Restorative Practice provides us with a value base, language, behaviours and tools to strengthen relationships with children and families and each other. Our restorative approach focuses on empowering our children and families to find solutions to their problems and recognises them as experts of their own lives.

Restorative Practice is about putting strong, meaningful and trusting relationships at the heart of how we work with children and families.

It is about seeing families as experts of the their own experience, and using restorative approaches to repair relationships.

Working with children and families means offering supportive relationships combined with clear goals focussed on the needs of children. It also places an emphasis on family led decision making approaches to solving problems.

Restorative practice also starts with building an organisational culture based on respect and accountability, where we value our professional relationships and take care of each other, but also challenge each other to get the best for children and families in Devon.

What does working restoratively look like in practice?

Our ambition is for everyone who works with children and families to be able to follow a consistent restorative way of working which is guided by our core principles and values and informed by evidence-based approaches.

Consistency does not mean rigidity; our approach is designed to be adaptable and flexible to respond to individual need but is centred on a restorative value base. This will enable practitioners to exercise skilled professional judgement to do the right thing, to provide effective help and support, to clarify the values of the organisation and have the courage to be creative when they must balance difficult and demanding decisions that affect the lives of children.