VIG Introductory Training Course – online course

Upcoming Dates

Course Outline

Video Interaction Guidance (VIG) is an intervention through which a practitioner aims to enhance communication within relationships. It works by engaging clients actively in a process of change towards realising their own hopes for a better future in their relationships with others who are important to them.

The methods, quality and standards of VIG are specified by the Association for Video Interaction Guidance UK (AVIGUK).

VIG works in a respectful and collaborative way with clients using edited video clips of “better than usual” communication between people as the basis of reflective dialogue about how to develop the relationship further. It is a relationship-based intervention which helps parents become more sensitive and attuned to their child’s emotional needs, regardless of the age of the child. There is a growing evidence base for the effectiveness of relatively short sensitivity-focused interventions with parents using video feedback in an attuned way.

Who is this course for?

This introductory course (delivered online in 2 full days) is the essential starting point to training in VIG. It provides the background to VIG and orientates participants towards the underlying value system and how this affects practice. Participants get the opportunity to practice using the technique in a small group.

Training in VIG is suitable for professionals who work with parents and carers who are experiencing difficulties in communication with their children and wish to develop better relationships with them. VIG is also relevant to staff who work with children and young people in care settings, special education, staff in higher education support, or staff working in specialist projects such as FDAC.

VIG has been used by a wide range of staff including educational and clinical psychologists, social workers, CAMHS workers, health visitors, residential care staff, speech and language therapists, children’s centre workers and peripatetic teachers in early years and special education settings. It has often been used in situations where communication and relationships between adults and children or young people have almost completely broken down as well as in situations in which good communication has been slow to develop. There is a developing evidence base for the effectiveness of VIG in promoting change in families where a history of professional input has failed to lead to change.

Aims and learning outcomes

The course offers illustrations of clips used by guiders with clients and an introduction to the framework for micro-analysis of attuned and non-attuned interaction.

After this introductory course participants will understand how and why VIG works and be able to describe the principles of attuned communication.

Having seen themselves on video and experienced supportive feedback about their communication style from peers, participants will also be able to describe their own strengths in communication with clients and identify for themselves a working point or goal for change in communication.

The ratio of trainers to participants will be roughly 1:5, to allow close support to the small group skills based practice sessions.

Participants will be ready to start supervised practice after the introductory training. To become accredited, trainees are expected to work with a minimum of 6 clients and undertake 18 cycles of VIG (a cycle consists of taking a film and doing a shared review of the clips with the client.)

Each trainee requires a minimum of 15 hours individual supervision with an accredited supervisor.

Mandatory Course Requirements

It is essential that trainees attend both days of the course.

You will need a laptop with access to Zoom Video Conferencing to participate on the course. To continue with VIG you will need to have equipment to take video and edit it.

‘Video Interaction Guidance. A Relationship-Based Intervention to Promote Attunement, Empathy and Wellbeing’, edited by Hilary Kennedy, Miriam Landor and Liz Todd and published by Jessica Kingsley is recommended as pre-reading and is a core text for the VIG training.

Facilitators

Monika Celebi is a parent infant psychotherapist & movement therapist and national trainer and supervisor for the Association for Video Interaction Guidance (AVIGuk). She will be joined by Rebecca Carr-Hopkins (AVIGuk accredited supervisor) and other colleagues.