Online Courses

General PA Training and Approaches

PA Training: The Essentials

This series of four modules is ideal for Personal Assistants (PAs) who are new to the role or looking to refresh their knowledge. Designed and delivered by individuals with significant care needs, this training course covers a wide range of key topics, including working in someone’s home, supporting your employer’s preferences, maintaining and respecting privacy, and fostering positive working relationships.

PA 1: There's Someone in my House

A module designed to train PAs in what it’s like to be a disabled person who requires PA support. It will get them thinking more about the experience of dependence on PAs and how PAs can facilitate their employer’s life better with a clearer understanding of their needs.

PA 2: Doing It My Way

Supporting your employer in the way they prefer. This is a module designed to educate PAs on the importance of doing things in the way their employer prefers. It explores time and tasks, specificity, communicating why things need to be done in specific ways, and helping PAs to understand this in the context of their role.

PA 3: It's Private

Developing boundaries maintaining your employer’s privacy – from work emails to personal care. This is a module designed to educate PAs on how to support their employer while maintaining their privacy and dignity. This is particularly valuable where a PA may be supporting someone with all their files and communication, and whilst it discusses and explores navigating these elements of dignity in personal care, it’s more concentrated on privacy and independence in a wider context.

PA 4: Relationships

Inside your employer’s relational life. This is a module designed to train PAs in how to support their employer around other people, from their partners, friends and family to work colleagues and strangers. This reflects some of the themes in our existing training but is more focused on how the PA might be required to support the disabled employer in very obvious ways and more subtle ones. It can be challenging for PAs and PA employers to navigate social spaces and relationships, and this is designed to give PAs the skills to address this confidently with employers, understanding and meeting their needs.

Understanding the Role of a PA

This FREE workshop based training, held via Microsoft Teams will enable participants to understand the role of a Personal Assistant (PA). These training sessions will ensure that PA’s and Employers are clear about their respective roles and their duties and responsibilities.

Each training session will cover:

Boundaries and expectations of the employer and employee relationship
Employer and employee responsibilities and legal requirements
Skills development, what is available locally?
Record keeping

Person Centred Care Training

Course Overview:

Half-day session that will explore the key features of Person-Centred Care.

Course Aims:

Review current CQC, NICE and CCA standards for person centred care planning
Indicate how personal choice and collaborative working can improve the care planning process
Identify how a care plan should be organised and structured including the need to plan for crises and contingencies
Signify how a SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely) approach towards care planning might improve the process
Consider the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities Threats (SWOT) of person-centred care planning and from this analysis complete a personal action plan for implementation

All online courses will take place via Zoom. A link will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Personal Assistant (PA) Training

Training focused on everything you need to know to be a brilliant Personal Assistant!

Whole Family Approaches

Our whole family approaches workshop is developed for professionals who would value the opportunity to engage in a reflective and practical course to improve practice around family centred approaches. Participants have the opportunity to explore how embedding family-centred approaches enhances a strengths-based approach to collaborative working with families.

Dignity and Privacy Training

The course will start by defining dignity and privacy within the healthcare sector, and will explain how the two are quite often linked. It will then go on to give you a range of useful professional tips about setting up the right working relationship with your clients, and discuss some of the issues that can arise when dignity and privacy are not respected. This is an online self-paced course. You will recieve an invite for this course via email.

Challenging Behaviour

Responding to Behaviours That Challenge Training

Course Overview:

This course is designed to support staff who deal with potentially disruptive and assaultive behaviours. It enables staff to understand what factors may increase or decrease the likelihood of anger and aggression occurring in work settings. It will consider some strategies and good practice in relation to managing potential angry and aggressive situations.

Course Aims:

The focus of the course to on preventing incidents of disruption and aggression by:
Raising awareness of non-verbal communications and its effects on the anxiety level of an individual
Identifying different stages of defensive behaviour
Organising staff members thinking about escalating behaviours in crisis situations
Helping staff develop strategies to safely and effectively respond to the behaviours being exhibited

All online training will take place via Zoom. If you register for a course, the Zoom link will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Communication and Challenging Behaviour

This practical workshop is an introduction to the links between communication and behaviour. This workshop is aimed at anyone who wants to understand how to improve communication with individuals with severe learning disabilities and in turn improve their quality of life, choice and behaviour.

Positive Behaviour Support

This is a two-part workshop set about Positive Behaviour Support. The workshops facilitate partnership working, to enable staff and families to work together to identify appropriate individualised behaviour support strategies that can be used consistently in all settings.

Awareness Training

Pica Behaviour (eating inedible objects)

The CBF’s Pica Awareness workshop is specifically designed for professionals, support staff and family carers who are supporting children, young people or adults who have severe learning disabilities and display Pica behaviour (eating inedible objects) and/or polydipsia (drinking fluids).

Learning Disability with Dementia Awareness Training

This course explores both Learning Disabilities and Dementia and how Dementia can affect people with Learning Disabilities uniquely. It will look at person centred approaches with Dementia and Learning Disabilities combined.

The course will take place via Zoom and a Zoom link will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Learning Disability Awareness Training

This course will start by giving you an overview of some of the common types and causes of learning disabilities and how they affect people. It will touch on how a person centred approach to care will get the best results and look at how best to work with someone with a learning disability. I will also discuss overcoming the stigma attached to learning disabilities and much more. This is an online self-paced course. You will recieve an invite for this course via email

Health and Safety Awareness Training

Course Overview:

This is a half-day session that will aim to provide a more in-depth understanding of Health and Safety in relation to the workplace.

Course Aims:

Provide a more in-depth understanding of Health and Safety in relation to the workplace
Staff and Managers roles in relation to Health & Safety
COSHH
Fire procedures in Adult Social Care establishments
Personal safety and lone working
Share information on the importance of accurate and up to date Risk Assessments

Dementia Awareness Training

Course Overview:

This course will explore what we mean when we say someone has dementia. The course will challenge you to think more about how we can best care for and support people with dementia.

Course Aims:

What do we mean by ‘dementia’ and most common causes of dementia
The individuality of the experience of dementia
Understanding behaviour and emotional distress
Cultural difference in dementia & communicating with people with dementia

The course will take place via Zoom and a Zoom link will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Diabetes Awareness Training

Course Overview:

This course explores ‘What is diabetes’ and the basic anatomy and physiology of what happens to cause diabetes.

Course Aims:

What is diabetes
Types of diabetes
Common indicators of diabetes
Treatment of diabetes

The course will take place via Zoom and a Zoom link will be emailed to you prior to the event.

Autism Awareness Training

Course Overview:

This course explores Autism and the current body of thinking and knowledge about Autistic Spectrum Disorders.

Course Aims:

How ASD is displayed and why
Explore the range of abilities found within ASD
Provide information, practical strategies and promote a positive understanding to enable people to work more effectively with people with ASD.

The course will take place via Zoom and an email with the Zoom link will be sent to you prior to the event.

Understanding Autism

This online training will equip you with valuable insights and strategies to better support individuals with autism. Emphasis is given on how our understanding of autism has evolved and how more current approaches inform our understanding and practices. It focusses on discussing the main areas of difference for autistic people and provides a range of autistic perspectives to enhance understanding and support good-practice.

If you’re a personal assistant interested in learning more about autism, this event is perfect for you. Join us for an interactive session filled with practical tips and knowledge. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to broaden your skills and make a positive impact!

Autism Awareness

Autism awareness training is essential in moving towards a more supportive community for autistic individuals. This training will increase understanding and knowledge of autism as well as reducing misconceptions and misinformation. This can lead to more compassionate and supportive attitudes and interactions.

• What autism is.
• Signs and indicators.
• Adult and child perspectives.
• Social interaction.
• Repetitive and restrictive behaviours.
• The senses.
• Meltdowns and shutdowns.

Trauma Awareness – understanding and responding to family trauma

The workshop facilitates professionals’ understanding on the experiences of families navigating health, social care and education systems and the layers of trauma they experience throughout this. It explores the factors that contribute to traumatic experiences and encourages professionals to reflect on how their service can prevent or mitigate any further trauma to families.

Mental Health Awareness Training

This course explains the difference between mental health and mental illness. It covers the symptoms of a number of the most common mental illnesses so you will know what to look out for or what to expect if you are working with someone with one of these conditions. As well as providing some practical advice on how you can work effectively with those affected by these conditions. This is an online self-paced course. You will recieve an invite for this course via email.

Mental Health Awareness

This course offers a comprehensive foundation in understanding mental health needs and using this information to deliver effective, person-centred care. Throughout this training, you’ll learn about various mental health conditions, tailoring your care approaches, and promoting overall wellbeing for individuals you support, as well as yourself.

• What mental health is
• Understanding the mental health continuum
• Having knowledge of your own stress container
• Understanding your own frame of reference and how this may affect how you support someone.
• Awareness of a variety of mental health conditions, including anxiety and depression
• Recognising some of the early indicators of ill mental health
• Self-help strategies and helpful resources

Disability Awareness

Join us for disability awareness training as we challenge preconceived notions, break down barriers and work towards a more understanding and compassionate society. This training will equip you with the knowledge and perspective to champion disability awareness and make a lasting, positive difference in your community.

What will be covered?

• The definition of disability.
• Hidden disabilities.
• The different models of disability.
• Barriers faced by disabled people and how we can overcome them.
• Tyler’s story – a short film about disability.

Moving, Medication, Eating and Drinking

Safe Administration of Medication Training

The Safe Administration of Medication training is designed to enable healthcare workers to perform their duties safely and effectively when assisting clients with their medication. In addition to the Medication Awareness, learners will cover:

The ‘Rights’ of medication administration
Practical assessment of medication administration
MAR sheets, including Controlled drugs
Recording procedures

All online training will take place via Zoom. If you register for a course, the Zoom link will be emailed to prior to the event.

Medication Support & Administration

When it comes to medication, safety is paramount. Our training focuses on teaching you best practices for safe administration, reducing the risk of errors and ensuring you have the information and expertise required to excel in your PA role. Once completed, this training should be refreshed annually.

What will be covered?

• Your roles and responsibilities when administering or supporting someone with medication.
• How to prepare medication safely.
• How to document the use of medication.
• How to store and dispose of medication in a safe way.
• The 8 rights and guidelines of administration.
• What to do if an error is made and why they happen.
• The types of medication.

Assisted Eating and Drinking Training

Course Overview:

It is important that everybody who works in the care environment recognises the signs of potential eating and drinking difficulties and is able to support service users to eat and drink. This course combines both theory and practical sessions to equip those who work in care settings with this knowledge.

Course Aims:

Define Dysphagia
Identify the main parts of the human mouth and pharynx
Recognise signs and symptoms of aspiration
Know when to refer a service user
Recognise good positions at mealtimes
Experience food textures and being fed in different positions
Management responsibilities

The course will take place via Zoom. An email with the Zoom link will be sent prior to the event.

Safeguarding

Safe Guarding Adults and Children Level 1 Training

Course Overview:

This course looks at the potential indicators of abuse and fulfilling your duty to pass on any disclosures or allegations as well as the feedback you can expect after making an alert. It covers how to address and immediate safety or protection needs of the alleged person at risk and the recording of the incident.

Course Aims:

Personal values and beliefs that underpin safeguarding adults and children
Recognising and responding to abuse disclosures and suspicions
Establishing a shared understanding of best working practice and offering support
Understanding procedures in line with the Care Act when reporting abuse and procedures after an alert

Safeguarding

Group work, looking at case studies, theoretical work and personal reflections. Guidelines and procedures within the course are intended to give health and social care workers the tools to recognise issues related to the mistreatment and abuse of at-risk adults. Half day course. On completion of the course, participants will receive a certificate to demonstrate learning.

Safeguarding

This training is designed to help you recognise and respond to concerns or risks related to the welfare and safety of adults and children at risk. The primary goal of this training is to prevent and address abuse, neglect, or harm and to ensure the well-being of the people you support. Once completed, this training should be refreshed every 2 years.

• What safeguarding is.
• Your responsibilities.
• What to do if someone is in danger.
• Making safeguarding personal.
• The types of abuse and how to recognise these.
• What to do if you suspect abuse.

Laws and Acts

The Mental Capacity Act (Level 1) Training

Course Overview:

This session will provide you with a working knowledge of the existing legal framework for protecting adults.

Course Aims:

What is the Mental Capacity Act & why do we need it?
The Five Key Principles (What is it founded upon)
Triggers & how to assess capacity & what happens if capacity is lacking?
Best Interests & Acting Lawfully
Restraint & Liberty Protection Safeguards
How it links into Lasting Powers of Attorney, Court Appointed Deputies, Advanced Decisions, Court of Protection & The Office of the Public Guardian
New criminal offences of ill-treatment & willful neglect

The course will take place via Zoom and an email with the link will be sent to you prior to the event.

Mental Capacity

This training is essential to ensure that individuals who may lack capacity receive appropriate care and protection of their rights. This course will cover real world examples to give you the best possible chance of safeguarding those you support.

• The Mental Capacity Act and what it is.
• Why the act is so important.
• The 5 principles of the Mental Capacity Act.
• The two-stage capacity assessment.
• Real word examples.

Equality and Diversity

Equality, Diversity & Inclusion

The goal of this training is to create environments where all individuals are treated fairly, with dignity and respect, regardless of their background, characteristics, or differences. In a world that thrives on diversity and inclusivity, understanding and appreciating the unique differences of individuals is paramount.

• The definitions of equality, diversity and inclusion.
• The 9 protected characteristics.
• The Equality Act 2010.
• The definitions of harassment, discrimination and victimisation.
• Unconscious bias and stereotypes.

Disability Equality

This workshop based training, held via Microsoft Teams will enable participants to understand key disability legislation and support the learner in recognising and meeting the needs of disabled people.

Each training session will cover:

Creating a more inclusive environment for all by removing barriers.
Understanding attitudes and how they have changed over time.
Highlighting the importance and value of the social model.
Awareness of respectful language and etiquette.

Training for Employers

How to support a Personal Assistant and your role as an employer

This online training is for parent carers who employ or wish to employ a PA to support their loved one. It will cover how to find and recruit a PA, what duties to expect a PA to support with. We will also explore different methods of sourcing support and how to access training for a PA via Individual Employer Funding via Skills for Care.

Independent Employer Training: The Essentials

This series of four modules is specifically designed for PA employers who are looking to enhance their skills, refresh their teams, or navigate the complexities of employing PAs for the first time. Managing a successful team of PAs can be challenging, but these modules offer essential tools and strategies to help create a balanced and effective employer-PA relationship. Developed by individuals with complex needs, the content is grounded in real-world experiences, making it practical, relevant, practical, and highly applicable. Whether you’re an experienced employer or new to the process, these modules will equip you with the knowledge and confidence to build and maintain a successful PA team.

PA Employer 1: Recruitment and Onboarding

This module will guide PA employers through the process of creating and sharing job adverts. It will cover the art of writing an effective advert, selecting appropriate platforms for posting, and tailoring it to communicate the employer’s unique needs. It will also include strategies for smooth and effective onboarding, ensuring a good start for new PAs.

PA Employer 2: Training PAs and Sharing Information

In this module, employers will learn how to train their PAs effectively, ensuring they understand the essential details about their employer’s preferences and needs. The module also covers the importance of sharing up-to-date information, documentation and knowledge where appropriate, and how to communicate expectations to ensure PAs are well-informed and aligned with their employer’s requirements.

PA Employer 3: Using Technology to Support Admin and Management

This module introduces PA employers to various technical tools, such as Google Suite and Todoist, that can streamline administrative tasks. It covers managing employment records, handling files, tracking timesheets, and organising information, all aimed at simplifying the management of a PA team.

PA Employer 4: Managing a Successful Employer Relationship

This module focuses on helping PA employers develop the communication skills needed to maintain a positive and productive employment relationship. It covers strategies for effective communication when things are going well and, importantly, when challenges arise. Employers will learn techniques to become proactive managers, anticipating issues before they escalate and fostering a supportive work environment.

This training is funded by Skills for Care

Online Courses

General PA Training and Approaches

PA Training: The Essentials

PA 1: There's Someone in my House

PA 2: Doing It My Way

PA 3: It's Private

PA 4: Relationships

Understanding the Role of a PA

Person Centred Care Training

Personal Assistant (PA) Training

Whole Family Approaches

Dignity and Privacy Training

Challenging Behaviour

Responding to Behaviours That Challenge Training

Communication and Challenging Behaviour

Positive Behaviour Support

Awareness Training

Pica Behaviour (eating inedible objects)

Learning Disability with Dementia Awareness Training

Learning Disability Awareness Training

Health and Safety Awareness Training

Dementia Awareness Training

Diabetes Awareness Training

Autism Awareness Training

Understanding Autism

Autism Awareness

Trauma Awareness – understanding and responding to family trauma

Mental Health Awareness Training

Mental Health Awareness

Disability Awareness

Moving, Medication, Eating and Drinking

Safe Administration of Medication Training

Medication Support & Administration

Assisted Eating and Drinking Training

Safeguarding

Safe Guarding Adults and Children Level 1 Training

Safeguarding

Safeguarding

Laws and Acts

The Mental Capacity Act (Level 1) Training

Mental Capacity

Equality and Diversity

Equality, Diversity & Inclusion

Disability Equality

Training for Employers

How to support a Personal Assistant and your role as an employer

Independent Employer Training: The Essentials

PA Employer 1: Recruitment and Onboarding

PA Employer 2: Training PAs and Sharing Information

PA Employer 3: Using Technology to Support Admin and Management

PA Employer 4: Managing a Successful Employer Relationship

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