Exploring Together
| Name | Exploring Together |
|---|---|
| Target Audience | Early childhood (3-7 years) Middle childhood (5-14 years) Parents |
| CfC Objective | Supporting Families and Parents Create Strong Child-Friendly Communities |
| Organisation | Exploring Together |
| Delivery Setting | School-based, community-based |
| Description | Cognitive-behavioural therapy program designed to be used in the classroom or community settings that aims to increase the resilience and happiness of children. |
| Delivered to | Children aged 3-14 experiencing emotional and /or behavioural difficulties and their parents. |
| Delivered by | Psychologists, social workers or those working in the education and welfare sector. |
| Program Structure | The Exploring Together program is offered to families with children at primary school and pre-school.
Both programs involve families participating in group work over 10 consecutive weeks, plus pre-group and post-group family interviews for assessment, evaluation and feedback. Group work consists of interactive parent/carer-child groups plus separate concurrent groups for children and parents/carers.
Leaders meet with the partners of the parent attending the group twice during the 10-week program. Leaders also meet with the children's teachers on two occasions during this period.
The time commitment for each leader is at least 3 hours per week. This includes preparation time, group time, post-group debriefing and planning. |
| Training | Four leaders are required to run each program (two for the children's group and two for the parents' group). At least two of the leaders must have attended Exploring Together Training.
Training is available throughout Australia. Contact the organisation for further details about training availability. |
| Cost |
There will be an additional fee for training held outside of Melbourne to cover travel/accommodation expenses. For more training information, go to: exploringtogether.com.au/train |
| Contact | Phone: 0438 879 360 Email: [email protected] Website: exploringtogether.com.au/ |
| Evaluation and effectiveness | A mixed method evaluation (control group) was undertaken with 106 primary school-aged children and their parents in Victoria. Participation in the program reduced children's externalising behaviours and increased their social skills at 6- and 12-month follow-ups.
Hemphill, S & Littlefield, L. (2001). Evaluation of a short-term group therapy program for children with behaviour problems and their parents. Behaviour and Research Therapy, 39, 823-841.
For a list of further studies see: exploringtogether.com.au/research |