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Continual Professional Development

Adults, who accompany children on a visit Jamie’s Farm, are often astounded by the transformation children make. They are key witnesses to the change in behaviour and positive achievements of their students, and are their champions on their return to school. Feedback has revealed that staff often leave the farm with a renewed sense of their own importance in the journeys of the young people under their care, and that their own pedagogical approach has been influenced by their stay on the farm.

Observing the ‘Jamie’s Farm’ approach to working with young people who exhibit challenging behaviours, is now recognised as the training and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) of many education professionals. On the back of this Jamie’s Farm has also been asked to deliver bespoke CPD sessions in schools for teachers who have not visited the Farm, and subsequently we now formally offer a range of CPD sessions in schools.

Why do we offer CPD?

During a week’s stay at Jamie’s Farm, we witness inspiring endeavour and achievement from our young visitors. We know that for this to be sustained long term, they need the support and encouragement from the adults who see them, on a daily basis. We therefore now provide our partner schools with a choice of options that aim to share, extend and evolve adult practice, that will encourage our young people to thrive at school and at home.

What is our approach?

Our adult CPD provision reflects our belief that everyone has their own story therefore should be treated individually. All educational organisations have specific contexts and all individual practitioners have different developmental priorities. To this end we adapt all CPD programmes in line with what we hope will have the greatest impact.

Who delivers?

Our CPD facilitators represent over 50 years of education experience both in the classroom, in senior leadership and in therapeutic work. We would match the most experienced facilitator to a CPD need.

Where does the CPD take place?

Facilitators will travel to an educational organisation to deliver a session. Subject to availability and upon request, CPD can also be delivered at one of our farms

‘I think the staff at Jamie’s Farm have incredibly valuable skills of conflict resolution that many of our staff would benefit from. She has a way of framing what she says so that – even when she is essentially telling a child off – the child feels responsible for their actions and is made to realise the importance of their own actions and consequences without any huge external pressure iterating it for them. It is, of course, more than just the way she words the sentence – her whole demeanour and tone exerts a very calming, yet authoritative influence over groups and I believe there is a lot to be learnt from this.’

Teacher, Islington Arts and Media School

How can the CPD be accessed?

This can be approached in three ways (below) or simply contact us and tell us what you need:

Contact Jamie’s Farm

Find out about volunteering

1. Select from our expanding CPD menu:

Behaviour for Learning

Create and sustain boundaries when working with young people.
Positive behaviour management strategies (All levels of experience)
Fight, Flight and Freeze (In adults and young people)
The Learning Environment

Pastoral

Create a culture of positivity and mutual respect in a classroom
Strategies to work with nurture groups
Language when working with young people
Engaging the ‘unlikeable’ child
Building the emotional literacy of young people

Beyond the classroom interventions

(as part of a post Jamie’s Farm, school-based follow on programme)

Running a healthy breakfast club
Starting a school small holding or vegetable garden
Designing outside the classroom learning experiences

2. Design a bespoke CPD session or programme sequence

Work in consultation with one of our facilitators to create CPD that targets the key needs of an individual, select staff group or whole team. This might stem from a performance monitoring system, faculty review or an OFSTED report.

3. Volunteering at a Jamie’s Farm

Work alongside us as a member of one of our four farm teams for a week. This might be through accompanying a group of children from your educational organisation or independently. Immersion is the most powerful route to gaining an insight into our methodology.