09:00 – 09:20: Arrival

09:20 – 09:30: Welcome and Introductions

09:30 – 10:15: Keynote speech

  • Why we Need Attachment and Trauma Responsive Practice for Optimal Learning with Dr Janet Rose
    • The keynote will outline some key theories and research behind attachment and trauma responsive practice and highlight how unmet attachment needs and trauma affects pupils’ ability to learn in an optimal way. It will signpost some of the attachment and trauma responsive practice being undertaken in school communities by identifying some practical, evidence-based strategies that are both realistic and effective in supporting pupils to improve their ability to self-regulate their feelings and behaviour, enhance their mental health and wellbeing, develop greater resilience and engage more effectively with their learning.

10:15 – 10:30: Break

10:30 – 11:30 Workshops (you will be asked to select your preferred workshop when booking):

  • Inclusive School Improvement with Nic Crossley
    • In this workshop, Nic will explore how a Theory of Change approach can help leaders really refine their approach to school improvement, ensuring it is rooted in evidence and drives tangible evidence of impact – particularly for marginalised groups.
      This workshop is suitable for leaders at all levels, but particularly those looking for a structured approach that can be implemented at class, department, and whole-school level.
  • Pans / Pandas with Tina Coope  and Miranda Barker
    • Paediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome (PANS) which encompasses PANDAS (Paediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disease Associated with Strep) is a post infectious medical condition which is little known but rising in prominence. A defining feature of this condition is an abrupt onset, where children can suddenly develop symptoms of obsessive compulsive disorder, tics or eating disorders, alongside a further wealth of cognitive, physical and social and emotional symptoms.  Children can quickly develop unexpected SEND.

      In this session, Tina Coope, Education Lead for PANS PANDAS UK, together with Andrew Edgar and Miranda Barker, Senior Lecturers in Education at Birmingham Newman will explore the role of teachers in identifying and supporting children and their families who are experiencing PANS PANDAS and reflect on the importance of developing awareness in our educational settings.

  • Zones of Regulation: Teaching Children to Manage Big Feelings Through Effective Social and Emotional Learning with Charlotte Moore
    • Self regulation is something everyone continually works on whether we are aware of it or not. If we,as educators, can teach our children to recognise when they are becoming less regulated, then we will be more able to provide them with the opportunity to do something postive about it. Giving our children these tools for emotional regulation can then lead to a more postive self image, higher learning engagement and a more positive attitude to self and school. This of course comes more naturally for some, but for others it is a skill that needs more attention and practise. Zones of Regulation is a whole school approach that supports the development of these skills in a positive and effective way.
  • Getting Ready for ‘Care Experience’ Becoming a Protected Characteristic with Keith Bishop
    • There is growing momentum towards making ’care experience’ a protected characteristic. Are you ready if this becomes law?
      We know that children with care experience face significant barriers and often have poorer outcomes than their non-care experienced friends. We also know that many practitioners are deeply committed to seeing children overcome these barriers, and who willingly go the extra mile to help our children thrive.
      This workshop will discuss and share the good practice which seeks to improve educational outcomes for children in care.
  • A Relational Approach to Behaviour Management with Tony Clifford
    • In this workshop we will be exploring some issues around taking a relational approach to behaviour. Is there a necessary conflict between behaviourist and relational – aka ‘trauma and attachment informed’ – approaches? Can we have both high standards and a high level of support for young people? How does our approach to behaviour link to our overall purpose as enablers of learning? Tony will draw on his work as a headteacher, Virtual head and current consultant to a number of local authorities and charities working with vulnerable young people.
  • The Futures Trust Workshop: Reshaping and Redefining 21st Century Education: Building an Attachment Aware & Trauma-Informed Community. with Nicolas Mort, Zoe Richards, Dr George Harris
    • The lived daily experience for all stakeholders in education has been transformed in recent years. Schools have changed; the mental health and wellbeing of staff have changed; SEND and inclusive provision have changed and classroom practice has changed. This workshop will provide practical ‘theory into practice’ examples, from both a system and school leadership perspective, of how an evidence-informed and relational approach to building trauma-informed and attachment aware communities, can have a transformational impact on the lives of young people and families.
  • Exploring Hopeful Practice around Equality, Diversion and Inclusion (EDI) in Schools: An Appreciative Inquiry Workshop with Ben Johnson
    • This workshop recognises that in education many minoritised groups experience similar forms of oppression, e.g. lack of visibility within the curriculum, lack of training amongst staff to meet their needs and a hostile political and media climate. Furthermore, intersectional approaches already highlight how many individuals experience oppression based on multiple social identities (e.g. Crenshaw, 1989). However, much good practice around equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) exists and initiatives which aims to embed EDI throughout the curriculum (for example; Moncrieffe, 2020; DePalma and Atkinson, 2009) are being taught and developed in an increasing number of schools. Accordingly, this workshop aims to create a space to interrogate wider systems of oppression and foster a critical consciousness (Freire, 2017) around how wider systems of oppression (racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism and cisgenderism) can be challenged. Drawing upon an Appreciative Inquiry model, which focuses on what is working well and asks how can we get more of it? This workshop aims to bring together educational practitioners from different contexts and locations to explore how we can develop teaching training, provision and support for EDI provision. Participants will be asked to reflect in small groups around elements of best practice in embedding EDI initiatives. The workshop will then explore the 4D’s of Appreciative Inquiry (Cockell and McArthur-Blair, 2012); Discovery (what gives life?), Dream (what might be?), Design (how can it be?) and Destiny (what will be?) as a positive, rather than combative, framework for exploring EDI education. One of the benefits of this approach is that it engages in a ‘pedagogy of hope’ (Freire, 2004) which privileges possibilities rather than problems.

11:30 – 11:45: Break

11:45 – 12:45: Workshops (you will be asked to select your preferred workshop when booking):

  • Inclusive School Improvement with Nic Crossley
    • In this workshop, Nic will explore how a Theory of Change approach can help leaders really refine their approach to school improvement, ensuring it is rooted in evidence and drives tangible evidence of impact – particularly for marginalised groups.
      This workshop is suitable for leaders at all levels, but particularly those looking for a structured approach that can be implemented at class, department, and whole-school level.
  • Pans / Pandas with Tina Coope and Miranda Barker
    • Paediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome (PANS) which encompasses PANDAS (Paediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disease Associated with Strep) is a post infectious medical condition which is little known but rising in prominence. A defining feature of this condition is an abrupt onset, where children can suddenly develop symptoms of obsessive compulsive disorder, tics or eating disorders, alongside a further wealth of cognitive, physical and social and emotional symptoms.  Children can quickly develop unexpected SEND.

      In this session, Tina Coope, Education Lead for PANS PANDAS UK, together with Andrew Edgar and Miranda Barker, Senior Lecturers in Education at Birmingham Newman will explore the role of teachers in identifying and supporting children and their families who are experiencing PANS PANDAS and reflect on the importance of developing awareness in our educational settings.

  • Zones of Regulation: Teaching Children to Manage Big Feelings Through Effective Social and Emotional Learning with Charlotte Moore
    • Self regulation is something everyone continually works on whether we are aware of it or not. If we,as educators, can teach our children to recognise when they are becoming less regulated, then we will be more able to provide them with the opportunity to do something postive about it. Giving our children these tools for emotional regulation can then lead to a more postive self image, higher learning engagement and a more positive attitude to self and school. This of course comes more naturally for some, but for others it is a skill that needs more attention and practise. Zones of Regulation is a whole school approach that supports the development of these skills in a positive and effective way.
  • Getting Ready for ‘Care Experience’ Becoming a Protected Characteristic with Keith Bishop
    • There is growing momentum towards making ’care experience’ a protected characteristic. Are you ready if this becomes law?
      We know that children with care experience face significant barriers and often have poorer outcomes than their non-care experienced friends. We also know that many practitioners are deeply committed to seeing children overcome these barriers, and who willingly go the extra mile to help our children thrive.
      This workshop will discuss and share the good practice which seeks to improve educational outcomes for children in care.
  • A Relational Approach to Behaviour Management with Tony Clifford
    • In this workshop we will be exploring some issues around taking a relational approach to behaviour. Is there a necessary conflict between behaviourist and relational – aka ‘trauma and attachment informed’ – approaches? Can we have both high standards and a high level of support for young people? How does our approach to behaviour link to our overall purpose as enablers of learning? Tony will draw on his work as a headteacher, Virtual head and current consultant to a number of local authorities and charities working with vulnerable young people.
  • The Futures Trust Workshop: Reshaping and Redefining 21st Century Education: Building an Attachment Aware & Trauma-Informed Community. with Nicolas Mort, Zoe Richards, Dr George Harris
    • The lived daily experience for all stakeholders in education has been transformed in recent years. Schools have changed; the mental health and wellbeing of staff have changed; SEND and inclusive provision have changed and classroom practice has changed. This workshop will provide practical ‘theory into practice’ examples, from both a system and school leadership perspective, of how an evidence-informed and relational approach to building trauma-informed and attachment aware communities, can have a transformational impact on the lives of young people and families.
  • Exploring Hopeful Practice around Equality, Diversion and Inclusion (EDI) in Schools: An Appreciative Inquiry Workshop with Ben Johnson
    • This workshop recognises that in education many minoritised groups experience similar forms of oppression, e.g. lack of visibility within the curriculum, lack of training amongst staff to meet their needs and a hostile political and media climate. Furthermore, intersectional approaches already highlight how many individuals experience oppression based on multiple social identities (e.g. Crenshaw, 1989). However, much good practice around equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) exists and initiatives which aims to embed EDI throughout the curriculum (for example; Moncrieffe, 2020; DePalma and Atkinson, 2009) are being taught and developed in an increasing number of schools. Accordingly, this workshop aims to create a space to interrogate wider systems of oppression and foster a critical consciousness (Freire, 2017) around how wider systems of oppression (racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism and cisgenderism) can be challenged. Drawing upon an Appreciative Inquiry model, which focuses on what is working well and asks how can we get more of it? This workshop aims to bring together educational practitioners from different contexts and locations to explore how we can develop teaching training, provision and support for EDI provision. Participants will be asked to reflect in small groups around elements of best practice in embedding EDI initiatives. The workshop will then explore the 4D’s of Appreciative Inquiry (Cockell and McArthur-Blair, 2012); Discovery (what gives life?), Dream (what might be?), Design (how can it be?) and Destiny (what will be?) as a positive, rather than combative, framework for exploring EDI education. One of the benefits of this approach is that it engages in a ‘pedagogy of hope’ (Freire, 2004) which privileges possibilities rather than problems.

12:45 – 14:45: Lunch

13:45 – 14:45: Keynote speech

  • Embedding the Anti-Racism Framework for Initial Teacher Education at Birmingham Newman University – The Journey So Far with Sohail Khan
    • The Anti-Racism Framework was launched in March 2023 having been developed through a research project commissioned by the NEU and supported by internal funding from Newcastle University. The project was led by Professor Heather J Smith (Newcastle University) and Professor Vini Lander (Leeds Beckett University). The project aimed to generate new data and evidence for the publication of a freely available and widely disseminated, trusted, accessible and research-informed anti-racism framework for Initial Teacher Education/Training in England. The project was seen to be of vital importance to education more broadly given that reference to anti-racism is absent in current policy and hence there is no current guidance for ITE/T providers on anti-racism in ITE/T. This has led to a situation in which the most recent DfE survey, mirroring previous results, revealed that only 53% of newly qualified teachers, six months into their first post, felt well prepared to teach pupils from all ethnic backgrounds and only 39% felt well prepared to teach pupils with English as an additional language. And yet there remains continued differential patterns of education access and outcomes for pupils from BAGM (Black Asian Global Majority) heritage as revealed in the government’s own Race Disparity Audit and associated statistics. The way that we educate current and future teachers has a central role in enacting change in the classroom and in curriculum and policy development to break this cycle. The hope, therefore, is that the framework will be used to inform policy development.

14:45 – 15:00: Plenary