5: Preparing and training

Participatory work, whether in research or action-based projects and activities, requires those facilitating to be able to plan, prepare, identify risks and challenges and manage unpredictable situations.

It is important that those facilitating these activities have relevant experience, are equipped with the necessary training and skills, and have robust support mechanisms in place.

An image of three people holding jigsaw pieces and helping them fit together

Across the Our Voices programme, the crucial role of the facilitator has been a key theme cutting across the different strands of work.

Our research and learning indicates that many of the potential risks and challenges that may arise in participatory working can often be mitigated if facilitators have the right experience, training and support.

Read more about this in our briefing Factors that influence outcomes when supporting the participation rights of children and young people with lived experience of child sexual abuse and exploitation.

There are a number of areas that are useful for facilitators to explore in depth when undertaking this work, including:  

  • Ethical research and practice
  • Self-care and setting personal boundaries
  • Understanding the local socio-political, legal and cultural context
  • Being able to identify potential risks and develop mitigation strategies (see section 3: planning)
  • Safeguarding
  • Communication skills and active listening
  • Responding to disclosures (see section 6: doing)
  • Managing and communicating about confidentiality
  • Responding to distress
  • Managing group boundaries and difficult group dynamics
  • Trauma-informed practice (based on an understanding of the potential impacts and dynamics of experiencing childhood sexual violence).

For those with less experience of facilitating groups with this cohort of young people, it can also be helpful to observe, co-facilitate and shadow those more experienced to see how different scenarios can arise and how to support and respond in these situations.

Practice example: Improving practice by delivering training on participation for specialist sexual violence support services

As part of the ‘LEAP Against Sexual Violence’ project , 88 professionals from specialist sexual violence support services across four countries undertook training on participatory practice. This included professionals from the four partner organisations who would go onto co-facilitate workshops with young people affected by sexual violence as part of this project.

Following their participation in the training, professionals were then invited to attend an ongoing community of practice (read more about this in section 7: reflecting and evaluating).

The four-day training was written and piloted with one group of professionals in the UK by Abi Billinghurst.

The training course covered:

  • Sexual violence and the impacts on young people
  • Participation and the benefits of participation
  • Children and young people’s rights and the policy context
  • The ethical implications of doing participatory work with young people affected by sexual violence
  • Power
  • Doing participation
  • The representation of young people
  • Shifting cultures
  • Creating champions for participatory practice
  • Action planning

Evaluation data showed that those who took part in the training (and community of practice) did appear to improve their knowledge, skills and understanding of child-rights and safe and ethical participatory practice when working with children and young people affected by sexual violence.

There were also examples of how professionals had changed their practice based on this acquisition of new knowledge and skills.

Professionals reported developing confidence to develop their own practice and achievements in altering and improving the approaches taken by their services and organisations when it came to involve children and young people in decision-making. 

Access the slide packs developed for the LEAP 4-day training programme on participatory practice for specialist sexual violence service providers.

As part of the LEAP Against Sexual Violence project, we worked with Childhub to develop an open access online course. Take the Participatory Practice for Children and Young People Affected by Sexual Violence course.

Participation work can involve young people working as facilitators, co-facilitators, supporters, mentors and researchers on projects.

As with adult professionals, undertaking training and being properly supported in these roles is key for keeping everyone safe. 

But when people actually take the time to give training to young people to the same degree that you would expect your staff to be trained, then there’s very little to fear. But it is about investing in the young people, and I think that is as important as anything else.'

Practice example: Training peer researchers to undertake research with young people who had experience of engaging in the criminal justice system as victims of sexual violence 

Small Steps, a sister project to Our Voices, focussed on training young people to become peer researchers.

As part of this project, the peer researchers engaged in a series of training sessions which included:

  • An introduction to social research
  • Youth participatory action research
  • Sexual violence: understanding different forms, key concepts and dynamics
  • Research methods: quantitative and qualitative methods, creative approaches
  • Research ethics
  • Scientific rigor
  • Research design
  • Project management
  • Familiarisation with selected topic
  • Data collection
  • Analysis
  • Writing

Other elements that emerged as important to discuss included: attribution, data-sharing agreements, intellectual property and copyright.

 

Practice example: Training youth facilitators to co-deliver the Life-skills, Leadership and Limitless Potential (LEAP) programme to other children and young people

As part of the ‘LEAP Against Sexual Violence’ project , 16 Youth Facilitators (males and females aged 17-20) took part in three full days of training in Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Romania and the UK.

The training involved:

  • Introductions and icebreakers
  • Project mapping
  • Hopes and fears
  • Creating a safe space
  • Individual outcome setting
  • Group discussions on core concepts (human rights, children’s rights, participation)
  • Group activities to support the development of core skills (effective communication, group facilitation techniques, identifying strategies to deal with facilitation challenges)
  • Observation and peer feedback (leadership, team work, communication, negotiation, presentation) and;
  • Practicing the delivery of sessions in the toolkit they would be co-facilitating with adults for the children and young people involved in the project.

The monitoring and evaluation data collected as part of the project captured how Youth Facilitators learnt professional skills (including skills in communication and leadership) and gained valuable work experience through the training.

In some cases, their engagement with the project also opened up opportunities for further study and opportunities to influence national and international policy.

This training was adapted and further developed and used to support Youth Advocates in the Our Voices Too project.

Access the slide packs developed for the Life-skills, Leadership and Limitless Potential (LLLP) 3-Day youth faciltiator training.

As part of Our Voices III project, we ran a PhD student forum where doctoral students undertaking research related to childhood sexual violence or child protection more broadly, could come together to share their knowledge and experiences.

Through forum discussions, PhD students shared how they would welcome more training on:

  • researching sensitive topics
  • project-specific training
  • opportunities for peer-to-peer role play and fieldwork rehearsal/practice and
  • reassurance from supervisors around the ‘messiness’ of participatory approaches when researching these topics. 

Read more reflections from the PhD forum in section 7: reflecting and evaluating of the learning journey.

Members of the Our Voices team also worked with Terre des Hommes Netherlands and SVRI to develop an innovative, self directed, open access online course for researchers on participatory approaches in childhood sexual violence research.

Access the course 'Power of Participation'.

Given that participatory and peer-led approaches to both research and practice in this field are relatively new, having support in place is crucial.

Our learning indicates that strong leadership and a commitment by the wider organisation (and or supervisory team) is vital when it comes to supporting colleagues and students to undertake this work.

The welfare and well-being of those facilitating and supporting these processes on the ground is critical.

Our partners emphasise the importance of promoting self-care but also putting in place formal structures to support staff and young people involved in this work. 

Reflective practice and debriefing is a core part of this work to keep young people and professionals safe and supported (see section 7: reflecting and evaluating section on your learning journey).

Toolkit: Life-skills, Leadership and Limitless Potential (LLLP) training toolkit. See the step-by-step guidance and methodological notes for a 3-day youth facilitator training and 12-session life skills and leadership programme for young people who have experienced or are at risk of experiencing sexual violence.

Online course: 'Power of Participation' Start this self-directed, online course by SVRI which provides an introduction to participatory approaches in childhood sexual violence research. Several members of the Our Voices current and former team members co-created the course.

The course is available in English and French.

Online course: 'Participatory Practice for Children and Young People Affected by Sexual Violence'. Start this course,designed for practitioners and developed as part of the LEAP against sexual violence project.

The course is available in Albanian, Bulgarian, English, Romanian and Serbian-Croatian-Bosnian.