🎉🎉 Congratulations and thank you to… 🎉🎉
Teresa and David Bell who have been caring for one year on 29/03/2024
Robert Russell and Mitchell Cook who have been caring for one year on 01/05/2024
Louise Thomas and Rodney White who have been caring for one year on 03/05/2024
Stevie and Spencer Roach who have been caring for one year on 07/06/2024
Have you RSVP’d for the School Holiday fun day at
REVOLUTION SPORTS PARK ON JULY 17TH?
55 The Avenue, Newcastle
Event starts at 10am and runs for two hours of non-stop jumping, playing and fun! Please bring grip socks if you have them otherwise we will supply them. Pizza for lunch and drinks supplied. Please let us know if there are any dietary requirements we need to cater for. There is a café on the premises so you can purchase coffee and other snacks if required.
This day was a blast last year so get in quick!
Save the date for Ongoing Training on 29th August in the Mezzanine room at Allambi Care. Please come along and spend time with like-minded people while listening to training that will help you support the child or young person you care for. As usual, morning tea and lunch will be provided so please let your Case Worker know if you are attending and have special dietary requirements. RSVP date will be given closer to the event.
My Forever Family NSW has training and resources that help Carers with their Fostering journey. July training is not yet listed but
For more information or to register for these training sessions go to: https://www.myforeverfamily.org.au/training/
You may be familiar with the iceberg analogy from previous training, but we all need refreshers on things that matter from time to time. The Iceberg Model is a helpful tool for understanding the behaviours of kids with trauma in care. The reality of us only being able to see a small part of an iceberg because most of it is under the surface correlates with the emotions of our kids. The behaviours they show us can be hiding what they are really feeling so we have to look deeper for the reasons behind the behaviours the help them (and us) get through them.
Developmentally, actions come before words.
Children and young people first begin to express themselves and their needs with behaviour. For example, babies cry to communicate to their caregiver that they have a need to be fed, comforted or to have their nappies changed.
Even after they begin to develop language, children and young people continue to use their behaviour to communicate with those around them. For example, when young children meet someone new they tend to cling to their caregiver for safety or look to their caregiver for non-verbal cues regarding whether the new person is safe to interact with.
Children and young people who have been maltreated often come from chaotic and rejecting environments.
Consequently, they adopt behaviours that may appear to be unusual or concerning but have developed to help keep them safe.
The Iceberg Model suggests that many of the behaviours maltreated children and young people develop arise from a place of stress and fear and are automatic responses to the child’s perception of threat and danger. Children and young people who have been maltreated can interpret events as threatening, regardless of whether or not the adults around them believe the threat exists, and their behaviours develop to keep themselves safe.
The behaviours of maltreated children and young people also communicate their intrinsic need for attachment to and nurturing from stable adult caregivers, yet their deeply rooted fear that adults will harm them. Maltreated children and young people (like all children) want to feel physically and emotionally safe, secure, validated, loved, approved, acknowledged and wanted. However, maltreated children and young people have often been so badly harmed by adults that they struggle to trust that adults can be relied upon to be safe and meet their needs.
So instead of behaving in ways that safely draw adults close to them to build relationships and ensure their needs are met, maltreated children and young people might create a wall of safety around them to protect themselves from the perceived danger of being vulnerable, helpless, powerless, frightened, misunderstood and harmed.
In summary, maltreated children and young people develop behaviours to keep safe, both in their environment and within relationships.
Because their behaviours have successfully kept them safe in the past, these behaviours are considered to be ‘adaptive coping strategies’ and they become habitual. While in an unsafe environment these behaviours remain adaptive, when the child or young person is placed in a safe environment, these same behaviours can be considered maladaptive as they cause the child or young person problems.
For example, in an unsafe environment a child might learn to run away and hide when there is danger around (eg raised voices that signal domestic abuse might occur); in that environment, running away is adaptive and helps the child or young person stay safe. In a safe environment when that same child hears raised voices, their instinct, their coping strategy of running away can be maladaptive as it places them at risk. But because these behaviours are so entrenched, they can be difficult to change until the child can really trust that they are safe and no longer need these behaviours.
Maltreated children and young people have been so focused on and preoccupied by self-protection rather than self-regulation (ie learning how to manage and control their emotions and behaviour), that they have poorly developed internal regulation systems. This means they struggle more than other children and young people to regulate their experiences of stress and fear.
These children and young people require sensitive, responsive and available caregivers to remain with them and provide them with co-regulation, to help them learn how to regulate themselves. In this way, the needs of many maltreated children and young people are similar to the needs of infants and toddlers, who need adults to help them manage how they feel before they will be able to learn to manage on their own.
To promote safety and to help maltreated children and young people develop better skills for managing their emotions, caregivers must focus their attention on what is happening under the surface for these children.
Once we know what emotional upset or memories are triggering the behaviour that we see at the tip of the iceberg, we are better able to help the child or young person. Until we can help a child or young person address what is happening under the surface, the tip of the iceberg behaviours are unlikely to change.
The Iceberg Model gives us a great strategy to remain focused on, and talk about, the behaviours of maltreated children and young people in a more understanding and therapeutic way.
If you want more information or help around this, please talk with your Case Worker. We also have training that will help with understanding scheduled for later in the year.
Winterheat is a FREE outdoor winter warming community event based around coming together and celebrating Newcastle city. There’ll be two performance stages, a silent disco, a kids zone, pop-up food alley, fire performers and much, much more all held across the entirety of Pacific Park, Newcastle East.
Activities include: “Winterbeats” silent disco ¨ Kids zone ¨ H’eat Street” themed pop up food alley and outdoor dining area ¨ Immersive installations and activations ¨ Fire sculptures ¨ Lantern workshops and parade ¨ Free drum & dance workshops ¨ Roving performers ¨ Fire performers ¨ Bicycle karaoke ¨ Toasted marshmallow cart ¨ Pop up sushi train ¨ Live music ¨ DJ’s ¨ Opera ¨ Cabaret ¨ Comedy ¨ Face painting & Texta Tatts ¨ Portrait artists ¨ Sideshows & fun booths
The first whales for the 2024 whale watching season have been spotted. 20,000 humpback whales make their annual journey from June to November and can be seen from different vantage points listed below. Look for the telltale blows of water or the flash of black and white as they splash around or breach the surface of the ocean.
Nobbys Headland
Stockton - Shipwreck walk
Newcastle Beach
Fort Scratchley
The Obelisk
Shepherds Hill Lookout
Anzac Memorial Walk
Bar Beach
Merewether Beach
Hickson Street Lookout
Redhead Bluff
Caves Beach Cliff top
Tomaree Headland
Barry Park - Fingal Bay
Boat Harbour Headland