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Parent Effectiveness Training

Learn how to raise responsible, resilient, emotionally healthy and happy children.

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Online or Face to Face courses are now available for your choice.

What is Parent Effectiveness Training?

Parent Effectiveness Training (P.E.T.) is based on a philosophy of respect for everyone’s feelings and needs in the family or teacher/ child relationships.  Meeting children’s emotional needs is vital for raising happy, resilient, secure kids and our needs as parents, carers and educators are important too!

P.E.T. is unique in that it is not focused on simply trying to change children’s behaviours.  Children’s behaviour is usually driven by underlying feelings and needs. Many parenting and teacher education courses focus on trying to change children’s behaviour and therefore miss the underlying causes.  This often results in change that is short-lived and doesn’t help children develop important social and emotional skills.

P.E.T. offers parents, educators and carers highly practical tools to raise emotionally intelligent children, without the reliance on coercive behaviour management such as punishments, rewards, threats, bribes or time outs.

This results in warmer, more connected relationships, and kids who are happier, more co-operative, responsible and self-disciplined. This also makes parenting, teaching or caring easier and more enjoyable!

Who does P.E.T. work for?

P.E.T. skills are equally effective for parents, educators or carers with children of all ages; for step-parents, single parents, foster parents, parents of different cultural backgrounds, grandparents, educators and carers.

Designed to teach healthy communication skills to parents, educators or carers, P.E.T. is a 24 hour course, which usually comprises of 8 x 3hour sessions. The P.E.T. program was developed by award-winning, psychologist Dr Thomas Gordon  60 years ago after extensive research. The course is now taught by accredited instructors worldwide.

P.E.T. can show you how to:

  • Listen so children will feel understood (ACTIVE LISTENING)
  • Grow your connection with your children (PREVENTIVE & RELATIONSHIP SKILLS)
  • Talk so children will understand and help you (I-MESSAGES)
  • Resolve conflict so nobody loses (THE NO-LOSE METHOD)
  • Avoid ineffective communication (COMMUNICATION ROADBLOCKS)
  • Deal constructively with values collisions (CONSULTING SKILLS)

Benefits to families or educators and children in classrooms:

  • Less stress and anxiety
  • Better able to deal with anger and strong emotions
  • Warmer more satisfying relationships
  • Children become self-disciplined, resilient and solve own problems
  • Day-to-day issues are resolved respectfully eg bedtime, chores, homework, going to school, classroom routines, use of social media
  • Children talk more openly to parents or educators
  • Fewer family or classroom conflicts
  • Children more open to parent or educators ideas and their values
  • Parents or educators can comfortably express their own concerns and unmet needs related to children’s behaviour.

Duration: 3 hour sessions offered over an 8 week period (24 hours in total).

Classes: Choice of online or face to face courses are now available. As a skills based program, you will practice your learning within your class to gain confidence in using them in your everyday life or unique situation.

“The PET course has genuinely affected the way I engage with my kids, wife and even my staff!

Being a Dad of four kids from eight years old down to one year old, I have swung from believing I knew everything there is to know about raising a child to thinking that parenting is a lost cause and I am just along for the ride.

PET connected with me as it wasn’t a magical parenting formula to follow and that I didn’t need to be the perfect parent. Instead it was a set of communication skills that recognized that I as a parent have important needs and that my child also has important needs and these skills help us both get what we need. Previously, I felt guilty if I met my work/social/sporting needs at the cost of my child’s needs. Other times I felt frustrated when my child’s needs were met at the cost of mine. Finding skills to get what we both need in win-win situations has helped immensely.

After the first session of real practicing and tutorials, I was amazed at how helpful the single skill of active listening was for engaging my kids. I suddenly started paying attention in this first session as I realized how valuable these seemingly simple communication skills are. The practice in the sessions was crucial for me to get the confidence to put it into practice.

I now engage my kids in a connected and meaningful way each day, I feel that my kids deeply respect me for connecting with them and I suddenly feel more present when I am with my family.

I now have the skills to have deeper and more meaningful relationships with my kids. I will be able to communicate my values to them and I will be ready to help them through the difficult issues that they will face in life.”

- Peter, father of 4 children, now has meaningful relationships
P.E.T.
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Loving Family | About ETIA

About ETIA

The Effectiveness Training Institute of Australia (ETIA) Ltd is a not-for-profit, community based organisation that is dedicated to making courses in communication and conflict resolution skills available and accessible to all people in Australia.

ETIA’s mission is to provide individuals with effective communication and conflict resolution skills to build connected, harmonious relationships.

Our inspiration and programs come from the late Dr Thomas Gordon who is the author and founder of Parent Effectiveness Training (P.E.T.) program and Gordon Training International (GTI).

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