Our team has extensive experience in needs assessment and training programmes development. We are specialists in the preparation of trainings for professionals in the field of social work, psychology, pedagogical practice and the helping professions.
- Basic theories on mental development and functioning
The training is designed for practitioners in helping professions and aims to present basic psychodynamic theories of mental development and functioning and the ways to use them in case assessment and intervention planning.
- The child in the context of family relationships and connections
The training is designed for practitioners from helping professions and aims to present approaches to family assessment, interviews, roles and functions, work planning and interventions.
- Work with children who have experienced violence
The training is designed for practitioners from helping professions to acquaint them with public attitudes towards violence, the specifics of cases of domestic violence, risk assessment, security planning; identification and response to violence against children – symptoms of having experienced violence, interview with a child who is a violence survivor, behavioural and psychological characteristics and signs of violence, specifics of working with children, victims of sexual violence – signs and interventions, regulations related to violence – legislative and sub-normative acts in the field of child protection and protection from violence; ethics in working with children – confidentiality, signalling for a child at risk.
- Dynamic interview
The training is intended for social workers, psychologists and others and aims to acquaint them with the structure of the interview, the main stages, content and process, techniques for conducting an interview, setting and behaving during the interview.
- Case assessment, working on a case
The training is suitable for working with children and families in social services, social care, schools, medical and specialised practices. The training covers basic psycho-dynamic, social and systems theories, the interview as a method of gathering information, observation as a method of gathering information, information analysis, case formulation and sharing the assessment with a child and family, work plan and interventions, stages in the development of a case, work in a multidisciplinary team.
- Training for trainers in social skills
The training is suitable for professionals working with young people leaving residential care or with disadvantaged The training offers a multi-module programme for group work for learning and acquiring social skills and their practical application during the training.
- Early child development
The training is intended for medical professionals, as well as for non-specialists working with young children in nurseries and kindergartens, and for specialists in community services. It aims to present a package of basic knowledge about child development, based on psychological theories, areas of child development, support for early child development, to upgrade and expand professional approaches and practices. Topics covered include: “Early childhood development through the eyes of psychology” – John Bowlby’s theory of attachment, Margaret Mahler’s theory of mental birth, stages in Freud’s psycho-sexual development, Erickson’s developmental stages and others, “Areas of child development “and ”The environment in the nursery and kindergarten in support of child development “- working with parents, understanding children’s needs, adapting to the child, the role of play in child development.
Working with children living in a bilingual environment
The training is suitable for professionals and non-specialists who work with children from a bilingual environment. It contains information about the ways of learning a language, the specifics of young children living in a bilingual environment and techniques for working to support the acquisition of a second language. The topic focuses on working with ethnic minority groups of children (Roma and Turkish) and offers derived strategies and work techniques. The training can be conducted online and in person and includes practice.
- Communication skills
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. Through the training the participants build basic communication skills and interpersonal relationships; empathy and active listening, giving and receiving feedback; basic techniques for verbal and nonverbal communication. The training is based on the subsequent needs of the soft skills such as skills for assertive behaviour, affirmation and refusal, skills for negotiation and conflict management, skills for cooperation and teamwork, presentation skills, motivational skills and time management skills, coping with stress and crises.
- Skills for assertive behaviour, affirmation and refusal
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. Participants have the opportunity to get acquainted with assertive behaviour as a type of successful behaviour in human situations and relationships, distinguishing it from aggressive and insecure (timid behaviour).
- Skills for negotiations and conflict resolution
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. Nature of conflicts. Types of conflicts. Stages of conflict. Ways to deal with conflicts. The training takes the form of a training with the help of various role-playing games, questionnaires, simulations and exercises.
- Cooperation and teamwork
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. Team essence. Group dynamics. The training takes the form of training with the help of various role-playing games, simulations and exercises.
- Presentation skills
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. The training provides an opportunity for participants to get acquainted with the basics of multimedia and all kinds of interactive presentations, in view of their technical part and the soft skills of the presenter.
- Motivational skills
The training is designed for all target groups of different professional fields and ages. Motivation – essence. The process of self-motivation. Incentives and motives. Steps for successful motivation.
- Time management, coping with stress and crisis situations
The training is aimed at teams and individual participants. Provides familiarisation and development of skills and specific techniques on the topic.
- Parents, children and divorce
Training aimed at social workers and specialists from the Child Protection Departments, as well as social services working on the topic. Introduces the participants to theoretical models and practical steps for working with children and their families. The topic discusses theoretical approaches to understanding the relationship in the couple and the stages of the family, how divorce affects children and what are the reactions of the divorcing couple to children, including parental alienation as a specific reaction in the couple.
- Aggression in school
Training for educators. Introduces the participants to basic theoretical models of aggressive behaviour and specific methods for working with aggression at school.
- Career orientation
The career guidance group training goes through self-examination in four steps – personal characteristics and preferences, interests, values and abilities. The intersection of the four forms the golden zone of development. The training uses experiential methods of group work, as well as psychological questionnaires and modern research on career development.
- Personal development trainings for young people, based on experiential learning in a group, practical exercises and interactive processes developing key 21st century skills on the following topics:
– Setting goals and building effective habits
– Growth mind-set
– How my brain works – understanding and awareness of assumptions, labels, limiting beliefs, biases and stereotypes
– Youth entrepreneurship
– Creating a cause / project
– Communication and speaking in front of an audience
– Empathy
- Social skills
Interactive group learning in which young people learn, get acquainted with 21st century skills, can discuss, practice, apply what they have learned through various role-playing games and interaction with other people.
- Nonviolent communication
The training is aimed at a wide range of stakeholders on the topic of effective and sympathetic communication. Answers the questions – which communication blocks empathy, connection, understanding between people, steps of effective action and which communication with yourself or others helps to connect, accept, empathise with yourself and others, which in turn supports effective steps, growth and learning. The training is based on the method created by Marshall Rosenborg and goes practically through the topics – observations, feelings, needs, request, difficult conversations, conflict resolution, self-expression and understanding of the other, giving feedback and NNK mediation.
- Project-based learning (PBU)
The training is aimed at working with children and youth, parents and lovers of alternative pedagogies and aims to present the model of creating trainers programmes on the principle of PBU and to develop skills for design of lessons, projects and their facilitation at each stage of the project . The framework and model are based on the Buck Institute for Education and the golden PBU standards.
- Experiential learning
The training aims to equip those working in the field of formal and non-formal education with practical tools for creating experiential playful learning programmes – structuring the workshop, introduction, processes, skills, goal-process alignment-impact assessment, reflection and debriefing.
- Self-directed learning and democratic education
The training aims to acquaint working with children and youth, parents and non-experts with tools for creating and facilitating self-directed learning environments inside and outside a formal educational institution – advantages, needs, methods and tools for organising, decision making and impact to develop 21st century skills in learners.
TEAM OF TRAINERS
Desislava Lyasova
Psychologist
She practices as an educator, trainer and facilitator in the field of “soft skills”. She has practised short-term focused therapy as a coaching educator in reteaming in 2010 in the Helsinki Brief Therapy Institute http://www.reteaming.com/coaches/bulgaria.html. She is an educator and consultant in Ben Furman Children’s Skills Method http://www.kidsskills.org/, helping children deal with fears, poor habits, problematic behaviour, and relationships with others.
Nikola Dimov
Trainer
Part of the training unit at the Center for Human Resources Development, the Erasmus + National Agency and the European Solidarity Corps of the European Commission. He is an informal trainer in the method of “Nonviolent Communication”. He has extensive experience as a facilitator and trainer in project-based, experiential, self-directed learning and democratic education. Nikola is a graduate of psychology from New Bulgarian University and is studying the psychodrama method.
Milena Marinova
Psychologist
She practises in a psychodynamic paradigm, has extensive experience as an author and co-author of training programmes, as a trainer and supervisor. She has extensive experience as a trainer on violence, early childhood development and casework.
Donika Angelova-Popova
Clinical social worker
With experience in preparing assessments of child development, assessments of parental capacity, conducting training for prospective adoptive parents, prospective foster parents, prospective professional foster parents, volunteers and training of employees and teams of social workers. Donika Angelova-Popova has over 7 years’ experience in practising the method “Relational psychomotor skills” in a kindergarten, with children aged 3 to 6 years. She has conducted training for professionals working with children at risk on the topic of prevention of child trafficking for sexual exploitation.
Penko Ivanov Dekov
Clinical psychologist
Penko Ivanov Dekov is a clinical psychologist with an acquired specialty from Medical University Sofia and certified psychotherapist in the method “Family and marriage therapy” from New Bulgarian University. Practitioner psychotherapist certified by the Bulgarian Association of Family Therapy. System supervisor with many years of experience as a teacher and supervisor at “Institute of Family Therapy – Bulgaria”. He has significant experience in working with children and families. Since 2002 he has been working as a clinical psychologist and family therapist in “Children’s and Adolescent Center for Mental Health”, Ruse diagnosing of children with manifestations of mental suffering, carrying out therapeutic work and clinical supervision.
