Schools trained to help children facing trauma at home

Training to help children who face early childhood trauma is to be offered to all schools in Wales.

Teachers will be taught how to support pupils who have adverse experiences such as family breakdown, bereavement or physical, sexual or substance abuse.

It follows a pilot project at three primary schools in Bridgend county.

Public Health Wales worked with Cymru Well Wales, Barnardo's Cymru and the NSPCC to create the training package.

It will be made available for all primary and secondary schools in Wales to download later this year.

It aims to help schools assess how well equipped teaching staff are to spot signs of trauma and look at what measures they have in place to teach children emotional resilience.

Julie Thomas, head teacher at Garth Primary School, Maesteg, which took part in the pilot, said: "Very often children can behave in a more aggressive way than you'd expect, they can seem withdrawn. Sometimes they're disruptive in classes and they can also be on hyper alert.

"The training for me isn't just about how we deal with individual children, it is about the importance of creating a climate in which all children can thrive."

In July, a study by Bangor University found children who have adverse childhood experiences were more than twice as likely to use accident and emergency departments and to be frequent GP surgery users.

The pack has been funded by the Home Office Police Innovation Fund and the South Wales Police and Crime Commissioner.