Therapeutic Parenting with PACE Course

After originally writing this course over ten years ago, I have continually adapted and updated the course content and reflective activities to best support the countless foster carers, adopters, special guardians, and Social Work teams that I have now trained. I am now offering this course over two days.

The training begins with a review of Attachment Theory and an exploration of the dynamics of attunement, before taking a deep dive into Dan Hughes’ model of therapeutic parenting focusing on the PACE attitude of Playfulness, Acceptance, Curiosity and Empathy. On this journey we explore the impact of loss and trauma; refer to social, emotional, and cognitive development; and cover concepts such as Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and pervasive shame. The course is delivered using a mixture of presentation, creative exercises, reflective activities, and discussion.

The PACE attitude helps children to feel secure and understood with the adults that care for them and encourages the adults to reflect therapeutically with children on the meaning behind the child’s behaviour, rather than focusing on behaviour management. PACE is a relational approach, in which carers can begin to understand and explore the child’s internal working models of themselves, their relationships, and the world around them, and thus truly enter the child’s world. Through PACE the child can begin to process positive experiences of relationship, learn to trust the adults that care for them, and together with their carer they can begin to make sense of, and manage, their emotions, thoughts, and behaviours. As the child adjusts to these new experiences they can find that they no longer need the negative behaviours that have formed part of their coping-strategies of the past. In using PACE both the child and carer can re-discover joy in their relationship.