I have maintained this blog site or more than ten years. This will be the 250th post published to it. Given the sheer volume of content I have decided to make a post with links to the posts that I think best reflect my work. It is not an exhaustive list, as the list would become too long. Rather, I simply wanted to assist visitors to this site to be able to quickly and easily access what I think are some of the central posts. I may even do a separate post containing links to the significant posts that did not make this list . . .. In any event, I hope this is useful to you.
It is too hard to rank the posts in order of what I consider to be their importance, or by topic. Rather, I will do them by year, starting with the earliest posts that probably no longer get the attention they once did.
2011
Four good reasons for using play during therapy with children and adolescents.
My first post, and still relevant. A printout of this post still appears in the waiting room of my practice and was re-published on the blog site of Jessica Kingsley Publishers following publication of the first edition of A Short Introduction to Attachment and Attachment Disorder – my first book.
2012
Attachment therapy for children who have experienced family trauma.
Another post about my approach to psychotherapy. This resulted in an approach by the editor of a periodical of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy to write an article for them. That article, titled Repairing Attachments, can be accessed here.
Taming Tantrums; Managing Meltdowns: Part One.
One of my earlier posts on this topic of much attention. Subsequent posts include:
- Taming Tantrums; Managing Meltdowns – Part Two (2012); and
- Tantrums: Eight management strategies to keep in mind (2019).
The Hawthorne effect in schools.
One of my earlier posts about therapeutic care and management of children and young people at school, it is also one of the most read posts on this site. There are a number of other posts about trauma-informed practice in schools, but in addition to reading the ‘Hawthorne Effect’ post I would direct readers to my article titled Attached to the Unattached, published in SEN Magazine in the UK in 2010.
A simple method for getting children off to sleep.
Drawn from my book, A Short Introduction to Attachment and Attachment Disorder, this is my most read post. Part 2 (2019) is also worth looking at.
2014
Adopting a Balanced View.
This short article first appeared in the Blog for The Adoption Social on 21/1/14. I have subsequently revised it, somewhat, for inclusion in the handbook for The CARE Curriculum.
2015
Lessons about Learning: Some Truths about Behaviour Management.
A reflection piece about why traditional behaviour management is problematic for addressing challenging behaviour among children and young people recovering from a tough start to life. It reflects my deep consideration of the operant conditioning paradigm and how that can inform the care of deeply hurt and troubled children, an exemplar of which is the prologue of the first edition of A Short Introduction to Attachment and Attachment Disorder – A Tale of Three Mice: An Attachment Story.
2018
It is, perhaps, not surprising that my more recent blogs best reflect my contemporary views and work. They also reflect some changes in the way I communicated about my work, including in this first post.
Your child’s CARE Requirements through the years.
In this post I was experimenting in developing infographics to give a quick and easy snapshot of the information I wished to convey.
2019
When Punishment if Problematic.
This was an update to an earlier post from 2015, and provides a succinct exemplar about my views and approach to the care and management of children and young people, and challenging behaviour.
Use your words: Supporting expressive language development and use
An article about the importance of communicating the thoughts and feelings of children and young people, which has significant developmental implications, especially for children and young people who are recovering from a tough start to life.
Raising kids who have high and complex needs: The importance of self care
Not my first foray on the issue of self-care for parents and carers, but the one that best reflects my contemporary views and approach; including that which is represented in The CARE Curriculum.
2020
Preserving placements during a pandemic: Video series with handbook.
One of a number of posts that appeared during the early stages of the COVID 19 pandemic, this content was developed for foster, kinship and adoptive parents of children recovering from relational trauma, and was included on the COVID 19 resource page of the South Australian Department for Child Protection. A related post of interest to a more general audience is Practical Parenting During a Pandemic.
Child Psychotherapy: An update about my approach
A recent update about my approach to psychotherapy with children and young people, this should be read in conjunction with Relationships Regulate and Repair (2021).
Five strategies for addressing issues with compliance in children
One of the more recent of a series of posts that appear on this site in which I attempt to distil my thoughts into a short list of practical strategies for addressing parenting challenges. If you enter ‘four things’ or ‘five things’ into the search bar on this site you will be able to access similar posts about other care and management challenges in the home and school.
2021
All relationships are important for attachment security
Perhaps, the most important post on this site, and one that I will soon expand into a periodical article for publication, this article challenges conventional privileging of singular relationships in attachment outcomes for children and young people, and makes the point that all significant relationships contribute to the attachment style and attachment security of children and young people.
This brings us to the end of this post. I hope you find it useful. For the best overview of my work, why not access one or both of my books; A Short Introduction to Attachment and Attachment Disorder (2 Editions), and A Short Introduction to Promoting Resilience in Children? Best wishes. Colby
Attachment and Resilience 