Building Partnerships: Providing
Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Youth in Care

E-Track Learning No: 318-15-S

Caseworkers: Do you wonder what goes on behind the closed door of a therapy session? Are you looking for ways to identify whether progress is being made? If you want a better understanding of trauma-informed therapy and how you and the therapist can work together more effectively, this course is for you.

What is Building Partnerships: Providing Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Youth in Care?

This six-hour, in-class workshop addresses the roles and responsibilities of both child welfare and mental health professionals when collaborating to provide trauma-informed services. Participants will identify ways to make their current practice more trauma-informed, consider the impact of trauma on youth they serve, learn how to appropriately advocate for trauma-focused therapy, and improve collaborative efforts between child welfare and mental health professionals.

Who is the intended audience?

Building Partnerships is intended for caseworkers and mental health providers.

Is training credit offered?

This course offers six hours of training credit towards ODJFS requirements for ongoing training. Licensed social workers and counselors can receive 5.5 hours in continuing education credits.

The CAPMIS Tool Kit

Supervisors: Do you wonder how to help your caseworkers successfully navigate the CAPMIS assessment tools? Do you wish there were tools you could use in your unit meetings or individually with your staff? The CAPMIS Tool Kit can help.

What is the CAPMIS Tool Kit?

The CAPMIS Tool Kit is a compilation of interactive  resources and skill-building activities designed to support CAPMIS implementation. Available through the Ohio Child Welfare Training Program website, the Tool Kit makes CAPMIS come alive for both new and veteran child welfare professionals. Packed with quizzes, self-assessments, checklists, and interactive learning sessions, the tool kit allows users to refresh their skills on the entire continuum of CAPMIS, or hone in on one or two areas that need attention.

The CAPMIS Tool Kit includes learning activities that can be delivered in a variety of ways, including self-study, workshops, coaching sessions, reference guides, and distance learning.

Who is the intended audience?

The CAPMIS Tool Kit is available for caseworkers and for supervisors supporting their staff.

Is credit offered for CAPMIS Tool Kit learning activities?

Caring for Children Who Have Experienced Trauma

E-Track Learning No: Assigned by Individual Modules Listed Below

Caregivers: Do you have children in your home with difficult behaviors? Do you wonder if these behaviors are related to the traumas they have experienced? Are you looking for new ideas in dealing with these behaviors? If you said “yes” to any of these questions, this workshop is for you. 

What is Caring for Children Who Have Experienced Trauma?

The full title is Caring for Children Who Have Experienced Trauma: A Workshop for Resource Parents. It is a series of four modules developed by the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) to help caregivers provide trauma-informed care to children in their homes. The series focuses on the nine essential elements of trauma-informed caregiving and presents hands-on ideas to address trauma reactions in children. The three-hour modules are listed below:

• Caring For Children Who Have Experienced Trauma: Trauma 101 [E-Track Learning No. 991-2-NOS]
• Caring For Children Who Have Experienced Trauma: Understanding Trauma’s Effects & Building A Safe Place [E-Track Learning No. 991-3-NOS]
• Caring For Children Who Have Experienced Trauma: Feelings, Behaviors,  Connections And Healing [E-Track Learning No. 991-4-NOS]
• Caring For Children Who Have Experienced Trauma: Becoming An Advocate  And Taking Care Of Yourself  [E-Track Learning No. 991-5-NOS]

Who is the intended audience?

The series is available for caregivers.

Is training credit offered for these modules?

Each module offers three hours of training credit towards ODFJS requirements for ongoing training for caregivers. Licensed social workers and counselors can receive 2.75 hours in continuing education credits.

The Child Welfare Trauma Training Toolkit

E-Track Learning No: Assigned by Individual Modules Listed Below

Caseworkers: Do you have children on your caseload who are coping poorly with trauma? Do you wonder how you can best help them?  Are you afraid of re-traumatizing the child?  If you said “yes” to any of these questions, this workshop series is for you.

What is The Child Welfare Trauma Training Toolkit?

It is a four-module series of workshops developed by The National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) to help agencies embrace trauma-informed child welfare practice. The series focuses on the nine essential elements of a trauma-informed child welfare agency and presents tools to help agencies address trauma when case planning or providing services. The three-hour modules are listed below:

• Module I:  Creating Trauma-Informed Child Welfare Practice: Introduction to the Essential Elements [E-Track Learning Number: 318-10-NOS]
• Module II:  The Impact of Trauma on Children’s Behavior, Development, and Relationships [E-Track Learning Number: 318-11-NOS]
• Module III:  Assessment of a Child’s Trauma Experiences [E-Track Learning Number: 318-12-NOS]
• Module IV:  Providing Support and Managing Stress [E-Track Learning Number: 318-13-NOS]

Who is the intended audience?

These modules are for caseworkers involved in case planning or providing services for a child who has experienced trauma. 

Is training credit offered for these modules?

Each module offers three hours of training credit towards ODFJS requirements for ongoing training for caregivers. Licensed social workers and counselors can receive 2.75 hours in continuing education credits.

Coaching

Coaching is not just for sports anymore!

What is coaching?

Who is the intended audience?

Is credit offered for coaching?

Effective Use of Home Visits

What is Effective Use of Home Visits?

It is a course that helps workers apply concepts learned in Caseworker Core and build skills in effectively conducting home visits. It combines e-learning, field assignments, and group discussion, and includes a Supervisory Companion Guide.

The course is comprised of three sections: 

• Planning for Home Visits,
• Conducting Home Visits, and
• Documenting and Debriefing Home Visits

Who is the intended audience?

This course is designed for supervisors and caseworkers. It was primarily developed for newer workers, but it can also be used with any worker who would like to improve skills when making home visits.

Is credit offered for Effective Use of Home Visits?

• If taken through E-Track, participants will receive nine hours of training credit.
• If the course is not taken through E-Track, no training credit will be granted.

Engaging Families in Planned and Purposeful Visitation

E-Track Learning No. 118-1-S

When the goal is permanency, facilitating safe and successful visitations between children and their families is fundamental. The research is clear: effective visitation shortens time spent in foster care and helps return children to their homes. Yet in most child welfare systems, visitation is often just a supervised encounter in an office. Here’s a training that can change that practice for the benefit of all.  

What is Engaging Families in Planned and Purposeful Visitation?

It is a blended distance-learning course in which four primary purposes of visitation are discussed. Strategies for assessment, meeting the developmental needs of the child, teaching and modeling parenting skills, and determining the permanency plan are all outlined. In addition, current research regarding both the critical importance of regularly-scheduled visitations and the key elements of a visitation plan is discussed.

Who is the intended audience?

This course is designed for supervisors, caseworkers, and caregivers.

Is credit offered for this course?

Participants get seven hours of credit for completing the workshop.

Essential Learning Online Courses

Caseworkers or Supervisors: Have you ever said “I need more information…NOW!” or “This is the training I need, but it isn’t offered for another six months.”?  The OCWTP has heard your frustrations and can now provide a “just-in-time” learning opportunity through Essential Learning. As an asynchronous learning resource, Essential Learning allows caseworkers and supervisors to access courses from their desks or the comfort of their own homes.

What is Essential Learning?

The Ohio Child Welfare Training Program (OCWTP) began contracting with Essential Learning in 2010 to meet the immediate needs of public child welfare agencies.

Essential Learning is a “just-in-time” online learning resource, offering courses for child welfare staff. Most courses are between one and three hours long, allow professionals to increase their awareness and knowledge in a selected topic area, and can be taken from home or at the work desk.

Who is the intended audience?

Essential Learning courses are a good option for workers or supervisors who need foundational knowledge in a given topic area.

Is credit offered for Essential Learning Courses?

Essential Learning is a program provider for Ohio Counselor, Social Worker, Marriage and Family Therapist Board licensure credit, and participants will receive OCWTP training credit for courses that qualify. View the OCWTP Essential Learning Course Catalog to determine if the course you wish to take is available for licensure credit.

Family Search and Engagement: An Overview

Caseworkers and Supervisors: Have you heard the term “family search and engagement,” (FSE), but are not quite sure what it looks like in practice? Are you looking for tools and a structured approach to conducting FSE within your agency?  If you want to move forward with these critical skills, Family Search and Engagement is the training for you.

What is Family Search and Engagement: An Overview?

It is an online overview that introduces basic concepts of FSE and presents a concept of permanency broader than legal adoption. Learners will look at three central skills in child welfare practice (i.e., engaging, planning, and documenting) and learn to apply them within the context of five key strategies in FSE:  searching, contacting, teaming, developing permanency, and sustaining permanency.

Who is the intended audience?

This course is available to caseworkers and supervisors.

Is credit offered for this course?

Staff will receive training and licensure credit when the course is launched through E-Track. 

Fundamentals of Fostering

E-Track Learning No: Assigned by Individual Modules Listed Below

Caregivers: Are you ready to go to the next stage after preservice training? Would you like to add substance to the foundation of foster caregiving? These workshops will give you deeper knowledge and an opportunity to apply what you learned in preservice.

What are Fundamentals of Fostering?

They are a series of workshops addressing the same content presented in preservice training, but taken to a deeper level. The workshops help caregivers apply what they are learning and adapt their parenting style to the needs of the children placed in their home. All of the workshops are listed below:

• Understanding and Building Attachment[E-Track Learning No. 924-FF7-S] 
• Discipline in Foster Care: Managing Our Behaviors to Manage Theirs [E-Track Learning No. 925-FF8-LLS]
• Relating to Primary Families: Understanding Challenges, Issues, and Strategies for Success [E-Track Learning No. 928-FF12-S]
• Foster Families and How They Grow: Understanding the Effects of Fostering  [E-Track Learning No. 926-FF9-S]
• Defusing Crisis Situations Safely and Sanely [E-Track Learning No. 926-FF10-S]
• Recognizing and Responding to Children Who Have Been Sexually Abused [E-Track Learning No. 923-FF6-S]
• Development of Infants and Toddlers: The Effects of Abuse and Neglect [E-Track Learning No. 923-FF2-S]
• Development of Preschoolers and School-Age Children: The Effects of Abuse and Neglect [E-Track Learning No. 923-FF3-S]
• Development of Adolescents: The Effects of Abuse and Neglect [E-Track Learning  No. 923-FF4-S]
• Healthy Sexual Development of Children and Teens [E-Track Learning No.   923-FF5-S]
• Fostering Self-Reliance in Children and Youth: Roots and Wings [E-Track Learning No. 926-FF9-S]
• Cultural Issues in Foster Care: Dealing with the Dynamics of Difference [E-Track Learning No. 927-FF11-S]
• The Caregiver’s Voice: Being a Valuable Part of an Effective Child Welfare Team [E-Track Learning No. 922-FF13-S2]

Who is the intended audience?

The Fundamentals of Fostering workshops are designed for newly-licensed foster caregivers. Experienced caregivers, however, will also find helpful information in these workshops.

Is training credit offered?

Each workshop offers six hours of training credit towards ODFJS requirements for ongoing training for caregivers. In addition, 5.5 continuing education credits can be applied towards either social work or counseling licensure.

Interviewing Skills for Responsive Diversity
Practice: An Ethnographic Approach

E-Track Learning No. 307-14-S

Caseworkers:  Have you ever been frustrated after interviewing a client, dissatisfied with the kind of information you gathered? Did you wonder how the answers might have been different had you only known how to ask the questions?

This workshop will help you enlist your families to guide and inform you throughout the interview—helping you ask the questions that matter in a way that (1) invites authentic input, (2) identifies and honors a client’s diversity,  and (3) informs your casework powerfully and effectively.

What is Interviewing Skills for Responsive Diversity Practice: An Ethnographic Approach?

This six-hour workshop will help participants learn the principles of what anthropologists call “ethnographic interviewing,” understand these principles in context of a child welfare interview, and adapt and apply them effectively for interviewing clients.  It will help workers:

• Understand the concept of each person’s (and family’s) uniqueness--and the critical importance of this concept to casework.
• Understand how a caseworker’s unconscious assumptions and biases can negatively impact interviews with clients.
• Understand the principles of an ethnographic approach in the child welfare interview for laying the groundwork to honor client diversity.
• Use ethnographic interviewing strategies in child welfare practice.

Who is the intended audience?

This course is available for caseworkers and supervisors.

Is credit offered for this course?

Participants receive six hours of training credit for this course. 

Key Concepts in Culture & Diversity

Caseworkers:

Have you ever caught yourself making assumptions about a person… based on his or her “demographic information,” or on how he or she looks, sounds, or acts? Has anyone ever made such assumptions about you? It’s both easy and human to make such assumptions, but it can be discrediting at best--and disastrous at worst--for child welfare professionals working with families.

In contrast, proactively learning about and honoring a client’s culture and overall diversity can make all the difference when serving families. Understanding these concepts is the first step.

What is Key Concepts in Culture & Diversity?

It’s an interactive, short (30 – 60 minute) online course that lays out basic concepts around culture and diversity and how these relate to sound child welfare practice.  A foundational piece for child welfare professionals, it helps workers:

• Understand basic concepts around culture and diversity, how the two inter-relate, and the role that race, ethnicity, and other key factors can play in a person’s identity and perspectives.
• Learn the concept and significance of “collective membership” (i.e., the fact that most people are members of not just one affiliate group, but many.)
• Understand the relevance of learning about their own and their clients’ diversity as a prerequisite to effective casework.

Who is the intended audience?

This course is intended for caseworkers and for supervisors wishing to support their staff.

Is credit offered for this course?

This course is currently not available for training credit.

Learning Lab: Casework Supervision

E-Track Learning No. 511-SC1-LLS

Supervisors: Would you like to increase your skills through analysis of a provocative Frontline TV documentary? If so, you will find this learning lab beneficial.

What is Learning Lab: Casework Supervision?

In this learning lab, supervisors view and discuss the Frontline TV-DVD Failure to Protect: The Taking of Logan Marr. Part One tells the tragic story of a five-year-old girl whose death in foster care prompted the state of Maine to re-examine its child welfare policies and practice.  Part Two follows caseworkers in Bangor, Maine, as they struggle to make decisions on issues that child welfare professionals face every day.  Learning lab participants apply critical thinking skills to key decision-making points in cases presented in the DVD. The learning lab also examines supervisory skills and strategies used to help caseworkers conduct quality home visits.

Who is the intended audience?

This learning lab is designed for casework supervisors.

Is credit offered for this learning lab?

Participants who complete the learning lab will receive six hours of training credit.

Orientation and Readiness

Supervisors and Managers: Could you use some assistance in orienting new staff and preparing them for their new jobs as caseworkers or supervisors? If so, this resource is for you.

What is Orientation and Readiness?

“Orientation” is an on-line tool designed to help new employees become oriented to their job environment, including:

• The field of child welfare
• Their county agency
• The community they serve

“Readiness” resources and activities will help new caseworkers and supervisors prepare for their specific job duties, and include two separate on-line tools: one for new caseworkers and one for new supervisors.

Who will use these tools?

Supervisors and managers will use these tools to prepare new caseworkers and supervisors.

Does the OCWTP offer training credit for Orientation and Readiness?

Employees do not receive training credit for Orientation and Readiness learning activities.

Post-Assessor Training Skill-Building Activities

Assessor Supervisors:  Are you struggling to find the time or tools to coach your new assessors in the skills they need for foster care and adoption practice? The Post Assessor Training Skill-Building Activities provide a structure for helping your supervisees take what they have learned in the Assessor workshops and apply it to their everyday work.

What are Post-Assessor Training Skill-Building Activities?

The Post Assessor Training Skill-Building Activities are post-training assignments designed to help staff apply what they learned in the Assessor workshops to foster care and adoption practice. They also provide the supervisor with easy-to-use tools for coaching some of the essential assessor skills.

There are ten skill-building assignments, one to follow each of the Assessor workshops. Workers are encouraged to complete whichever assignments (e.g. Services for Birth Parents, Family and Child Assessment, Adoption Assistance, Openness in Adoption) pertain most to their role.

Each assignment has learning objectives stating what the learner will gain after completion. Depending on the target objective(s), the worker will do one or more of the following activities:

• Develop a placement plan that demonstrates consideration of the feelings, stressors, and strengths of all parties involved.
• Consider the influence of race and ethnicity on a child’s identity and self-esteem.
• Determine which subsidies might be potential resources for a child.
• Use a variety of interviewing strategies to gather pertinent family assessment information.

Who is the intended audience?

These skill-building activities are designed for adoption assessors and the supervisors who support them.

Is credit offered for this course?

Training credit is not available for these skill-building activities.