Author: Nicoletta Armstrong

Update, Caroline Wendel, November 2024

In recent years, the Jönköping Municipality, in collaboration with ICDP Sweden, has developed the ICDP programme for parents from other countries.

We have trained around 100 guides for Parents in a New Country. The idea is that all parents need to reflect on how they support their children to live within two cultures.

In addition, a research study on ICDP for Parents in a New Country is underway at Dalarna University. This research has now been expanded to include more municipalities.

Among other things, ICDP is now being incorporated into SFI (Swedish for Immigrants) teaching.

The picture above is from the central training for Guide for Parents in a New Country, which was held in Stockholm in September 2024.  

Update from the ICDP facilitators at the Ububele Educational and Psychotherapy Trust, who continue to train new groups of caregivers:

We have trained 25 parents in ICDP. Most of our parents live in Alexandra township, a low resourced community confronting a lot of socio-economic challenges including crime, drug abuse, unemployment, poor infrastructure to mention a few. Parents often share with us how these dynamics negatively affect their families, and make parenting more challenging than it would under normal circumstances.

Our ICDP groups consider the local context, using relatable role plays to encourage rich conversations and peer-to-peer learning. Here is some feedback from participants:

“I did not have a good relationship with my children. I did not know what is the best way to talk to them when I discipline them. Since I have been to Ububele, I am calm, and I talk to my children nicely. I can discipline them positively now. We even host meetings together and talk, something I did not know you can do with a child,” Mpho Moretsele, (mother).

“Unlike before, we talk to each other with smiles. We are calm when we communicate. I can see even the improvement at school, the results are much better than before,” Norah Malebye, (mother).

November 2024

ICDP in Ukraine had to go through a difficult period. Due to the war, many facilitators were forced to change their place of residence. Some facilitators left Ukraine for safer countries. Others moved to other cities or were forced to change jobs and activities. Due to this, connections with many facilitators were lost.

In 2024, we were engaged in restoring connections, collecting information about the place of residence of facilitators. By the summer, the register of facilitators was updated and a new coordination council was created that started to operate. Activities have been resumed in cities such as Kharkiv, Odessa, Kyiv, Poltava, Kramatorsk, Druzhkovka, Zaporizhzhia, Kryvyi Rih, Vinnytsia, and Dnipro. Two large training projects have been implemented.

On the volunteer initiative of ICDP Ukraine trainers, a group of facilitators was trained from July to October, including 26 participants from eight cities of Ukraine (Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Vinnytsia, Kryvyi Rih, Druzhkovka, Kamyanske, Zaporizhzhia) who completed the full training course and received facilitator level diplomas.

The second project was related to the training of facilitators for the International Charitable Foundation Caritas Ukraine. The training participants were 30 psychologists from crisis centres who work with children and specialists from Save the Children.

The new facilitators held parent groups in their cities. The group leaders noted that with the beginning of the war, there were more problems in families. Frequent experiences of stressful situations make adults emotionally closed and do not use positive emotions when communicating with their children. The principles of ICDP help to establish contact with children, to support them in the process of recovery and stabilization of their psycho-emotional state.

Facilitators who work for Save the Children note that children are unable to attend school regularly because of the war and experience frequent traumatic situations. Many witness their parents die, and experience separation from one or more caregivers, separation from brothers, sisters and other family members. Some children witnessed or participated in shocking events (for example, the release of brothers or sisters, relatives or neighbours from under the rubble after explosions).

The ICDP principles help to establish contact with children, to support them in the process of recovery and stabilization of their psycho-emotional states. Adults are also in an unstable psycho-emotional state. The seven principles of developing sensitivity in the program’s educators help to create trusting relationships within the group and launch work based on the principles of “peer to peer”.

 Facilitators from Ternopil, Serhiy Bukhvalov and MariaGavrishko, said: “Adults showed interest, recalled stories from their childhood, talked about their relationships with children, and actively shared their experiences regarding methods of communication with children”

Facilitators Igor Dashevsky, Svitlana Klunnik (Poltava), shared that their group included not only parents, but also grandmothers. “Questions helped to activate group work. Participants shared their experiences regarding the fact that children spend a lot of time on gadgets. During the exchange of experiences, adults recalled the games they played in childhood. There were many lively positive emotions”.

Natalia Kosenko Ulyana Kotsemira (Drohobych) used practical exercises and videos in their work. Adults shared their feelings about how close adults expressed their love for them in childhood.

Facilitator Marina Nechaeva (Kryvyi Rih) wrote: “The parents liked activities that involved interaction with each other, where they could talk about certain things about their lives. They also enjoyed the creative activity and individual work we did with them. It was interesting to watch how they shared their childhood memories, how much warmth they had and how others were filled with it. It was a little unexpected that some mothers burst into tears. After the tears, the condition of the participants began to stabilize”

Despite the difficult living conditions during the war, the trainers and facilitators of ICDP Ukraine continue their work and are planning to continue next year.

Rita Crecelius is an ICDP trainer and psychologist living in Germany, where she has been training groups of professional caregivers from several educational institutions. Rita describes her participation in an event that took place in Austria in the autumn 2024: 

The national conference of guidance counsellors took place from 10th to 12^th of October in the magical mountain landscape of Austria, in St. Wolfgang. Guidance counsellors support both teachers and students in challenging situations, in all types of schools. This means that they have excellent communication skills and know a lot about the developmental needs of children. Many speakers were invited to the conference who spoke about the topic of attachment from different perspectives.

My presentation of ICDP fit perfectly into the programme. I was able to report on the first study about the efficacy of ICDP in a school in Sweden (2021: https://doi.org/10.1080/00313831.2019.1705898).

Using the ICDP’s three dialogues for good interaction, I showed the common thread for successful cognitive development. The audience was particularly impressed by the brain scan of Romanian orphanage children, which clearly shows the effects of a lack of positive interaction (UNICEF, 2005).

Many of the participants in the conference were so curious about the ICDP programme that some have already registered for the ICDP workshop that I will be holding in Munich in February 2025.

I am very pleased that the ICDP spark is now also spreading to Austria.

On photo above, from left to right: Nivoneia Kikaho, Ezekiel Assecheck, Mariam Athumani, Patrick O’Loughlin, Veronica Amo, Martha Massawe, Chiku Ali, Godwini Hilari, Irene Ringo, Daniel Kasikiwe

Eight facilitators based in four areas of Tanzania: Arusha, Singida, Mbulu and Haydom completed training as trainers in 2024. Gunnar Eide, representing FO (Norwegian association for social workers) is the International Coordinator of this project. FO has supported Taswo (Tanzanian association of social workers) since 2015. Uptil 40 facilitators have been trained since then by two experienced trainers from Moshi, Egla Matechi and Verynice Fredrick. They in turn were trained by Grete Flakk from Norway.

Ezekiel Assecheck from Taswo has been the National Coordinator. Chiku Ali (Tanzania) and Patrick O’Loughlin (Ireland/UK) based in Norway were the International Trainers (ITs) for the TOT 2024. The training started with an eight-day seminar in Babati in January 2024. At first a lot of time was devoted to sharing from personal and professional experiences. This paved the way to forming an intimate, supportive group. “I felt like I was saying goodbye to my new family in Tanzania” said Patrick after this first seminar. There was time for Chiku to take the group through many ideas regarding awareness of harmful traditional practices and for Patrick to share a basic understanding of trauma.

Trainee trainers (TTs) had already started recruiting facilitator candidates in November 2023 and this meant training of all facilitators, in four groups each with two TTs, was completed by June 2024. TTs met the ITs for online supervision during the first half of 2024. Ezekiel had an essential role coordinating the TTs and dealing with many local issues. A key success factor was that Gunnar and colleague Erik Solaas met the eight TTs in April for two days of training and after that visited their training of facilitators locally, altogether forty new facilitators which now makes the total number of facilitators in the four areas around eighty.

TTs worked intensively to complete the facilitators’ training, including supporting and finally accepting their log-books. No time was then wasted as the TTs completed all required written work. This could not have been achieved so efficiently without the ability of Chiku to work with the TTs in Kiswahili.

The scene was then set for a return to Babati for the final 3-day seminar 29^th September – 1^st October. All TTs were able to demonstrate their in-depth knowledge of ICDP and how to support the development of a wide range of skills in their trainee facilitators. A wonderful dinner and certificate ceremony rounded off the final seminar attended by local Social Work leaders and Heidi Steel from ICDP Norway. It was a special honor for us that trainer Egla Matechi from Moshi attended. Patrick and Chiku learned a lot regarding applying ICDP in different cultural settings and can further develop trainings in Norway, Tanzania and other contexts.

On photo above: Erik and Gunnar meeting two new trainers, Nivo and Daniel, in Arusha.

Lima, Peru, November, 2024

In April 2024, ICDP trainer, Honorata Herrera, resumed her ICDP work at the Santa Mónica Women’s Prison, located in the Chorrillos district, in the city of Lima, Peru. The ICDP meetings are held on Tuesdays from two thirty in the afternoon to four thirty. To date participants include twenty-four boarding mothers. The following is from Honorata’s own notes:    

The ICDP meeting is a safe place for participants to express themselves and for me to listen. It requires patience and perseverance to run each ICDP session, recognizing that the process is very slow with these mothers…but it is also an opportunity for growth for all of us. Introducing the ICDP guidelines, in their order and structure, allowed me to organize the topics and leave the mothers free to share their experiences and family stories that arose spontaneously.

Together we managed to create a place of trust, where each mother felt valued and was seen as an equal. I am continually encouraging them to connect with the brightest part of their being. Mothers felt that the ICDP meeting is “a magical place,” “it is our therapy,” “we share laughter and tears”. However, the mothers’ attendance at meetings fluctuated for various reasons: due to appointments related to their confinement in prison, such as having to meet with a psychologist, social worker or lawyer. Some fail to attend due to emotional reasons, like when receiving a sentence beyond what was expected, or going through their own criminal process. Except for one mother, who is always there, happy to attend.

After I introduced the first of the 8 ICDP guidelines (which is: How do you show love to your child?)  mothers started to share their experiences. Then I proposed that they also show love and affection to each other. Lucia responded immediately, very adamantly, “I don’t love myself.” Her reaction made me reflect and I decided to ask the mothers to direct the ICDP guidelines towards themselves, to first experience the meaning of each guideline through their personal experiences.                                                                                                                                          

At the beginning of the session on Empathy, one of the nine participant mothers recalled that upon entering the prison her cellmates welcomed her by saying “Welcome to hell”, she described how this made her feel. On the same day, a participant mother called Wendy joined us very late, towards the end of the meeting. To my surprise the nine mothers shouted out in unison, pointing at the register in front of me: – Don’t sign the attendance sheet for Wendy! Surprise, discomfort, and annoyance appeared on Wendy’s face. After a few minutes of asking for their attention, I asked the group to reflect about what thought or idea went through their mind which led them to act that way. They all remained silent for a few seconds, until one of the participants responded that it was just a joke. Immediately they all confirmed that it was a joke. I asked Wendy how she felt and she said, “Attacked at first, but then I thought it was a joke.” Afterwards we talked a bit longer about the meaning of empathy, attunement and affection.

In our fifth session, we were supposed to work on the ICDP guideline four, which is about the meaning of praise and appreciation of efforts. At the beginning of the session, we stood in a circle greeting each other, when I saw one of the mothers whispering in the ear of her companion Mara. Mara was crying silently.  I asked Mara what had happened to her. Mara told the group that she had had an altercation with another mother in her ward. This mother had insulted and verbally assaulted Mara, accusing her of stealing her baby’s bottle. She concluded her story by saying: Honorata, most of the people are here for theft. I am not a thief. I am here for Illicit drug trafficking. At that moment, a very upset inmate entered the workshop space, saying that her roommate threw her new shoes in the rubbish bin. Mara told me that this was in revenge, because this inmate had betrayed her roommate… With all this happening, there was no time left to work on the guideline four. To date, Mara has not returned to the ICDP meetings, but whenever she sees me, she greets me affectionately. Last Thursday she gave me a blessed rosary and a small red heart-shaped keychain.

During the session on guideline 8b, (which is to plan actions step by step), I asked mothers to share a personal story with respect to making plans step by step, and here are two of their stories:

Story one: Before entering prison, all I thought about was how to dress up in beautiful clothes, but nowadays, I do not care for such things anymore. My biggest concern now is to be released, to become free so that I can return to my five children, all waiting for me. My mother takes care of them now. When I am released, I plan to sell food. I have done it before and they tell me that I cook well. I also prepare a delicious chili.

Story two: When I was fourteen, I had my first daughter Sofia. My mother kicked me out of the house. I looked for my daughter’s father. He was nineteen years old and we started living together. Sofia was my doll. I was very happy with her. I learned to be a mother. But when her father came home from work, the tension would build up, he was violent towards me. The beatings became more and more frequent; black eyes, blows to my arms. Seeing my five-year-old daughter tell her father not to hit me was too much for me, so I decided to run away. But now I just want to get my daughter back and return to my village. So, this is what I plan to do.

ICDP has taken a second breath in the Republic of Georgia, as bold and timely support from the Karavi Center has brought together 12 incredible individuals. These participants—parents, a kindergarten principal, and dedicated therapists from Karavi—have embarked on a journey to strengthen and nurture harmonious relationships with children. With all resources provided, sessions have been held in a beautiful, supportive environment where reflection and growth thrive.

We have already completed five out of ten sessions, each one an opportunity to dive deeper into the principles that underpin ICDP’s work. In these sessions, participants thoughtfully engage with each concept, reflecting and practicing not only during the meeting but also at home, where they continue to build on their learning. Every meeting adds a new brick to our metaphorical house, practicing sensitive care through empathic identification and response and acknowledging the positives.

Our sessions are more than just workshops—they are collaborative spaces for transformation. Participants share insights, laughter, and sometimes even tears, weaving their unique stories into the fabric of the principles. They are open, thoughtful, and engaged, bringing life to the ICDP values through personal commitment.

As we look forward to the final sessions, the anticipation builds for a celebration of all we’ve accomplished together. The completion of this house will symbolize the enduring strength and care our participants are bringing into their families and communities. And with plans for a new group of parents and facilitator-level training on the horizon, our journey in the Republic of Georgia is just beginning.

– ICDP Trainer Nino Margvelashvili

On the 11^th of October 2024, I had an interesting conversation with Jeed Prakaikaew Phochan and Sara Sarawaree Lie. They both live in Norway, but their native country is Thailand which they visit a couple of times a year.  Our conversation was facilitated by Olav Skjerpeour who introduced us and assisted with translations. Sara is leader in the Youth Buddhist Federation, Jeed is Children’s Pastor in the Church of Norway.

Jeed and Sara are currently undergoing training both in Norway and in Thailand to become ICDP certified trainers. They travelled to Thailand to attend workshops organized by ICDP Thailand, whereas their practical projects are currently taking place in Norway among Thais. They are conducting the training in Thai. Jeed and Sara will have become certified ICDP by the end of January 2025. In my conversation with them they expressed keen commitment and desire to take the ICDP programme to others.

As part of their training they are forming new persons to become ICDP facilitators, namely, Mr. Phra,  Phichitchai Miphimol, Mrs. Lalita Chumpon and Mrs. Penprapha Skjæret. After attending the ICDP workshops, the trainee facilitators started rolling out the ICDP programme to Thai parents, accompanied by Jeed and Sara. This process is taking place at the Wat Thai Buddhist Temple in Norway and will be completed in November. Mr. Phra is a Buddhist monk, so for the first time we have a Buddhist monk becoming an ICDP Facilitator.

Olav, Jeed and Sara explained how the temple fulfills an important social function, acting as a safe place for fellowship among Thais. When Thai migrants experience challenges in their family lives, they approach the temple, but the temple has few tools to help with when it comes to family life and parent-child-relations. This is where ICDP comes in.  

Furthermore, the Buddhist temple feels that ICDP fits in their worldview and there is keen interest to spread ICDP more widely to reach the Thai diaspora in Europe. The abbot at Wat Thai Norway is the President of the Union of Thai Sanghas (Buddhist temples) in Europe and Jeed and Sara were invited to introduce ICDP to Thais living in different parts of Europe. ICDP will sign an agreement with Jeed and Sara once they have completed their training and we will keep in touch and observe future developments with great interest. – Nicoletta Armstrong, ICDP chair.

A workshop on “strengthening ICDP as part of Child Sensitive Social Protection (CSSP)” took place in Helsinki, Finland, from 12th to 16^th of September 2024. It was organized by Save the Children Finland who have been promoting ICDP internationally for several years now.

The workshop was attended by ICDP trainers who have been implementing the ICDP programme as part of the CSSP. Three ICDP trainers came from SC Nepal, two from SC Philippines, one from SC Zambia, one from SC Somalia, two from SC Finland and one ICDP trainer came from Normisjon Bangladesh. Nicoletta Armstrong from ICDP was also present. Disa Sjoblom, Mukesh Lath and Nicoletta facilitated the workshop.

The overall objective was to provide a forum for sharing between countries to ascertain ways of strengthening the work of ICDP, focusing especially on how to provide quality implementation and maintain the quality of the work after the end of the project intervention. Two days were dedicated to this, and on both days participants were split into small groups to explore the following two questions, with in-depth discussions afterwards in the big group:

1. How can you enhance the parents to practice 8 guidelines during the period of implementation? 
2. How to sustain caregivers’ practice after our involvement has finished/mechanisms of sustainability.

On the first day, the morning was dedicated to sharing about the work in respective countries. Here are some of the highlights from that session:

Nepal: The concept of CSSP, with ICDP as part of it, is currently in process of being institutionalized at 9 local government levels, as well as having national government endorsement for it. There are 142 facilitators who in addition to ICDP, also deliver sessions on nutrition and family budgeting. Evaluations of their work showed significant impact. Ten animated films about the 8 guidelines for good interaction were produced to be sent to caregivers as reinforcement after each session.

ICDP trainers from Nepal presented the programme Building Brains, role playing the part that ties in well with the Comprehension dialogue of the ICDP programme. These are play activities that encourage parents to use books and games to enhance children’s learning and cognitive abilities.

Philippines: The CSSP work has been integrated in the 4Ps country programme, which consists of education, health, nutrition and ICDP. In 2018, 1429 parents were reached in region 8. The 2019-2021 impact study showed positive results, and in 2022 the work received government endorsement by region 8. In December 2022, an agreement was signed between SC Philippines and the Ministry (DSWD) for national scale up of the CSSP. There are 1068 facilitators, 18,031 parents were reached so far – the future seven-year plan is to reach 4 million. A new group of 213 social workers have been trained as ICDP facilitators and they aim to reach 869 000 parent leaders/volunteers. There are 17 regions with 17 regional programme coordinators of the 4Ps and all have asked to be trained. Family Development Division cooperates on materials. Animated videos were made on the 8 guidelines to enhance the quality of implementation by caregivers, as is was done in Nepal. 

Zambia: The project (2022-2025) works with government cash transfer, promoting transparency and accountability, implementing ICDP parenting sessions, as well as resilience building sessions, in the districts of Kalulushi and Lufwanyama, in the Copperbelt province. A total of 59 groups of caregivers were trained, in these two districts; 1066 caregivers were reached. Cooperation is with the Ministry of Social Affairs, who have a volunteering policy, so many facilitators are volunteers. A concept note will be sent to the Ministry for a scale up.

Somalia: The work of CSSP (2022 – 2025) has so far reached 625 households in two districts of Somaliland, namely working in 3 IDP camps in Hargeisa and in Berbere village. The milestones achieved include the first ever review of Social Protection in the country, the signing of the policy for Social Protection by the President of the country in 2024, and the recognition of Social Protection by the National Development Plan. Preparations for scaling up of the CSSP that includes the ICDP programme is in planning.  A study of the impact of ICDP is in process, involving 400 persons in the experimental and 200 in the control group.

On the following day, an interesting presentation by Mark Millrine from CUBIC introduced participants to behavioural science as a way of increasing caregivers’ engagement on parenting programmes.

On the last day a visit took place to the premises of The Federation of Mother and Child Homes and Shelters (ETKL) in Helsinki, to meet Miia Pikulinsky from ETKL and the vice chair of ICDP Finland, Petra Zilliacus.  Miia, welcomed everyone and presented a power point which showed a wide range of services, many of which included the ICDP programme. After that, Petra shared about the implementation of ICDP in Pargas. A pleasant and meaningful exchange of ideas took place and the workshop ended with a small ceremony when Nicoletta presented ICDP Trainer level diplomas to two new trainers, Adam Nyundo from Zambia and Abdilladif Ismail, from Somaliland.

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In August 2024, Nicoletta Armstrong, on behalf of the ICDP foundation board , has established cooperation with the Gdansk Centre for Health Promotion and Addiction Prevention (GOPZiPU). The Centre is committed to improving public health through various municipal programmes focussed on promoting healthy lifestyles and preventing addictions to psychoactive substances.

The ICDP programme is piloted from January to June 2025, and it will be rolled out to pre-school teachers. The plan is to train approximately four groups with all activities funded by the local government, with no cost to participants. ICDP facilitator Lidia Wasik will be delivering the ICDP programme to teachers at caregiver level.

In November 2024, Marek Jankowski, director of GOPZiPU signed a contract with Izabela Wojtowicz, who will support Lidia in developing ICDP in Poland – it is a contract of mandate for the duration of the pilot.

Dr Marek Jankowski, said:

– Implementing the ICDP aligns with our mission and allows us to strengthen relationships between parents, professional caregivers and children, thereby addressing the essential needs of children in Gdansk. We aim to integrate this programme into our offerings and we believe that our cooperation with ICDP will bring significant benefits to our community and contribute to the global mission of ICDP. We are eager to work closely with ICDP international. I am pleased to support this initiative to enhance child development and caregiver interaction in our community.