environments. ICDP training was given to the teachers
and to 2 community workers in each of the 5 schools. The team of pedagogues
that developed competence in ICDP became responsible for further
training of all school staff. The community workers implemented the ICDP
program, under the supervision of the ICDP trainer, with 200 families of
the children attending the schools. The experience
of this ICDP implementation was so positive that it attracted interest
from other municipalities who are following
suit. ICDP is seen as a strategy capable of assisting low achievers.
According to ICDP trainer Afonso Eleazar Luft, the teachers have now
created a political movement that is beginning to lobby the
Brazilian government to adopt ICDP as a national programme for schools .
NEW MEMBER OF THE OSLO OFFICE
We
welcome Joshe Bose at our international office in Oslo. Joshe's
background is in business administration and international
environmental studies and he has 9 years experience in development work
as manager and team leader. In Bangladesh he worked for World Vision
and the Bangladesh Nazarene Mission, and was responsible for
the development of various projects and programs. Joshe
will be offering us his assistance 27 hours a week, especially
focusing on management, fundraising and evaluation.
GRAMEEN BANK AND ICDP
Shan Ali,
the director of the Grameen Bank Foundation Australia attended two ICDP workshops and during that time he
became convinced of the importance of ICDP as a service to the poor.
Talks with Shan revealed mutual interest in developing close
cooperation between ICDP and the Grameen Bank, and the decision was made
to start with a pilot project in the Philippines. The pilot would test
out a new integrated approach including health, micro-credit and
ICDP as a package to be delivered to communities in several areas
of the country. An action plan was put in place, whose first step is
the production of a didactic video for use in the Philippines. The
challenge for ICDP is to create audio visual aids that would allow
efficient delivery of ICDP inside the Grameen frame of working.
Shan Ali, director of the Grameen Bank Australia
ICDP IN COLOMBIA
(back home)
HUILA:
Mayors
from 37 towns of the Huila province gathered to
discuss public policy concerning early childhood. The meeting was held
in the capital Neiva, on the 5th and 6th of October and it led to
signing of an agreement for future consultation and cooperation with
Unicef, focusing on the development of policies, as well as concrete
actions in favour of children.
ICDP attended the meeting as one of the organizations
working for
the benefit of children
in Huila. This year 147 trainers and 1417 facilitators are implementing ICDP with 16,617 families. Click to see
the Presentation
and the ICDP banner.
Some of the ICDP trained facilitators hold positions on local councils
("consejo de politica social") and are thus partaking in the decision
making processes about social policy and program implementation at
municipal level.
CHOCO: ICDP has continued to spread throughout this province,
coordinated by the UNICEF's regional office. The new focus is on
applying ICDP with the indigenous Indian population and therefore the ICDP program has been adapted to their philosophy,
cosmic vision and cultural way of relating inside the family. The
"8 ICDP guidelines booklet for parents" has been translated in 4
Indian languages: Katios, Embera, Waunaan and Tule.
OCTOBER
SOUTHERN AFRICAN NETWORK CONFERENCE
IN MAPUTO
For
some years now, ICDP has held regular workshops in the Southern
African region, training representatives from different international
and national governmental and private agencies. In all these
places we have in parallel been working with academic institutions in
order to secure sustainability after we leave. The overarching
development goal is to improve the psychosocial and educational care
of orphans and vulnerable children, in the wake of poverty and the
AIDS pandemic in the Southern African region. These workshops have
been supported by the van Leer Foundation and the Norwegian and South
African research councils. From these groups there are requests for
further support and training in order to sustain their work and expand
into new surrounding areas. The idea of a Southern African ICDP
network is basically about support for competence building inside a
context of South – South cooperation and autonomy. The network is
holding a meeting from 26-29th of October in Maputo, Mozambique.
Participants will include representatives from Mozambique, Tanzania,
South Africa, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Malawi and Ethiopia. See
the Conference agenda.
NORWAY
The
ICDP Norway organization has elected a new board comprised of the
following members:
Marianne Fjetland chairperson, Hilde Tørnes, Christine Sørøy, Berit
Helene Johnsen, Sonja Kolstad Lie and Ingeborg Egebjerg. ICDP Norway
is independent from the ICDP International organization.
Marianne Fjetland, chair of ICDP Norway, at the Nordic ICDP conference
in Stavanger in company of the mayor who opened the conference.
AUSTRALIA
From a
report about the ICDP developments by Anne Moore, member of the ICDP
Australia core group:
-
Training in the professional forum has already commenced with
workshops being delivered through a company called Many Bridges which
Roland Kidman Lewis has set up. This is fee for service training
allowing professional people to come and learn to deliver the ICDP
Program. The first workshop was held at the Priority One Conference in
Logan and generated much excitement. This workshop was delivered to
childcare professionals, teachers and child protection agencies who
are traditionally very difficult to impress. The ICDP workshop was the
final session before lunch and, as is normal in such a conference,
everything was running late. Roland and Anne were delighted that the
participants were so engaged in the learning that they did not want to
stop and discussions around the program continued throughout the lunch
hour. The simplicity of the ICDP Program and the way we have been
taught to deliver it ensures its success. We are looking forward to
our next workshops at the end of September and October and are
confident that ICDP Australia will be a huge success.
A
partnership has been formed between Morningside C.A.R.E. and ICDP
Australia and the two organisations are exploring the opportunity to
merge with each other. Currently work is going on to obtain
Registered Training Organisation status from the QLD Dept of
Education, Training and the Arts for Morningside C.A.R.E. and training
will be delivered in Cert III in Children’s Services, Cert III in
Youth Work and Cert I in Skills for the Future. Our learning from ICDP
International will be incorporated in all that we do, and by
delivering under the umbrella of Morningside C.A.R.E., we will be
eligible for government and philanthropic funding. This will
allow us to deliver training to those who need it most and who may not
have the finances to afford the training by any other means.
PERU
ICDP Peru
has started a project in cooperation with the
Essalud Municipal Hospital in Lima. Talks with Dr.
Francisco Bocanegra, the Head of the Obstetrics and Gynaecology
Department led to signing of an agreement for cooperation
with Veronica Loayza, head of the nursing staff in the Obstetrics
Department of the hospital. ICDP is welcomed as a methodology that
can contribute and complement the existing programs run by nurses for
expectant mothers. The first workshop will take place on the 17th of
October. According to Veronica Loayza: "In Essalud we have
focused on developing provision and different programs with activities
that aim to prepare parents for the birth of their child; we feel that
ICDP fits in perfectly with our efforts as it can orient parents after
the birth - this is an area where we do not currently have any programs
so ICDP will fill in that gap. Our vision is to introduce ICDP on a
wider scale after the pilot."
The ICDP
workshops will be attended by 13 nurses who will receive training as
ICDP Facilitators. They will implement the ICDP program with 140
families, under the supervision of ICDP trainers. This ICDP pilot
project will be testing out and adapting the methodology for future use
through Essalud network of hospitals. It is funded by SD Britain and
partly by Essalud.
The
photo shows a recent meeting held in Lima at the Essalud hospital,
from left to right: ICDP represented by Nicoletta Armstrong
and Anna Sofia Mazzini, Polly
Skerratt chair of SD Britain and Veronica Loayza, standing at the back.
PARAGUAY
ICDP
trainer Benita Gavilan writes about a new initiative in Asuncion:
- This
is just to inform that we are starting a new ICDP implementation in
the context of a cooperation project with the national Ministry for
Children. They invited us (among other NGOs who do the same job in
other places) to coordinate interventions in children's' homes. In
these homes assistance is sought to upgrade the quality of care and
the way they are run in order to bring their competences up to
new legal standards. This is part of a new Government's Program;
before, children in such homes just had to be lucky not to fall into
the hands of neglecting or abusive caregivers.
The
Ministry is financing us to implement ICDP workshops for caregivers
working in 3 institutions; one is maintained by Catholic nuns and two
are run by different protestant churches. We are also involved in the
other part of the project, as designed by the ministry, which
comprises interventions by social workers and psychologists, as well
as legal experts. In addition we also added a nutritionist to the
overall staff to improve the quality of diet for children. So in
addition to the ICDP training, we are also coordinating teams of
professionals to develop different programs in these 3 homes for
children. This is all a new challenge, especially as we know
that in one of these homes the children are being constantly beaten by
staff. If the ICDP intervention proves to be helpful, then it is
likely that we will be invited to develop more initiatives using this
integrated approach in cooperation with the Ministry for Children.
SEPTEMBER
ETHIOPIA
From
Virginia Thomas, one of the board members of ICDP International: - On
a recent visit to Ethiopia, I had the privilege of meeting Teka Zewdie,
Professor of Psychology at the University of Addis Abba, and his wife
Askale Baby Jean, who is a secretary at a wholesale enterprise.
From
left to right: Askale, Virginia and Teka
According to Teka, "since I was trained in the ICDP we have done
trainings across Ethiopia - with nurses, parents, community leaders,
social workers and traditional educators in churches and mosques". In
the 1990s, Teka formed a team of 8 ICDP trainers - but two passed
away, and others left the country. Now he and his wife are on their
own, but with the support of Karsten Hundeide and ICDP International.
Teka
will attend an ICDP Southern Africa Network meeting this October in
Maputo, Mozambique, where he will get a chance to exchange experiences
and good practices with ICDP trainers from across the Southern African
region. Teka is interested in working with Blue Nile Children's
Organisation which would be a good partner in the revival of ICDP in
Ethiopia. According to Blue Nile, "the Ethiopian people are facing
colossal challenges today. Mired in poverty, they are dying by the
thousands every year from the ravages of AIDS and traditional killers
like malaria and TB. It is estimated that AIDS alone killed more than
1.7 million people over the past few years and has left about 1
million orphans."
Teka
feels that ICDP has a lot to contribute in Ethiopia, which is still
among the poorest countries in the world, ranked 169th of 177 on
UNDP's Human Development Index. The problems faced by AIDS orphans and
their care givers are pressing. According to Teka "ICDP is a
cost-effective way to improve childcare, and doesn't require expensive
materials. It is an easily adaptive method - adaptable to all cultures
and contexts. It is a good way to promote a sense of empowerment in
caregivers, parents and anyone working with children in need".
ICDP PROGRAM AT THE INSTITUTE IN
OSLO
Professor
Henning (photo above), one of the founders of ICDP, has over the years
given many lectures in early intervention and family psychosocial
counselling. During 2008 and 2009 he was instrumental in facilitating
the introduction of the ICDP methodology as part of the Master degree
program for students at the Institute for Spesialpedagogikk (ISP) in
Oslo, Norway.
As part
of this aim he gave ICDP workshops to a group of 15 students who
afterwards implemented the ICDP program with groups of caregivers, and
were thus training themselves in the practical task of working as ICDP
facilitators. Erling Kokkersvold was the coordinator at the university
who recruited the groups of caregivers from the local kindergartens -
these groups included both staff and parents. The ICDP trainer Hilde Tørnes offered support meeting to the students, and met with them at 3
intervals during the period that they were doing the training of
caregivers. The sponsorship came partly from the university, partly from
the Bufdir (The Norwegian directorate for children, youth and
families) covering costs of the support meetings and with a part coming
from the students themselves (500 Norwegian krona).
The
evaluation of the whole experience by students showed that they were
very satisfied by their practical experience of implementing ICDP and
they commented that ICDP should not only be offered as an option but it
should be permanently included in the Master thesis program. However,
they also said that in their opinion if ICDP was to be included other
parts of the thesis requirements would need to be made shorter, as the
ICDP practical work takes time to accomplish. Comments by one of the
students: " This ICDP training has given me a lot, both personally and
professionally. It would have been a loss if I had not partaken in it. I
therefore think that it should be available for those really interested
and particularly those who also wish to continue as ICDP facilitators.
Together with a more experienced ICDP facilitator I am now running a new
group of caregivers - working with ICDP is now my part time job."
In the
autumn of 2009 it is planned to start the training of a new group of
students. Berit Johnsen will take over the ICDP training from Henning
Rye. Hilde Tørnes will continue to offer the support meetings for
students and Erling Kokkersvold will also continue to coordinate and
organize the groups of caregivers to be trained by the students.
TANZANIA
The
Women’s Organization in the Kilimanjaro Region of Tanzania, called
KIWAKKUKI , was founded to combat HIV/AIDS by awareness raising,
dissemination of information and by offering support to those infected
and affected by the disease. ICDP was incorporated in their work in
projects sponsored by the Bergen University and the Bernard van
Leer Foundation (BVLF).
The
selection of the leaders/facilitators to be trained in ICDP was in
accordance with their ability to communicate, willingness to share
experiences and ability to demonstrate what they know, as well as
willingness to add to their knowledge. A group of 21 persons are now
ICDP Facilitators and 13 went further to become trainers (who train
new facilitators). Trained facilitators returned to home villages to
implement ICDP in groups of six caregivers, applying the 8 meetings
agenda of the ICDP program. Once the 8 meetings end facilitators form
new groups and continue with a new round of 8 meetings. A survey of
children and caregivers, including teachers, was conducted in
order to find out what they thought about the effects of the
intervention. It showed that the ICDP training increased the
participants demonstrations of love and their use of praise with the
children. They learned that giving love enables children to accept
discipline and to behave better; that using a stick is not as good as
hugging, talking and praising. They also learned that including
children in planning makes them more eager to participate. Caregivers
learned to share experiences with one another, to speak and to “open
up”.
AUGUST
TRAINING IN LESOTHO
Based on
the report by Karsten Hundeide and Helga Melkeraaen:
In March
2009 a contract was signed between the Blue Cross Norway (BCN),
the Thaba-Bosiu Centre (TBC) and ICDP with the aim of developing
cooperation in order to implement ICDP in Lesotho. It was agreed
that the training in ICDP should take place in 5 phases - and the first
one was carried out in Maseru, at the beginning of July. Karsten
Hundeide and Pedro Mendes from ICDP were responsible for that first
training phase, which consisted of a 4 day long workshop.
Workshop leader Karsten Hundeide (sitting on far left)
with group of participants
The Blue
Cross in Lesotho, and especially the Thaba-Bosiu Centre had done a very
good job in preparing the ICDP workshop, inviting a great number of
relevant organizations. There were 25 participants from 14 different
organizations; practically all participated during the 4 days of ICDP
training. Half of the participants expressed the wish to become ICDP
accredited Facilitators. Many showed that they really understood the
ICDP concept and the importance of the different dialogues.
Participants
kneel as part of a local dance display
They were
very interested, worked hard asking relevant questions, reflecting, and
introduced many suggestions of how to implement ICDP in their work and
also personal daily life in relation to their own children,
grandchildren and others. Many had a rather traditional attitude when it
comes to child rearing and conception of children, and many had
difficult childhoods. They told moving stories about their
relationships, especially to their fathers, who as mine workers
were seldom able to spend time with their children. Many of the fathers
were alcoholics and violent at home and this was discussed during the
workshop. The
comments from the
participants during the evaluation session showed that the ICDP
workshop was very successful.
An
important task for Blue Cross is to determine how to include the alcohol
and drug issue into the ICDP/Blue Cross program. Helga Melkeraaen from
BCN assisted in the discussions about ways of implementing the ICDP
program in connection with the drug and alcohol preventative and
rehabilitative work carried out by the Blue Cross with abusing parents
and their children.
The
second ICDP workshop in Lesotho is planned for the first week of
November. This workshop will be preceded by the ICDP annual network
conference taking place in Maputo at the end of October.
Representatives from the Blue Cross were invited to attend the network
conference and thus become part of the ICDP Africa network.
EL SALVADOR
Marina
Morales, from UNICEF El Salvador: - ICDP is continuing to develop and
expand; there are new organizations that joined the ICDP network this
year. Currently in El Salvador the team is in process of training new
facilitators and promoters, and at the same time there are feedback
meetings with the original group of 70, who were previously trained by
ICDP as core group of trainers for El Salvador.
Photo
sent by Lorena, one of the new facilitators, who writes: "No matter
where we manage to meet people are keen to attend ICDP meetings."
The two
key organizations responsible for ICDP in El Salvador are ISNA and
UNICEF. In ISNA, (social services) Ana Molina has recently become the
new ICDP coordinator, replacing Carolina de Guevara who has been in that
position for the last three years and in UNICEF Marta Navarro is the new
person assuming responsibilities with regards to ICDP developments.
In 2008
an ICDP facilitator came from Guatemala to El Salvador to exchange
experiences with the local facilitators. This year there will be an
opportunity for further sharing to take place between the two countries,
as we are very interested to send a group of trainers to the Guatemala
workshop which is taking place in November. We also plan to show our
achievements to the new authorities.
JULY
INDIA
Report
from Dr. Karl-Peter Hubbertz and Maria Chatterjee:
Click here for full report
Current level of the work in the projects of
Indienhilfe e.V. in West-Bengal -
Visits and Evaluation Discussions with Project partners
February 2009 - Conclusions and Suggestions
The following conclusions and suggestions are based upon visits to our
project partners, carried out from 3 February to 15 February 2009.
The following organisations have been visited by us: Manab Jamin (SEVA);
Vikas Kendra (SEVA); Bikash/ Bankura; Seva Kendra Kharagpur; Namasole
Palli Mangal Samity; Lake Gardens/ Kolkata. At the respective locations
we had elaborate evaluation discussions with the ICDP colleagues,
individually with mothers and different parent groups. It was partly
possible to experience the work with the parent groups live and to
supervise. The following explanations are meant as pre-results for the
Working Committee of Indienhilfe e.V. in Herrsching/ Germany – a
more detailed report will follow.
Effects and Success of ICDP-Work -
During the conversations with colleagues and parents the following
positive effects have been accentuated:
Parents show in the course of an ICDP group training more loving
attention, empathy and sensitive care for their child; They are more
patient, considerate and above all more aware of the way they bring up
their children; Beating of the children is considerably reduced or
stopped altogether; The children react to this with more cooperation;
they are emotionally more balanced and happier.
ICDP proves itself furthermore as a good prevention against increasing
problems in context of family’s living together. A more positive
handling of conflicts not only between parents and children, but also
between husband and wife becomes possible. In many cases the
communication between all concerned improves. Helpful is in the first
instance, that the program does not provide readymade
solutions/advice, but emphasizes on searching and the development of
own solutions. Such positive effects show with different parents to a
different degree and varying intensity. Concerning the parents
themselves, a gradation depends mainly on two criteria:
- Educated – non educated: The more education the mothers have, the
better they can absorb the communicated contents and implement them
actively, the more alert and interested they are. On the other hand
it is also valid: Even mothers without any formal education (e.g.
tribals) profit from the training. They accept the ICDP messages
more as general approach, not as differentiated guidelines.
- Known – not known: Mothers who had already other trainings or
programs before getting to know ICDP (e.g. crèche-offers in the
centre or SHG-groups), are more approachable and interested
than mothers who have been contacted to participate in such
kind of training for the first time.
2. Different ways of ICDP-Work - During
our visits we observed at the different locations different ways to do
ICDP. These can be differentiated according to two dimensions:
- Centre-based versus field-based (the parent group meets in the
project centre; the group training is held in a village in the
open or in a small community house);
-
Short time-Training versus Fulltime-Training (In approx. 4 group
meetings only a part of the program, mostly the „introductory
circle“ is carried out; the full program with a minimum of 12
meetings is done).
Click here to continue reading the full
India report
TRAINERS' MEETING
IN OSLO
News
received from
Astrid Kleppe Flacké, one of the organizers of the Norwegian trainer
meeting which took place at the end of May in the outskirts of Oslo,
sponsored by the Ministry for Children and Family affairs.
-The
meeting gathered about 50 ICDP trainers from all over Norway who came to
spend two days together to exchange experiences, acquire
new knowledge and find new inspiration for their work with the ICDP
programme. Karsten Hundeide, the author of the ICDP programme was
invited to the gathering to give a presentation; he shared his knowledge
to a very attentive audience.
The other speakers included
Dr. Eva Johannesen who she drew from her world wide experiences and
illustrated a variety of contrasting conceptions about the child
held in different parts of the world. Terje
Christiansen lectured about knowledge based practice and implementation
challenges and the ICDP trainer Grete Hyldmo from Trondheim talked
about her own experiences which led to implementing ICDP in a successful
way. Psychologist Anne Linder has a long experience as ICDP trainer in
Denmark and her experiences fascinated the listeners. She focused on the
engagement and joy of working, which she communicated very vividly,
both visually and verbally.
JUNE
PORTUGAL
(back home)
From a report by Penélope Villar: -
Presently the work of ICDP Portugal is mostly in “Roda Viva”
Educational and Social Centre, situated in a social quarter in
Alfragide, near Lisbon. A significant part of the population that
attend “Roda Viva” lives on low income and/or is dependent on social
and economic support. The Centre aims to contribute to the promotion
and social integration of disadvantaged populations and groups at
risk - in community and social perspective. The activities of the
centre fall within the areas of early childhood education, family
support and monitoring, prevention of domestic violence, sports and
socio-cultural animation, marginality/delinquency and addictions
prevention, study support, etc. The Centre is a non profit
organization hosting children and youngsters from 4 months to 15
years old, total of 115 children. Our ICDP team focused first on
sensitizing parents of children attending the centre and later we
trained the whole technical team consisting of 4 educators and 5
educational helpers. In addition, 32 persons are to be accredited as
ICDP Promoters.
The aim of ICDP was to develop in those who deal directly with the 115
children an emotional and communicative language as uniform and
consistent as possible, so that the necessary and fundamental changes
can happen at the levels of children education and their
cognitive-emotional development. As result of our work changes
were observed in the parents, the technical team, as well as in
participants that we trained as Promoters. The success of this
intervention ensured the continuity of the project, which will see its
scope expanded in the coming months. In 2009 our main objective is Parental Education in the context
of promoting more harmonious, constructive and less aggressive/violent
interpersonal relationships between parents and children. A further
round of ICDP sensitisation sessions are given to parents who did not
attend ICDP previously. In addition trainer Penélope Villar has
been holding ICDP meetings for mothers victims of Domestic Violence;
she is also providing individual psychotherapeutic support to them.
What
really makes us believe in the work that we are doing is represented
by the “real people and their life stories”, so we would like to share
two stories of parents who participated in the sensitization sessions
conducted in the "Roda Viva” Centre. One example is a mother of one of
the boys considered to be more "problematic". From the first moment
she confessed to have no patience, to be shouting and beating her
children . As she was progressively more involved in ICDP there were
profound changes in the way she saw her children and she began to
understand the impact that her behaviour had on them. She became one
of the most interested members of the group and shared her experiences
with remarkable frankness. She internalized the ICDP concepts and the
changes in her behaviour were significant. She completely stopped
beating her children, became more consistent when imposing limits to
them. She became more calm and relaxed and her relationship with
children became more peaceful and easy. Another example is a father
who changed and started to feel the need to be with his daughter.
Initially he was totally unaware of the importance of spending time
with his daughter and the impact it had on her psycho-emotional
development. He gradually started to express himself positively about
playing with his daughter and began to show more and more interest in
spending time with her in order to give her a “secure basis” (in his
own words). Towards the end, he verbalized the need to be firm with
her within the set limits, even when she was up against them.
Portuguese blog:
www.icdpportugal.blogspot.com
SWEDEN
Professor Rolf Holmqvist from the Linköpings University, recently
met up with the ICDP team in Oslo to discuss a new evaluation
project in Africa. The study will be carried out in Tanzania
in cooperation with ICDP Sweden, ICDP International, Save the
Children UK and the University in Dar es Salaam. The study group is
comprised of a supervisor and seven doctoral students. The main
researcher will be Sofia Frankenberg Johnsson, a doctoral student
currently living in Dar es Salaam. The intention is to create
conditions for a randomized study in order to get effect data that
can be used for further development of support groups for caregivers
in Tanzania. The study will enhance our knowledge on two levels: the
first concerns the actual effects of ICDP on parents and children
and on another level, the study will increase the knowledge about
socio-emotional functioning, child-parent interaction and
perceptions of parenthood in the selected part of Tanzania and
probably also give knowledge about these phenomena in other growing
cities with transitional values in Africa. ICDP International is
considering a similar study for Mozambique.
MAY
COLOMBIA
News from Abel Salazar, from Medellin, Colombia: - We
have started a new ICDP project, in cooperation with an NGO called
"La Imaginación". The target group are students who are in the
process of finishing their studies in child care at a government
institution called SENA.
 
The ICDP training involves practical interactive tasks in between
the workshop sessions. The aim of the training is to give
the students an opportunity to develop practical skills as
caregivers, thus complementing their theoretical studies about child
development and child care. ICDP trainer, Carolina Montoya from the
FUNLAM University (photo on the right) is also involved and leading
part of the training.
In addition to the work with the students, we also ran 4 groups to
train 30 teachers (photo above) from the FAN and Carala
Cristina organizations; both organizations are working with
vulnerable families in marginalized areas of Medellin. Each teacher
is responsible for 35 children less than 6 years old. Apart from
this, I am in process of training a new group of 40 teachers from
the Los Alamos institute, who assist children with special needs.
Later this year we plan to train a group of 40 leaders year to reach
800 children.
News
from ICDP Trainer Luis Fernando Lopez Cardozo, employed by the
Health Ministry in the department (province) of Boyacá:
- We
have been implementing the ICDP program for 5 years now. For the
Health sector it was important to insert ICDP as a permanent ongoing
activity specifically designed to promote mental health and good
relationships in families throughout the Boyacá department; ICDP is
present in the plans for action in local municipalities with the aim
of raising the awareness in caregivers about the importance of their
role in supporting and guiding their children, particularly in the
early years. The number of families that receive ICDP are increasing
every year as we are reaching more and more into the communities - and
in parallel we are training more health personnel so that there can be
a follow up, as well as evaluation of the work accomplished. We are
also focusing on strengthening the positive image of the father with
additional activities that we designed for that purpose. This year we
have reached over 1100 new families and in addition we have also
reinforced the 3 dialogues with the families who had received the
training last year. My own involvement is with the Health Ministry,
but the Education Ministry and the Secretariat for Human Development
are also involved in promoting and spreading the ICDP program in
Boyacá.
AUSTRALIA
ICDP Australia has
recently been formed and officially launched in Brisbane; the next
step is for the organization to be legally registered. The process
leading to this development had started over a year ago when Renee
Goetz and Alex Blauensteiner visited Norway to find out more
about ICDP by attending an ICDP course in Oslo; ever since then they
have been actively promoting their idea of bringing ICDP to
Australia and working on it together with others who showed
interest. Two recent activities
mark the beginning of concrete ICDP developments in Australia: a
public fundraising event in Brisbane and an ICDP workshop which
gathered participants from Brisbane, Sydney, Perth, Cairns, as well
as New Zealand.
Renee
Goetz and Sebastian Flynn
Flamenco Guitarist Gerard Mapstone
Fundraising for ICDP: The Gallery Gig series is
based around
an afternoon tea, with high quality musicians and art exhibition
- with proceeds going towards the training of ICDP facilitators.
Sebastian Flynn, is chair of a cultural organization called SICA and
he has joined Renee and Alex in their efforts to promote and
establish the ICDP program in Australia with the aim of improving
the quality of care and interaction offered to children - whether as
a parent or professional care-giver. According to Sebastian,
Australia is looking to improve its poor international record with
the United Nations and UNICEF for the quality of its childcare, and
in these times when parents are working long hours and many children
spend extended periods in care, improvements to caregivers' training
and better interaction between parents and children is a great
cause.
On
Sunday 19 April the first concert recital held at the Clearview
Centre, Seven Hills/Morningside featured
Flamenco Guitarist Gerard Mapstone, one of Australia's finest
classical and flamenco
guitarists
http://www.gerardmapstone.com.au
 The ICDP training
workshop took place a few days after the fundraising event. It was
very successful and as result all
participants showed a lot of interest in the ICDP methodology and
agreed to start implementing the program in practice in small scale
projects, as part of their training. The whole group decided to create
a network, to keep in touch and to continue working together to make
ICDP Australia a reality.
APRIL
PARAGUAY
From ICDP trainer Elizabeth Gavilan:- We applied ICDP in a project
in the small industrial town of Villeta, 45 km south of Asunción, on
the Paraguay River, in the period between May 2008 and April 2009.
Our work was linked to the Program for Improvement of Early
Childhood Education Services by the Ministry of Education, funded
the Interamerican Development Bank; the objective of the Ministry is
to collect experiences in community-based Early Childhood Education
in order to design public policies based on best practices.
We held
the ICDP meetings for 40 families and their children on the premises
of the Catholic convent, on Sunday afternoons, from 2 – 5 pm. We
included creative and recreational activities, greatly enjoyed by
all. The ICDP participants were mostly women, but the few men that
attended were really interesting as they overcame a Paraguayan
prejudice: that child care is an exclusively female job. Our
participants were more Guaraní than Spanish speaking.
We
could not count on laptops or electronic projectors, but we used
photos, interchanging of experiences in small groups, role-playing,
sharing anecdotes and stories. We gained solid experience in all
those alternative methods, and see them as a good way of spreading
ICDP to other parts of the country. One thing crystallized for me
during the years of application of ICDP in pilot projects, in
institutions and on facilitator, as well as caregiver level in
Paraguay: We have to focus on caregivers, and choose from
among caregivers (rather then from among professionals) the best
candidates to be trained as ICDP facilitators. This is because
teachers, social workers and other professionals tend to take their
ICDP task more as an academic one, and sometimes do not see the high
importance of the caregiver’s task that needs to be undertaken in an
affectionate, understanding, enthusiastic and alert manner.
What do evaluation instruments reveal to us so far about the effects
of training in Villeta?
Direct observation,
supported by photographs showed that participants started to talk more
with their children; they practice more physical proximity and have
more eye contact with their children. They take care not to insult or
maltreat their children in any other way. Evaluations after workshops,
as well as spontaneous conversations with participants revealed that
participants felt well during workshops; they value their children
much more and have learned to dialogue with them; they noticed that
having dialogues with one’s children has a good effect and it needs to
be done calmly; they dialogue now with their teenage children too;
they understand that they can be their own children’s teachers
(previously they thought it was something reserved just for school
teachers); they believe children know exactly what it means to be kind
or unkind towards them - they will not obey anybody who treats them
badly, but do so willingly for somebody who treats them well.
Some of participants' comments: “I now know what it is that I am doing
with my children, I have learned terms to describe how I raise them.”
“Thanks to what I am learning here my children converse more with one
another now.” “What a pity the course is soon finishing. For me these
Sunday afternoons are a time when I can truly relax. Thanks to what we
are learning here I have re-established good contact with my oldest
son who is 15 years old and had previously distanced himself from me.
My husband is alcoholic and that is a big unresolved problem but at
least my children and I talk and share now.”
DENMARK
Article
from psychologist Anne Linder, member of the ICDP Board, Denmark
www.authenticus.dk
Relationship is real - but rather invisible force in the pedagogical
work. ICDP increases visibility
Since
my training as psychologist more than 10 years ago, I have been busy
using my educational knowledge to help create good learning
environments. In this process, I have been, professionally and
mentally, strongly support by the ICDP program. In 2002 I was invited
to collaborate with 5 pre-schools who wanted to ensure the quality of
their pedagogical work. Together with external psychological
consultant Peter Westmark, I was invited to join them in their
“educational transformation journey”. The trip was very successful
because the ICDP program became the professional framework which
allowed the pedagogical staff to find the courage to broaden their
outlook – to replace the individual perspective of the child with a
relational perspective. The relationship became the heart of the
pedagogical work during the project. Through increased sensitive
reflection and peer feedback, we focus on the invisible but real
relationships. Using ICDP, we could put in words the power and energy
that are embedded in the relationships. The project was a great
professional and personal satisfaction for the majority of the
participants. We talked about our project throughout the whole of
Denmark to other kindergartens and schools, and published a book
“Relationship Work in kindergarten" Dafolo, 2004.
Former professor of social psychology Per Schultz - Jorgensen called
the project "a milestone in Danish pedagogy." The cornerstone of the
success was actually quite ordinary. We started, supported by the ICDP
to highlight and talk about the obvious and ordinary: human
relationships. The external evaluation showed that the project had
increased the staff’s professional skills, but at the same time the
project proved that employee job satisfaction also increased in
parallel. It was a significant side effect that made me very curios.
How could it be that increase in duties (for example using video
analysis) and “demands for change” were seen positively? Detailed
analysis of the evaluation responses showed that the participants
experienced thoughts and ideas behind ICDP as meaningful and at the
same time a “technical support” for the “invisible – but real
pedagogical work” - which increased both the professionalism and joy
of work.
Many
factors influence both the professionalism and job satisfaction, but
during the last few years I have turned to positive psychology, which
from a scientific point of you is trying to deal with issues like
"what is a good life?" What emotional states increase sensitivity? How
can people feel the joys of life, in times which are characterized by
great complexity and conflicting trends? My professional passion is
concerning the effort to create good life, for young and old, and in
this context I find it difficult (impossible?) to find an alternative
to ICDP. ICDP is scaffolding all my professional activities or in
other words ICDP represents my professional cohesion, whether I work
with individuals, team or organizations. I am convinced that for the
rest of my working life as a psychologist I´ll find meaning and
increase my professional commitment around ICDP.
In
May 2008, the Danish ICDP Board was formed. We are engaged in the
Nordic cooperation and work simultaneously to create a powerful
resource of the ICDP network in Denmark. Currently, it is unclear how
strong and large the ICDP network is in Denmark, but hopefully we can
be more accurate in next years report.
I
have written this little article to assure you that ICDP in Denmark is
strong and alive, and contributes to enrich professionalism and the
joy of working. And
the very best: next month I can practice my ICDP skills together with
my first grandchild. - Anne Linder
NORWAY
Year report from Bydel Alna, Oslo
I work as an ICDP coordinator in Alna, a big community that consists
of about 60.000 inhabitants. I am one of the two main ICDP trainers.
More than 60% of the population are of foreign background. ICDP is
my only task in this community and I have been doing this for about
a year and a half. During that time I trained two groups of
facilitators together with Anne Haga. All together we will soon
have 34 accredited facilitators; 9 are still doing their group work
with parents or colleagues, but they will hopefully fulfil and
deliver their paperwork before the summer! During spring 2008 we put
the ICDP programme into practice with 10 groups and in 3 of these
groups we worked in a foreign language (Urdu). During the autumn the
number was 19 groups; 16 groups (8 for colleagues and 8 for
Norwegian speaking parents) and 3 for parents with foreign languages
(Urdu and Persian Dari). One of the Urdu groups was with fathers
only. There was on average about 6 participants in each group, which
means that last year about 174 persons attended an ICDP course in
this neighbourhood.
It has been easy to recruit facilitators for training, but not as
easy to have parents join the groups. We also experienced that few
of the parents attended all the 8 meetings. But nevertheless, we
noticed that even those who came only once experienced something
important and we concluded that even one "lesson" of ICDP can make a
small change. That is at least what we hope for! People are very
enthusiastic, and it feels so meaningful to work with this program!!
My mission is soon completed here in Alna, but the work with ICDP
will continue by other persons. In the future we really want to
get an appropriate system and establish good routines to record all
the activities, and we are already beginning to work together
with government and HEV to make this happen.
The big plan for the future is that we hope all parents in Norway
may be invited to attend an ICDP group before the children get too
old!!! Best regards from, Eli Ø Baardseth
MARCH
NORWAY
Rani Rajmohan
(in the middle on photo above)) is one of the facilitators involved in
the ICDP implementation with minority groups who has recently
participated in the refresher workshop about ICDP, held on the
2nd March in the Ammerud school, in Oslo. Rani has been implementing
the ICDP program by working with 2 groups of parents per year and is
also the ICDP coordinator for the local council, Bydel Grorud.
She said: " In our council most of the assistants and
kindergarten teachers have been through a course in ICDP. I have been
working with ICDP since 2004 and in my experience it is most
interesting and useful for parents. I see how it influences the
parents' experience of the child in a positive way. It is important
also because it activates parents' cultural practices and values which
help their children's development. It gives parents more
self-confidence."
COLOMBIA
ICDP
activities in the Huila department are continuing to develop. ICDP
Colombia has been working in cooperation with the government
departments; main sponsorship is by UNICEF and Ecopetrol. Recently a
delegate from UNICEF went on a field visit to Neiva, the capital of
the Huila department, to check progress of ICDP implementation planned
in 2008. The visit was to the school "Oliverio Lara Borrero" and the
meeting took place with 8 teachers and coordinators who were trained
as ICDP facilitators and promoters. They showed that ICDP is being
successfully used with children, particularly with those who are
experiencing some difficulties in their school life. The institution
would like to receive more ICDP manuals in order to apply
ICDP with all its preschool and primary school pupils (1200 children).
Click for
information on ICDP in Huila:
Report in Spanish;
Power point 1 with
photos, including also some of the outstanding facilitators;
Power point 2 which explains the
implementation format. Power point 3
with short report.
The official government website announces a meeting in the capital
Neiva of the Huila province, to discuss progress of the ICDP project
and to set future plans; present among others will be Luis Jorge
Sánchez García - the Governor of the province, Paul Martin - the
representative of UNICEF, Nicoletta Armstrong -ICDP International
board member - click on link below:
http://www.gobhuila.gov.co/cms/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7739:gobierno-y-unicef-socializaran-programas-dirigidos-a-la-infancia&catid=54:secretaria-de-salud&Itemid=200
MEXICO
A group of
professionals who were introduced to ICDP in August 2008, have since
formed a team and have now finished preparing written materials with
basic ICDP information with the aim of introducing ICDP to Mexico.
On the 5th of March, Fernando Fatah Nieva, the general director of the
CIMA B&C, together with his colleague Martha Sanchez Aguilar, in
charge of Education projects, started negotiations with the
representatives of DIF (the government area responsible for families)
in the town of Puebla. Their vision is to integrate the ICDP program
through the government networks on large scale.
PERU
News from ICDP
Peru board members, Ana Sofia Mazzini and Fermina Herrera:
Ana Sofía Mazzini Fermina Herrera
ICDP Peru, as a newly registered ICDP national organization, is
currently in process of negotiating an agreement of cooperation with
the Ministry for Women, which is responsible for a nationwide
program called Wawawasi. The Wawawasi program consists in delivering
training about health, nutrition and basic care for children, to
selected mothers from a community, who become known as the Wawawasi
mothers; their task is to take care of children less than 3 years of
age during the hours that the children's parents are at work. The
aim of the ICDP cooperation with the Wawawasi program is to develop
an ICDP pilot project for families and children living in Villa el
Salvador, in the south of Lima. It is planned to form 60 ICDP
facilitators: 30 persons would be chosen from among the health
promoters and 30 from the Wawawasi mothers.
FEBRUARY
BRAZIL
Following the
initiative of Dr Guillermo Navas, the Save the
Children Programme coordinator in Recife, a
new ICDP initiative is being planned for Brazil. Cooperation started
with a
meeting in London between one of the ICDP directors and Maria
José Coutinho, the country director of the Brazilian office of Save
the Children UK. The Save the Children objective is to promote
integral policy for early childhood development and survival including
components of early education, health, nutrition and parenting.
As an outcome of the meeting, a
preliminary plan has been formulated for the
future ICDP implementation in the poor communities of the North-eastern area of Brazil .
NORWAY
(back home)
ICDP in Oslo
The Oslo
municipality is divided in 15 districts with a population
of 560 484. The work of ICDP takes place through Health and Welfare,
at municipality and district levels. The Oslo municipality has 170
facilitators and 60 of these are from minority groups. We are now in
the process of developing a strategy that would secure good quality
implementation of ICDP as part of the daily work of the city
districts' children's services 'bydelenes oppveksttjenester ' and
their networks which are reaching children and families through health
stations, kindergartens, schools, and with a special focus on children
at risk. The facilitators working with the minority groups will
be receiving additional training about awareness raising and ways of
dealing with the problems concerning female genital mutilation. The
facilitators will be enabled to deal with these issues which may come
up in some of the ICDP sessions concerning cultural practices and
themes about limit setting. This work will be in line with the
government current efforts aimed at tackling 3 important areas:
forced marriages, female genital mutilation and use of violence as a
method of control. The ICDP facilitators will be followed up and given
opportunities to share about their experiences on regular basis, and
will have access to advice and counselling as required.
Other areas of
focus for the ICDP work in the Oslo municipality encompasses: a)
working with families whose children have special needs, and b) using
ICDP through child protection services for children at risk, by
working both with parent groups and with individual families on one to
one basis. - Mona Hannestad
MOZAMBIQUE
News from
Pedro Mendes: - During these last few months the focus of our
activities has been on preparing for closure of the three year
intervention project at Khanimambo Education Child Centre. At
the same time we were taking first steps in consolidating our strategy
for the future: the aim is to anchor ICDP in stable and
outreaching institutions and to mainstream the ICDP program in
community organizations. The objective is to train local resource
persons and create a spill over effect and also to keep evaluating the
impact at grass root levels.
A survey using
a pre-post questionnaire that involved 35 children from Khanimambo
showed a clear change in several dimensions. Children said that there
was an improvement in the quality of the teacher-pupil relation,
that adults developed a more open attitude towards them, that the
school atmosphere became more human and relaxed and that the teachers
and other adults started asking them for their views and their
interests.
In terms of
achieving practical results, we keep facing strong obstacles in our
work due to general poverty, daily struggle to survive, HIV and AIDS.
People are demoralized and totally dependent on old-fashioned ways of
functioning and on external material support to counteract their
gloomy destinies. Instead of being self-motivated, active and open to
real changes, they feel hopeless and are unable to see any positive
design for their own future and lack the will to struggle for it.
However, the
ICDP psychosocial intervention is understood and recognized as
necessary, especially by the women. There have been developments in
and around the capital, Maputo. We started working with the
“Mozambican Women Organization” that is extremely dynamic at community
level and it is becoming an active promoter of the ICDP program. A
more systematic and extended cooperation with them is planned for
2009.
We also
started working with the Red Cross and signed a 'Memorandum of
understanding'; in the first phase of our work we are focusing
on the training of the staff at a Day Care Centre for children at high
risk that gives support to 150 children and youngsters.
Religious
organizations continue to be the most reliable vehicles in spreading
our messages. We started projects working with two new communities,
both extremely needy. In spite of their difficult circumstances we
know that their religious beliefs will greatly assist the ICDP process
and will have a positive impact on the behaviour towards their
children and families in the future.
Mainstreaming
of psychosocial support is of critical importance in Mozambique
because, according to the Health Ministry calculations, there are 500
new infections every day and as result the number of orphans is
increasing dramatically. This situation is putting pressure on us to
increase and extend our ICDP work.
JANUARY
Download the ICDP calendar 2009
ICDP INTERNATIONAL HEAD
OFFICE
We welcome
Kristina Aas Fure to the ICDP International head-office! Kristina is
replacing Trine who took maternity leave.
ICDP NORWAY
Photo above shows ICDP trainers at the ICDP head-office at a meeting
in January. They started to work on the revision of the ICDP training
procedures for Norway, under the supervision of Professor Karsten
Hundeide: Hilde Tornes (on far right) and Mona Hannestad (in the
middle) are members of the board of ICDP Norway. Grete Flakk (on far
left) is employed by the Directorate for Children, Youth and Family
Affairs to coordinate the ICDP Parental Guidance project which is
spreading to most regions in Norway. The implementation of ICDP has
reached 37 new municipalities since last year. Hilda is developing
ICDP projects in Bergen adapted for use with special needs children.
Mona has been coordinating the ICDP Minority Project which is
gradually spreading all over Norway. In the Oslo municipality ICDP is
implemented with families and children through different networks,
such as health stations, kindergartens, preschools and social
services. There are 170 ICDP trained facilitators of which 70 are
working with minority groups.
PLANS FOR UKRAINE
Marianne Fresjarå (on photo below )is from the Norwegian Peace
Association. She has recently established close cooperation with the
ICDP international team. For over ten years Marianne has been involved
with educational projects in Antratsit (town in the Donetsk region of
Ukraine) and has developed partnership with several local institutions
working for the benefit of children at risk.Through her work over the
years she became aware of the importance of programs such as ICDP and
this led her to contact the ICDP Oslo office. Following her initiative
to introduce ICDP to Ukraine and with the assistance from the ICDP
team, she formulated an ICDP project proposal and started the process
of seeking funding from various sources in Norway.
DEVELOPMENTS IN SWEDEN
At the annual meeting in 2008, Karin Edenhammar resigned from her
position as chair of the ICDP Sweden Foundation but will continue as
an honorary member of the board. Annelie Waldau Bergman was
elected as the new chairperson. Annelie is a
psychologist/psychotherapist and has been working with the foundation
since year 2000. There is another new member of the board, Lilian
Berggren, a psychologist active at Örebro University and
Barnrättsakademien (Children’s Rights Academy).
In 2008 a new training program for trainers started to develop
all over the country, with 70 accredited trainers/supervisors.
ICDP training reached out also to some new areas, such as training
groups of social workers in geriatric care. The first group started in
November. Plans are made to host a conference in June 2009 about the
inclusion of ICDP in geriatric care. A project that educates young
students in ICDP guided interaction has also been initiated. It is an
adaptation of the ICDP program to meet the needs of young people
today. The purpose of the project is to reduce alienation and
rejection amongst younger pupils at intermediate schools.
In September, Peter Westmark from Denmark held a much appreciated
seminar on the theme “Golden Moments” in Västervik. In November, a
seminar on the theme “Guided Interaction and Creativity” was held in
Stockholm. Lecturers included Petri Partanen, Paul Bergman, Benny
Marcel (from the Cultural Council) and a guest from Denmark, Anne
Linder.
The ICDP Foundation has started an evaluation project, funded by the
government's health institute. The evaluation is part of the effort to
ensure quality of training. A research project has also been
initiated, in cooperation with Linköpings University. The goal is to
find out whether professionally educated caregivers more easily detect
and understand interaction. There will also be an evaluation of
parenting groups.
ICDP Sweden has started a joint-stock company, ICDP AB. The
purpose is to hire through the foundation consultants trained in ICDP
guided interaction for different assignments, such as lectures and
educations.
A number of books, booklets and manuals are currently being edited.
There was a need for a review and update, as it is almost eight
years since their initial release. In March 2009, the Swedish homepage
will be rebuilt to meet the needs for clearer and more easily
accessible information. The address is
www.icdp.se
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