Practice strategies for implementation

Download printable Practice strategies for implementation course summary

A practitioner’s influence in a family’s life begins with their first contact with each other and continues with every question, statement and activity they engage in together. But for many, the implementation phase of child mental health interventions is when their knowledge really comes to the fore.

Practice strategies for implementation emphasises the importance of children’s participation in implementing interventions to support their mental health and wellbeing. It recognises that children’s existing skills, creativity and know-how are key to the success of any child mental health intervention. It also acknowledges the need to work collaboratively with the child’s parents, who are often the driving force behind children’s attendance at therapeutic services.

The course considers four practice skills which support children’s participation:

1. Supporting parents to align actions and values.
2. Collaborative skill-building with children.
3. Noticing progress in setbacks.
4. Future-proofing new skills.

These strategies will help you to ensure children and families don’t feel like a failure if techniques seem ineffective in solving their problem. They will also help you to ensure any newly-acquired skills can be used by the child and family to address any ongoing and future problems they may face.

This online course is part of a suite of products designed to support collaborative engagements with children (aged 5–12) and their families. The first two courses, Practice strategies for assessment and engagement and Practice strategies for formulation are available now. A practice strategy course for working with infants, children and parents (from conception to age four years) is set to be released in early 2023, but if you would like more information on working with infants and toddlers, check out:

• Keeping the infant and toddler in mind
• Promoting infant and toddler mental health with parents
• Supporting infants and toddlers

This course is designed for practitioners who work with children and their families to implement child mental health interventions. This includes accredited mental health professionals, such as:

• paediatric psychiatrists
• psychologists
• paediatricians
• mental health social workers
• mental health nurses
• mental health speech therapists; and
• mental health occupational therapists.

Core learning

This online training will take you approximately 150 minutes (two-and-a-half hours) to complete. This includes reading the written content, watching the videos and completing the reflection activities.

Further reading

Additional time can be spent reviewing the supporting resources included throughout the course.

You can undertake the course across multiple sessions at your own pace. The last screen you visit before logging off will be bookmarked and you will have the option of returning to that screen when you next log in.