Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 1 GUFOVA - Growing Up Free of Violence and Abuse - working to build resilience and strengthen children who have lived with domestic violence Patricia Bell, Ravi K. Thiara and Christine Harrison Introduction Prevalence of domestic violence 1 and impact on children The impetus for the GUFOVA Project, funded by the European Union under the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme between February 2019 to January 2021 2 , arose from the fact that domestic violence is a problem for a significant number of women, and many will have children living with them at the time. German statistics estimate that almost 25% of women experience domestic violence and half have children living with them at the time 3 , whilst British studies indicate that 29.5% of all children are exposed to domestic violence before the age of 18 4 . Austria and Denmark report about one third of all women experiencing domestic violence and the figure for Bosnia and Herzegovina was higher at 38% 5 . That a significant proportion of children will suffer the impact of living with domestic violence is clear from research, which has established that many women report domestic violence starting or escalating around the birth of their first child 6 . Pre-school children are, therefore, overrepresented in households where domestic violence is a problem 7 and, consequently, women with dependent children are found to be three times more likely to be victims of domestic violence than women without dependent children 8 . The impact on children of living with domestic violence is estimated to cost up to 0.5% GDP (see Method of Calculating Costs by Dr. Karin Schönpflug on the GUFOVA website www.gufova.eu). Children suffer long term consequences as a result of living with domestic violence 9 . The impact will depend on their specific situations/contexts, the frequency and severity of violence and a range of resiliency factors which can ameliorate the long-term consequences. Nevertheless, it is known that children living with domestic violence are at increased risk of being physically, emotionally and sexually abused 10 . Violence and abuse do not always end with the separation of the parents 11 and can include stalking, violence and abuse against women when children are handed over for contact visits and violence against children during contact 12 . Considerable research has highlighted the continuing impact of abusive ex-partners on the lives of children and their mothers for many years after separation, including ongoing coercive control of children from non-custodial parents 13 Therefore, although parental separation may have put an end to violent assaults in the home, children are forced to live for many years with “abusive masculinity and constrained femininity” 14 as an ongoing reality in their lives, where the ‘’Absent Presence’’ of the abuser continues to cast a shadow 15 . The consequences of post-separation contact can be severe and, for some children, even fatal 16 Children experience violence and abuse pre- and post-separation and there is also a correlation between intimate partner violence in the household and sexual violation of children 17 . Estimates of prevalence are hard to assess, but a meta-analysis of English language sources found minimum estimates of 15-20% for girls and 7-8% for boys 18 , which was similar to findings in Germany 19 Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 2 Contrary to the popular view, and like the experiences of adult women, sexual violence against children occurs most often in a domestic setting 20 . Many of the difficulties children face in talking about their experiences are also similar to the difficulties faced by adult victims of intimate partner violence and research suggests that most children do not disclose until they are adults 21 Support for women and children For the first time in the 1970s, women and their children were offered life-saving support through women’s shelters. The first women’s shelter was opened in Chiswick, London, in 1971 and offered emergency accommodation to women and children fleeing violence in their own homes. The initiative rapidly spread throughout Europe. By 1976, there were already more than 100 women’s shelters operating in the UK and three were opened in Germany, in Berlin, Cologne and Frankfurt and the first women’s shelter opened in Vienna in 1978 and in Denmark in 1979. Since the women’s shelter movement was a product of second wave feminism, these shelters were organised along non-hierarchical lines of self-help and supportive sisterhood. A 1975 recommendation of the UK Parliamentary Select Committee on Violence in Marriage 22 for one family place per 10,000 of population was rejected by the UK Government on the basis that the shelter movement was so new it was dealing with pent up demand which would not be sustained 23 . A current network of 1,914 shelters throughout Europe 24 bears witness to the consistency of demand and the minimum recommendation of one family place for every 10,000 population, now enshrined in the Istanbul Convention 25 , continues to be well justified. The goal, then as now, is the eradication of male violence against women, but no one envisaged that 50 years later shelters would still be struggling to cope with demand for accommodation and support from women and children fleeing violence in their own homes. Ratification of the Istanbul Convention, which commits countries to the terms of the treaty, was completed in Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Denmark in 2014 and in Germany in 2018. At the time of writing, early in 2021, the United Kingdom had signed, but not ratified, the treaty and Turkey withdrew altogether. The success of the women’s shelter movement, as a model for tackling domestic violence, was undoubtedly due to the fervour of feminist political grassroots organising. This had a widespread social impact, including on training for a wide range of professionals, such as social workers and police officers. Legal change has also been achieved, for example, outlawing rape in marriage and new legal protection measures to exclude abusive men from family homes to ensure greater safety for women and children. From the 1990s, the problem has received greater mainstream recognition as well as additional services, such as perpetrator programmes. Moreover, the impact of domestic violence on children, previously regarded as ‘hidden victims’, has been widely recognised by statutory services. Arguably, this has also resulted in a de-politicisation of the issue and a displacement of attention on women. Children may now be recognised as victims of domestic violence, but affording them protection against perpetrators who use the argument of ‘shared parenting’ to continue control and abuse, has yet to be achieved. The EU funded CEINAV (Cultural Encounters in Interventions Against Violence) project which investigated intervention cultures throughout Europe has identified a move to standardise procedures in tackling gendered violence which reduce the opportunities for victims-survivors to participate in decision-making. This poses a danger if recognition of the impact of domestic violence on children is reduced simply to a child protection issue, where interventions ‘for their own good’ can themselves become a form of Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 3 coercive control 26 . This is particularly the case when interventions exclusively target women as ‘failing mothers’ and perpetrators are seldom challenged and hardly ever prosecuted 27 . Such challenges have led some to argue that a reconnection to feminist politics is necessary to effectively ensure the long-term welfare of both women and their children. Historically, women’s shelters have consistently campaigned for recognition of children as victims of domestic violence 28 . Studies have detailed the expertise children’s workers in women’s shelters and similar specialist domestic violence services have developed in building children’s resilience, coping mechanisms and self-confidence 29 . Through groupwork, individual counselling and a range of recreational activities with other children, their horizons are expanded enabling them to learn alternatives to the use of aggressive behaviour, to make sense of their experiences and to change how they see themselves and to succeed in education and careers. Women’s shelters have also developed skills in breaking taboos about domestic violence, helping children to heal from violence and abuse (including sexual abuse), aiding disclosure and repairing damaged child-mother relationships 30 Despite their wealth of knowledge and skills, the provision of children’s work in women’s shelters is very patchy, primarily a result of inadequate funding for such work. In Germany, some women’s shelters have well-established teams of staff dedicated to working with children and well-resourced indoor and outdoor recreation areas. In other places, shelters rely on donations to provide necessary play materials and volunteers to take children on outings 31 . Children’s work is not seen as a core activity and the budget is often the first to be cut when resources are tight. Yet, supporting children is an invaluable support to their mothers. Furthermore, the implications of not investing in children’s services, such as low educational attainment, reduced employment prospects and lifelong psychological difficulties, are a tremendous cost to society. Women’s shelters are in a unique position to support children and their mothers. During the family’s stay in a shelter, children’s (and other) workers are present and thus able to interact with children frequently and informally, which enables them to rapidly build a trusting relationship. This may be the first time a child has encountered an adult who talks openly about violence, condemns it and invites the child to share their feelings. This can be life changing. However, shelters by their very nature, offer temporary accommodation and most children have no access to the support they offer in the longer term. Instead, their continued wellbeing relies on other professionals with whom they come into contact, and the professionals’ ability to provide high quality support to children. Undoubtedly, there is a need for ongoing support to children following their stay in a shelter and for the very many children who never enter a women’s shelter for a whole variety of reasons. Thus, the main aim of this project is to draw on the expertise of women’s shelters to develop and implement training for a wide range of professionals on how to work effectively to build resilience and strengthen children who have lived with domestic violence. Restrictions on shelter support The women’s shelter movement has demonstrated that domestic violence is a widespread and serious social problem with long term consequences for women and children which require adequately resourced interventions that focus on building confidence and self-esteem of victim- Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 4 survivors. The fact that the problem of domestic violence has not been solved in the last 50 years is not an argument to give up, rather to step up support. That women’s shelters are still full and turning away women and children in need is not a sign of failure, but a success that routes to safety exist. Much progress has been made in attracting marginalised groups, such as women who face multiple disadvantage and those from diverse migrant groups. In some countries, such as the UK, there is a history of autonomous organisation by Black and minoritised women against violence against women and children since the late 1970s. Legal changes, such as being able to exclude violent men from the family home and the expansion of advice and counselling services linked to shelters, enable many women to separate from a violent partner without recourse to accommodation in a shelter. These changes have impacted on the profile of shelter residents and it is the experience of shelter workers that they seldom support women whose only problem is domestic violence 32 Following legal, policy and service developments, women have a greater number of options available to them when deciding which course of action when confronted with domestic violence. They can legally exclude their partners from the family home, and some are able to buy or rent accommodation. They can access advice and counselling centres, run by women’s shelters or co- operating closely with women’s shelters, or even quite independent services. Many more women are in the workforce than in the 1970’s, when the first women’s shelters opened. State provision of childcare is improving in some contexts, albeit not at a pace to keep up with demand. Consequently, more women earn money and are in a position to access legal advice and support they need, however, financial abuse and control is a feature of domestic violence and many women will not have access to independent resources, even if they have continued to earn during the relationship. Women who do move into women’s shelters are not a cross section of society, but rather reflect the impact of wider societal discrimination. Thus, women entering shelters may be fleeing from a violent partner, whilst at the same time dealing with extreme poverty, high debt levels, lack of family or community support, unfamiliarity with local institutions and administrative structures and a poor grasp of the local language. These women can be helped and supported in shelters and there is still a need for securing and extending shelter provision. Many women are helped, but there is a larger group of women who are not served by existing provision. Black and minoritised women, because of their intersectional location in society, encounter multiple barriers in seeking to end violence in their lives. They stay longer in abusive relationships due to racism, unfamiliarity and knowledge of mainstream systems and a lack of adequate dedicated provision for them and their children. It is widely acknowledged that specialised services run by Black and minoritised women for Black and minoritised women are in short supply. The EU funded SNaP project identified specific groups of women who are not adequately served by existing shelter provision in Europe. These include women who are subject to mechanisms of exclusion and denigration which result in a socially produced disability because of physical, cognitive and mental challenges; migrant and refugee women with insecure immigration status; and those with mental ill- health. In addition, women in rural areas and women with many children are also poorly served by existing shelter provision 33 . In some contexts, it is argued that there is a need for more local shelters, rather than clusters of shelters in cities. Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 5 Many shelters are very effective at networking and need more resources to be able to do this, for example, so that they have time to attend the Family Court and give evidence on behalf of children or attend multi-agency case conferences. Their insight and expertise are needed in coalition building to campaign and lobby for children’s human rights in relation to domestic violence and its aftermath. Note on terminology Throughout this manual, women and children will be described as victims and victim-survivors of domestic violence and men and fathers as perpetrators. This is done for ease of reading, as male violence towards female partners is the most prevalent form of domestic violence. It is not intended to ignore or deny that, in some cases, women may be perpetrators and men victims of domestic violence and that domestic violence can also take place in same sex relationships. Domestic violence describes the location of violence, in the home, which means that it is pervasive and there is no respite from the constant threat of physical, verbal, emotional and sexual assaults. Actual assaults may be frequent and severe, or seldom and result in no lasting injury, however living with the perpetrator means there is a constant danger and no safe haven. The impact on women and their children becomes all-encompassing and inhibits ‘their freedom to be and think without reference to the potential for abuse’ 34 . The term, intimate partner violence is sometimes used, which describes the relationship between victim and perpetrator. The term coercive control, which entered UK law in 2015 and Danish law in 2020, is not employed extensively as this term is not current in German language debates. Nevertheless, it is recognised that physical violence may not be necessary to control women and children and coerce them into complying with a perpetrator’s expectations. It is also acknowledged that coercive control constitutes most situations of domestic violence and the term is used on occasion in this manual to emphasise this point. The use of the term “sexual abuse of children” has been called into question as it could imply that there is a legitimate “sexual use” of children. Alternative terminology has been employed, such as, “sexual violation of children” and “sexualised violence against children”. However, as the term sexual abuse of children is so widespread, the term is also used in this manual as many people are familiar with it and understand what is meant. This manual positions children as subjects, individuals with rights including the right to live free of violence and abuse. Too often children are treated as objects that belong to their parents, this is regrettably clear in some child contact and living arrangement disputes following parental separation. This manual takes the child’s perspective, for example, a child’s right to contact to both parents unless this might cause them harm. During the project, Austria and Germany have included children’s rights in their constitution. It is too early to say what impact this may have on professional practice in working with children. One obvious benefit is to simplify some child protection procedures by having children’s rights clearly stated in one piece of legislation, rather than in a myriad of national and local legislation on education, social welfare, and housing. Throughout the manual, Practical Examples of professional practice from participating organisations are highlighted. For example, the practice of Lübeck Women’s Shelter in Germany which makes a point of introducing children to democratic structures which protect their rights. Thus, children visit the police, child protection departments and the town hall to make the professionals and children visible to each other and especially the professional who make decisions about their welfare. Children are thus informed that they have rights, are encouraged to find their voice and given an indication of how it can be effectively used to defend those rights. Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 6 Participating Organisations ZÖF, Association of Austrian Women’s Shelters, Austria KJA, Children and Adolescent Advocacy Vienna, Austria City of Vienna, Child and Family Support, Austria City of Vienna, Child and Youth Support, Professional Development and Quality Assurance Udružene žene , Foundation United Women Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina LOKK, National Organisation of Women’s Shelters in Denmark Holstebro Women’s Shelter, Denmark Danish Ministry for Children, Denmark Angelou Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, England Panahghar, Coventry, England Cheshire without Abuse, England City of Lübeck, Department of Child and Family Support, Germany Lübeck Women’s Shelter, Germany City of Hannover, Department for Women and Equality, Germany Hannover Women’s Shelter, Germany KIS, Co-ordination and Intervention against domestic violence and stalking, Leipzig, Germany City Leipzig, Office for Children, Families and Education, Germany All participants and partners were involved in contributing to the international meetings, commenting on the training manual and developing policy recommendations for participating countries. The manual is also translated into Danish, German and Serbian and all versions are available online. Karin Schönpflug from the Institute of Advanced Studies, Vienna produced an assessment of the costs of children growing up with violence. From this a lobbying tool for children’s work has been developed and is available on the GUFOVA website. Training Manual Professionals working with children may not realize that they are specialists in dealing with domestic violence. An analysis of their workload, with a specific focus on domestic violence, shows that almost 80% 35 of all child protection assessments in the UK involve children who live with domestic violence. Whether or not this is explicitly acknowledged, in order to provide an effective service, professionals concerned with child protection need to build their confidence and skills in dealing with children affected by domestic violence as part of also supporting women’s parenting. To do this they need to: • Acknowledge that domestic violence constitutes a major cause of harm to children. • Increase their knowledge and awareness of the needs of children and young people who have been affected by domestic violence. • Relate this to crisis intervention, direct work, and longer-term help and support in an inter-agency context. • Apply learning to consider improvements to service and agency responses to children and women. Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 7 • Consider how the relationships between children and their mothers can be promoted to support children’s needs. • Understand the complex safety needs of children (and women) when contact with fathers is being considered, facilitated, or court ordered. • Raise awareness of diversity amongst children and women affected by domestic violence and abuse and of the impact of intersecting aspects of oppression. • Think in terms of a developmental trajectory of children (from before birth). • Consider the impact on women in relation to the impact on children and vice versa. • Acknowledge that mothering can be a target for domestic violence and abuse. • Recognise the extent and impact of post-separation violence, which can sometimes be fatal. • Recognise that ongoing consequences, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, can be compounded by other forms of oppression. Structure of the training manual The manual has been divided into three major sections looking at: • What children living with domestic violence experience and what they need. • The impact of living with violence on the child’s relationship to the mother. • The impact of living with violence on the child’s relationship to the father. Divorce or separation may end a woman’s relationship with a violent partner, but her children may have continuing contact with their father, and this can have a significant impact on her and her child’s life for many years. Therefore, a section on post-separation issues for children (and their mothers) is included to highlight the long-term impact abusive men can have on women and children many years after separation and divorce. Surviving domestic violence is more than ending physical assault. Surviving means not only being able to name the violence and abuse, but also being believed and becoming safe. It is also more than having access to social and criminal justice mechanisms and primary preventive anti-violence measures, such as perpetrator programmes. It requires ongoing access to practical and therapeutic help for women and children through a range of interlocking services and interventions. This enables women and children to develop ‘space for action’ 36 in their lives. Each of the following 12 training modules is designed as a whole day event to allow networking. The decision to present the modules as whole day events was made as a result of piloting and evaluating the training modules in Austria, England and Germany. The pilot trainings clearly demonstrated that giving professionals time to discuss the issues was of enormous benefit. Their own anxieties, insecurities and concerns can be considered without pressure to make a timely life-changing decision on safeguarding a child’s welfare. This opportunity enables them to feel more skilled and confident in being able to deal with complex and serious problems. Furthermore, there is great value in enabling frontline professionals to exchange with local colleagues from different agencies in an informal way and the delivery of the modules/sub-modules should allow for refreshment breaks and space for participants to mingle and chat. Local informal networks can be a source of support in a child welfare crisis and increase professional competence in finding solutions by improving Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 8 interagency cooperation. Protocols for cooperation may exist on an organisational level, but rely on channels of communication between frontline staff. These staff need to develop an understanding of the roles, responsibilities, priorities and pressures of other agencies. Generous break time was rated as highly valuable by participants fortunate enough to attend live training sessions. If, however, training must be delivered in a shorter time, each module can divide into two, comprising Introduction & Groupwork 1 and a second module of Groupwork 2 and Final Groupwork. Alternatively, the content of Groupwork 1 can be delivered by the facilitator in a longer introductory session. Allowing time for informal networking and discussions is invaluable in developing a robust local support system for women and children and full day trainings are strongly recommended. The aim is to bring professionals together locally to network and these training modules are designed to be delivered to interagency local groups of frontline professionals who come into contact with children, such as: social workers; schoolteachers; pre-school teachers; child minders, health care staff; police officers; family court officials; youth workers; child and family counsellors and similar professionals. The training is also useful to support staff and those working informally with children, such as in sports clubs. A child does not choose an adult to approach about their problems based on their professional qualification. For example, a child may confide in the dinner lady at school or a volunteer who supervises a junior football team. These people, too, should be able to give an appropriate response and immediate reassurance before passing the concern on to someone in a position to deal with the issue. The trainings are specifically designed to accommodate the needs of professionals with a lot of experience of dealing with the problem and those with less experience or none. Each of the modules follows the same format. To encourage interaction, participants will be divided into small groups and care should be taken to promote interagency networking in creating the groups. As far as possible, each group should have a mixture of different professionals from different organisations and with different levels of experience, that is newly qualified and those with many years of service. The best support for any child experiencing any form of maltreatment or difficulty is an effective local network of relevant professionals with an understanding of their issues. Professionals need opportunities to network to develop the ability to understand how other agencies work, how they view the problem and what their priorities are. Once this is achieved, this understanding can be used to effectively negotiate the local support structure. A shared conceptualisation of the problem as a baseline for further action is the goal. Institutional barriers to joint working can be slowly overcome as experience is gained ensuring a better service delivery for women and children. The concept of the Childhood House, originally developed in Scandinavia, and already adopted in some German cities, is one model for improving multi-agency cooperation. In cases of suspected child abuse, the child is taken to a place where they can be medically examined and interviewed by police and child protection services. This all takes place in one building designed to be as child friendly as possible. It is staffed by professionals from a variety of institutions who have been specially trained to interview children, and the interviews are recorded. The professionals then share information among themselves, thus obviating the need for children to go from agency to agency repeating their evidence. One improvement to this model suggested in meetings, would be for children to receive ongoing support in the same setting. Currently, these Childhood Houses are used by professionals investigating child abuse. Once the legal requirements are complete, ongoing support for the child, such as any counselling or therapy must be separately arranged. The provision Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 9 of such ongoing support varies greatly from place to place and, in general, there is a lack of ongoing therapeutic support available to children. These services need to be developed further. Multi-agency Training Materials The training materials are intended to be delivered by staff from specialised domestic violence services, who can draw on their practical experience of working with women and children who have lived (or are living) with violence in their homes. This level of insight and skill is required, not only to enable them to add new insights and developments into the training materials of relevance to a group of local professionals, but also to have the breadth and depth of context to adequately deal with challenges. For example, there is an increasing trend to medicalise the impact of domestic violence. This can lead to an individualisation of the problem, rather than recognising the context of domestic violence as anchored in structural gender inequality. Similarly, viewing domestic violence as a generationally transmitted public health issue, fails to acknowledge how other forms of societal discrimination, based on race, class, gender and disability (alone and intersectionally) reduce an individual’s options to achieve change 37 . It is much easier to express frustration at individual failure to take advantage of advice and opportunities for change, rather than direct frustration at the causes of limited access to resources, which appear unchangeable. The structure of the sessions The following diagram sets out the structure of the training. Between each of the activity blocks there should be generous breaks with refreshments to encourage participants to informally mix and network. Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 10 Introduction Aim: Which organisations are represented Groupwork 1 Aim: Establish existing knowledge level & allow less knowledgeable to catch up Feedback & Handouts distributed. These can be added to and adapted to local circumstances. Groupwork 2 Aim: Applying knowledge. Goal is NOT to solve the prohblem BUT identify expected obstacles and hurdles Feedback & finding solutions to obstacles and hurdles. Identify changes required in working practice and procedures, at organisational or legislative level. Final Groupwork Aim: To create a visual summary of what they have learned and steps they can take to overcome obstacles and hurdles Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 11 The handouts designed to be distributed at the end of the first group work session can be amended by the facilitator before the training to take account of local conditions, new experiences and developments. The handouts are not exhaustive and are intended to supplement existing knowledge and give practitioners new aspects and ideas to consider. The participants should add to these and take them with them at the end of the training. There is a collated set of references at the end of the manual. This should be copied and handed out by facilitators with Module handouts. Facilitators should include a reference to the GUFOVA website and the EU logo on all handouts. After the final groupwork, the posters are put up and everyone reads each group’s poster. An alternative to a poster could be a pinboard with differently shaped cards or a flow chart etc. Again, depending on the topic being discussed, it is left to the discretion of the facilitator to decide which format to employ. It is, however, important to have a visual summary of what has been learnt. The final stage is the facilitator pulling together the content of the day. To what extent has it been possible for the professionals involved to identify changes they can make in their work practice to improve service delivery to children? To what extent has it been possible to identify changes that need to be made to enable professionals to optimise their service delivery for children? These changes can be fought for within organisations, local authorities, with local politicians and nationally, if legal changes are required. Children are our future, and they are worth fighting for. The didactic method 38 is designed to be interactive and stimulate local groups of professionals to find solutions together to challenging child protection cases. The instructions for facilitators are a general guide. Depending on who attends the trainings the instructions, particularly for the second round of groupwork in each module, may need to be adapted as not all suggested questions to be considered may be relevant. Within each of the three categories, child, mother, father there are four modules, each of which addresses a specific situation. It is intended that each module represents a one-day training as follows: What do children need? Module 1: In crisis intervention Module 2: In suspected domestic violence Module 3: Following parental separation Module 4: If sexual ised violence is suspected Child-Mother relationship Module 5: Impact of intimate partner violence on a woman’s parenting Module 6: Child-mother relationship following domestic violence Module 7: Whole family responses to domestic violence: developing a critical framework Module 8: Working with mothers and children together Module 9: Shared parenting after relationship breakdown due to domestic violence Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 12 Child - Father relationship Module 10: Working with fathers Module 11: Child-Father contact following parental separation Module 12: Supporting children in contested child contact cases Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 13 Module 1: What do children who have lived, or continue to live, with domestic violence need in crisis intervention? Introduction The facilitator should welcome the group to the training session and allow everyone to state their name, the name of their organisation and their role within the organisation. Following this, the facilitator should give a very brief introduction to the topic. This is intended to last no more than 10 minutes and should refer to the following points: • Children who live with domestic violence are at increased risk of directly experiencing physical, sexual and emotional abuse themselves. • Witnessing verbal, physical and sexual violence directed at their mother, including coercive control, is child abuse. • Children suffer long term harm from living with domestic violence and require support in their own right as victims of domestic violence. • Children are at risk of continuing serious harm following separation and divorce of their parents. Getting started Following the introduction, participants should be divided into groups of four or five people. It is important that the groups are a good mix of people in terms of their professional role and place of work. As the training is directed at professionals who work with children, it is expected that they will all have some experience of working with children who have lived, or are living, with domestic violence. The aim of this first groupwork session is to find out what the participants already know about the topic. Each group is given the same situation to discuss. They have time to talk about their understanding of and experience with the situation. At the same time, they are getting to know each other, and the different roles, responsibilities and priorities of the various agencies involved in child protection. They are also creating the context for the second step of new information being introduced. Groupwork 1 - Situation to be discussed. They are called to intervene in a crisis, violence has occurred, and all involved adults are highly emotional and stressed. In this situation, what do children need? The situation presented is deliberately vague and participants can consider how they would deal with various possibilities, e.g. the mother requires immediate hospitalisation; the children are all pre- school age etc. The group task is to come to some common understanding of the situation they have been given and possibly some expectations that they have of the training in dealing with this. Throughout all the exercises, the facilitator should ensure that participants are taking intersectionality into account and addressing the needs of Black and minoritised women, children of Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 14 mixed heritage, as well as women and children living with physical and mental health problems. The specific needs of each individual family will be determined by how these, and other factors, impact on their ability to access resources and support. The facilitator’s role is to go around the groups, listen in, add information, if necessary, guide the discussion or bring ideas together. After a certain time (everyone should have had enough time to contribute) each group presents a summary of their discussion to the others. These presentations allow the facilitator to find out who knows what. It is less boring for those who have a lot of experience or knowledge of the training content already because they can contribute more to the discussion and those for whom the information is new can learn through the discussion so that everyone has more or less the same starting point. During the presentations, the facilitator may want to refer to the following points. This page can be copied (added to, amended) and distributed. Following feedback and discussion allow the group a generous break, in which participants can follow up points in informal discussion. Co-funded by the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme of the European Union (2014-2020) 15 Handout M1:1 They are called to intervene in a crisis, violence has occurred, and all involved adults are highly emotional and stressed. In this situation, what do children need? Children need Information. • Children need to know abuse is not normal and it is not their fault (even if something they did triggered the outburst). • Children need to know where they can go for help and who can they call on in a crisis. • Children need to know about their rights and what to expect (for example, if the police are called to their home). • In crisis situations, children should be supported to understand that t