Working therapeutically with children who have experienced trauma from physical or sexual abuse

This paper is aimed at practitioners who want to respond to disclosures of child sexual abuse in ways that challenge self-blame in safe and respectful ways. It provides strategies to help practitioners support a child who has disclosed sexual abuse, either while waiting for a referral to a specialist service, or while continuing to work with the child in a general or specialised capacity. It follows the Emerging Minds paper, 'Making use of practitioners’ skills to support a child who has been sexually abused'.

Infants and children rely on the adults around them to meet their needs, keep them safe and help them to make sense of their world. This puts them at greater risk of adverse impacts when a disaster occurs. This practice paper introduces the foundational knowledge and skills needed to support children and families at all stages of a disaster (preparedness, response and recovery).

This practice paper is designed to help you understand the importance of disaster preparedness for not only increasing safety and protecting lives when a disaster occurs, but facilitating the recovery of individuals, families and communities. It also offers practical advice for supporting the disaster preparedness of the children and families you work with.

This practice paper aims to equip practitioners with knowledge about the ways disasters can influence a child’s ecology and the importance of targeted support for children’s resilience and recovery in the short and long term.