Level 1 Flashcards
Whose responsibility is safeguarding children?
Everyone
Who is required to have a safeguarding policy
Every organisation
How is safeguarding defined?
Protecting children from maltreatment, Preventing impairment of children’s health and development, Ensuring children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care, Taking action to enable all children to have the best chance
What are three appropriate safeguards?
- A child protection policy
- Procedures for dealing with issues of concern or abuse
- A safer recruitment procedure
What is early help?
Early help is the collection of all services that work with children and families and how they work together in a co-ordinated way to support children when additional or complex needs are identified.
ALL PRACTITIONERS working with Children and Families are ‘Early Help’.
EARLY HELP IS NOT A SERVICE - IT IS A WAY OF WORKING. It prevents family problems escalating by getting the right support at the right time in a child’s life.
Who can I contact about a concern?
The Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL)
If it is not possible to make contact with DSL for a non-urgent concern you should contact the Locality and Community Support Service (0356 2412705 or LCSS@oxfordshire.gov.uk) 8:30-5pm or 4pm (fri)
If there is an immediate concern ie it would not be safe for the child to return home, there is allegation or concern of abuse or severe neglect, the child may be put in immediate risk or the child has been abandoned contact the Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (0345 050 7666) 8:30-5pm or 4pm (fri)
Outside of office hours you should contact the emergency duty team 0800 833 408 or in immediate danger the police
What does the Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) do?
Deal with complaints or allegations made against people who work with children
Any complaint should be reported immediately to a senior management within the organisation
Who are Oxford’s three lead safeguarding partners?
Oxfordshire County Council, Integrated Care Board Buckingham, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West (BOB) and Thames Valley Police
What does Oxfordshire Safeguarding Children Partnership do?
Hold agencies accountable for their work around safeguarding children, it ensures:
1. A clear, shared vision for improving outcomes for children across all levels of need and types of harm:
2. Quick, appropriate and effective responses to protect and support children
3. Organisations and agencies are challenged appropriately, and hold each other accountable
4. Children and families’ views and feelings are heard, and along with expert knowledge and data, help us to understand strengths and/or areas for improvements
5. Information is gathered, analysed, and shared to understand outcomes for children and identify new safeguarding risks or emerging issues
6. Senior leaders promote and embed a learning culture which supports local services reflective and improve their practice
7. Senior leaders have a good knowledge of, and understand the quality of local practice and its impact on children and families
What are the four main categories of abuse?
- Neglect
- Physical abuse
- Sexual abuse
- Emotional abuse
Definition of Neglect
- The persistent failure to meet a child’s basic physical and/or psychological needs, likely to result in the serious impairment of the child’s health or development
- It may occur during pregnancy as a result of maternal substance abuse
- It may involve a parent or carer failing to provide adequate food and clothing, shelter including exclusion from home and abandonment, failing to protect a child from physical harm or danger
- Failure to ensure adequate supervision including the use of inadequate care-takers; or
- Failure to ensure access to appropriate medical care or treatment
Signs a child is living in a neglectful situation?
- hunger
- poor hygiene
- tired
- inadequate clothing
- lateness or absent
- untreated medical problems
- poor relationship with peers
- stealing or scavenging
- rocking, hair twisting and thumbsucking
- running away
- excessive under pressure over weight
- low self-esteem
- poor dental hygiene
Where might we see non-accidental injuries?
Ears, side of face, neck, inner arms, back and side of drunk, black eyes, soft tissues of cheeks, inside mouth, chest and abdomen,
groin or genital, inner thighs, soles of feet
Concerns for physical abuse?
Injuries to both sides of body, raising arms to protect themselves, injuries to soft tissue, injuries with patterns, injuries with an odd explanation, delays in presentation, untreated injuries
Definition of sexual abuse
Involves forcing or enticing a child or young person to take part in sexual activities, not necessarily involving a high level of violence, whether or not the child is aware of what is happening.
The activities may involve physical contact, including assault by penetration (e.g. rape or oral sex) or non-penetrative acts
Can also include non-contact activities such as watching porn with a child
Signs a child is being sexually abused
- sexualised behaviour
- emotional distress
- changes in behaviour or relationships
- physical signs
- normalising inappropriate behaviours
- an overly-exclusive relationship with an adult
- controlling behaviours from an adult
- environments which make abuse possible
Definition of emotional abuse
Persistent emotional maltreatment of a child such as to cause severe & persistent adverse effects on the child’s emotional development.
Examples of emotional abuse
- Conveying to a child that they are worthless or unloved, inadequate, or valued only insofar as they meet the needs of another person
- Not giving the child opportunities to express their views, deliberately silencing them or ‘making fun’ of what they say or how they communicate.
- Age or developmentally inappropriate expectations being imposed on children
- Interactions beyond the child’s developmental capability, as well as overprotection and limitation of exploration & learning, or preventing the child participating in normal social interaction
- Seeing or hearing the ill-treatment of another
- Serious bullying (including cyber bullying), causing children frequently to feel frightened or in danger, or the exploitation or corruption of children.
Signs a child is being emotionally abused
- Lack of self-confidence / self-esteem
- Sudden speech disorders
- Self-harming (including eating disorders)
- Drug, alcohol, solvent abuse
- Lack of empathy (including cruelty to animals)
- Concerning interactions between parent/carer and child (e.g. excessive critism of the child or lack of boundaries)
What is child exploitation
Child exploitation refers to the use of children for someone else’s advantage, gratification or profit often resulting in unjust, cruel and harmful treatment of the child. These activities are to the detriment of the child’s physical or mental health, education, moral or social-emotional development. It covers situations of manipulation, misuse, abuse, victimisation, oppression or ill-treatment.
What is contextual safeguarding?
Contextual Safeguarding is an approach to understanding, and responding to, young people’s experiences of significant harm beyond their families.
It recognises that the different relationships that young people form in their neighbourhoods, schools and online can feature violence and abuse.
How might I find out that a child is suffering abuse or neglect?
You may witness abuse directly.
You may see an injury or behaviour consistent with abuse; something that cannot necessarily be explained in any other way.
More rarely, a child, young person or parent may tell you what is happening.
What to do if someone talks to you about it?
REMEMBER TO:
- Listen to what the child/young person has to say without interruption; use active listening skills
- Never promise to keep the information secret
- Record what the child / young person has said in their own words as soon as possible afterwards; only recording the facts and being careful not to record your own opinions
- Take the necessary steps to report your concerns and safeguard the child or young person
If someone talks to you about abuse: - REMEMBER it is not your role to investigate concerns
- Do not make judgments about whether or not the allegation is true
- Never assume that someone else will recognise and report what you have seen or heard
What is T.E.D
Tell me
Explain to me
Describe to me
Safeguarding the staff
- do not go into a private room with a child on your own
- make sure other adults know where you are
- do not add a child or young person on social media
- avoid physical contact
