[This course will take you about 2hr to complete.]

Children who come into care are likely to be processing a number of complex emotions. These can be linked to the circumstances that brought them into your care, which could include significant trauma. Each child will have their own way of processing emotions, but these emotions could lead to distressed behaviour (also known as ‘challenging behaviour’), which could range from complete shutdown to extreme anger, and everything in between.

Part of your role as a carer is to teach them that all feelings are valid, apply appropriate de-escalation techniques, and help your foster children find healthier ways of expressing their emotions.

In this course, you will learn:
- What distressed behaviour is
- Why foster children might display distressed behaviour
- How to set out your expectations regarding behaviour
- Ways to build emotional literacy
- How to help your foster child display their emotions in healthy and safe ways
- How to de-escalate situations.