Framing Report Writing Guidance
Framing Report Writing Guidance: Read Here
We recognise that to build strong, vibrant, equitable communities we need to ensure that each and every child is loved, nurtured and supported to thrive. As a workforce we need to take a rights- based, trauma informed approach and recognise that relationships need a foundation of trust and mutual respect to improve the lives of our children, young people and families.
We all understand and recognise that the language that is used throughout the “care journey” plays a crucial role in either enabling relationships or acting as a barrier. This is true for direct one-to-one interactions with children, young people and families as well as the language that is used in written reports, external communications and in meetings.
In our aspirations to #Keep the Promise and ensuring we are Getting it Right for Every Child, there is a desire and motivation to change the way we write, instead of focusing on the struggles of children and families, there is a shift to focus more on families’ strengths, needs and hopes for the future and how these can be supported, nurtured and built on. When we write with a strengths-based focus, working alongside children and families with an emphasis on what all children, young people and families need to thrive, we have clarity in care planning with a tone of possibility, empowerment and achievable outcomes
We know that stigma can impact on children and young people throughout their lives, and this stigma is often reproduced through the language used to describe them and their circumstances as evidenced in The Promise and reflected in the What Matters: Plan 24-30.
Each and Every Child have been sharing research and robustly tested framing recommendations since May 2021, initially as a way to challenge stigma and create a new narrative around care experience and the care system. However as we developed our training with our colleagues with lived and learned experience we became increasingly aware of how the framing recommendations can impact positively on our own practice, in particular how we write about our children, young people and families.
Our colleagues who form our Voices of Experience Reference Group shared their own experiences; the impact of accessing records, the wider experiences they had heard of, their professional experience of hearing language in meetings and reading countless reports. At the same time we were also delivering online and in person sessions sharing the toolkit to the wider workforce including frontline staff. What we were inspired by was, amid exceptionally challenging times, the commitment and motivation to listen, to learn, to share and work together to make change. We heard of the challenges of the practical implementation of changing how we write but also how people were taking on that challenge to explore new ways of writing and, most importantly, working in partnership with children and young people from their own communities inform how reports are written.
This led us to apply for additional funding through the Promise Partnership to explore how we could use our robust research to produce a practical guide to support language work across the country.
We wanted to start by looking at who was already working in this area, and what we could learn from their work. In partnership with Our Hearings, Our Voice, and National Leadership Network, we brought together young people from across the country who were already working on language to take part in our language residential to share their ideas and solutions to improving our “language of care” June 2024 to bring together all the participants from the residential, with the workforce and policy makers to share their ideas and together find ways to make changes.
We also formed a Report Writing Steering Group that consisted of representative from local authorities, third sector, CELCIS, Social Work Scotland, The Care Inspectorate and of course, people who had experience of care, who acted as critical friends through the process of producing the guidance.
The framing recommendations are not just about changing the words we use but also about challenging the way we think, enabling us to understand at a deeper level the challenges facing our children, young people and families, and how we are addressing unmet needs to support their healthy development into the future. They enable us to focus on the child, young person and family to build holistic support – and to show how our care works alongside other aspects of the scaffolding of support that is there to ensure their needs are met. They ensure our children, young people and families are not further stigmatised or discriminated against through the language that is used in reports, records or life story work
Everyone has a right to know their story, to have memories that reflect their whole selves and not just the challenges they have faced. It is how we make sense of the world and our place in it. This will help a person potentially reading their records in the future to understand why certain things may have happened in their life. When people read the information that has been recorded about them and their experiences, they should be able to get a sense of who they were and who they are, an authentic record of their life and personality, not just a professional view of their life full of professional terminology and acronyms
We are working in really challenging times, with the cost of living crisis, the rising tide of poverty and an increasingly stretched workforce impacting on children, young people and families. When we add in the divisive narratives that we are experiencing at a local, national and international level, we can at times feel overwhelmed and powerless. But we are not powerless. We have our shared values, our compassion, our knowledge.
You are not alone, we are a movement for change that continues to listen and walk alongside our families. Each of us has the power of our voice, the power to tell a different story that changes how we think, how we feel and the actions we take. Together, we can write with love, compassion and action, together we can create a “care system” that makes Scotland the best place in the world for our children and young people to grow up.
Framing Report Writing Guidance: Read Here
Each and Every Child never work in isolation but are part of a wider community, where co-production and collaboration are key to all the work we do. We are grateful for the knowledge, expertise, support of our wider peer network and all the organisations and individuals who share their learning and experiences to shape our work.
I’m Ciara, I’m a keen artist. I study art, but there are some things you can’t just read in a book and become better for it; you need experience. And trust me, I have plenty of that (and that’s not even taking art into consideration). Art is one thing that always stands so strongly in my life. I learn information, I draw. I feel something, I draw. So, when I grew as an artist and discovered more ways to express myself creatively, I found such a release in realising what a powerful tool art can be for myself and others, when used to create change.
In the artwork above, it is likely that we will all see different things in each picture. Why not consider both for yourself first, before reading on to see what I was trying to express and raise awareness of.
“Why keep language that keeps young people out?”
This was the title I gave to the first piece: it was said by a young person at the residential and stuck with me.
I am trying to convey closed off body language, curled up. Their back to a door – the door could be half open or half shut, depending on how you view it like a glass half empty half full situation.
All the words in the piece are labels that a young person has been called, similar to those in Our Hearings, Our Voice’s Articulate Animation
The labels are also things young people find hard to understand. They are like a door; and they can shut them out if care isn’t given to help them understand and feel safe with what’s being said.
All of this comes down to STIGMA STICKS. I see stigma as this gooey, fluid creature: something that follows a young person around, like a shadow. There’s a weight to them; carrying stigma weighs us down and most of all, it sticks. All the language surrounding a young person will feed the stigma monster.
“Language creates realities”
The second piece is based around feeling safe, seen and supported. Things we all deserve to feel. With the right use of language these values can ‘create realities’, a line which was in the Promise.
We can see the effect of the ‘right’ language in the illustration: the young person at the centre has more open body language and is seen from a different perspective – above us but not looking down on anyone. Think about their body language, subtleties of dress and what that can mean, their hood is down. I wanted the young person to look more confident, as a result of their experience of language from others.
The silhouettes form a semi-circle, almost protective, safe. Their forms are strong and built like pillars; a net of people gathered around a young person to solely support them.
I included the bag on purpose; not a black bag, like many have experienced when within the care system, but a backpack. There’s an independence surrounding a backpack: you are going places. You can pack anything you need in there, and it’s so much more personal.
Hidden in the shadow, is the Stigma, that we see in the first piece. It is much smaller, drowned out by all else, but still there. It may take a while to fully counter stigma in language, but that’s not to say it won’t get better, especially with the love, safety and support that even just a change of language can bring: the reality created from it.
The young person stands above it, tall, conquering. I think we all have a chance to be that with the right people and lasting support beside us. The language we all use is such an important part of making sure we all feel safe, seen and supported.
What do you see in these pieces? This might be a general opinion or comments on specific parts of either illustration… There are no rights or wrongs – none at all! I am keen to hear your take on the feelings of both pieces and what they might mean to you. Please email your thoughts to gordon.main@scra.gov.uk
To view more of my artwork, visit my Instagram page: @ciaraillustr8
The language residential is a joint venture between the National Leadership Network, Our Hearings, Our Voice and Each and Every Child, who commissioned this artwork.
Ciara is a board member with Our Hearings, Our Voice (OHOV) and a member of Language Leaders – Children’s Hearings Improvement Partnership
Our Hearings, Our Voice is an independent board for children and young people across Scotland who have experience of Children’s Hearings. Our board members are young people who help scrutinise, change and lead long term improvements to the Hearings System.
Each and Every Child is a new initiative to change hearts and minds on care experience in Scotland. We aim to create a fresh, inspiring narrative to shift public attitudes and improve life chances of children, young people and their families.
National Leadership Network aims to support individuals with care experience to explore leadership in all its shapes and forms through engagement in opportunities that support personal and professional development, social activity, peer support, active citizenship and democratic participation.