COSP: A Tool for Parents, Caregivers and Professionals

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e think of the Circle of Security Parenting™ Program as a tool. Caregivers use the COSP Program tool to connect with the children in their lives, whether at home or in childcare or classroom settings. Designed as a preventive intervention to be used universally, the COSP program is typically delivered over 8-10 weekly sessions in group format. While COSP groups work particularly well, the COSP program is also often used with individual caregivers or couples. Now translated into many languages, the COSP program has traveled the world. Training is now available in eight languages (English, French, Spanish, Norwegian, Danish, Italian, Japanese and Romanian) and providers can be trained in person or online in either English or Spanish.

Speaking of language, one way the COSP tool impacts caregivers is by giving them a new language–the language of the Circle. We’ve taken the complexity of attachment theory and research and organized it into a simple set of concepts that help caregivers see relationships more clearly. Each week, caregivers learn new terms, highlighted in videos and with handouts and reinforced by trained Facilitators who already know the COSP language. By the end of the COSP program, participants have adopted new words and phrases that help them negotiate their relationships in a more secure fashion. You can learn some of these terms by watching the video overview of the COSP program.

Engagement: For Which Populations is the COSP program the Right Tool?

We’re constantly amazed at how our trained COSP Facilitators apply the COSP program tool. For example, check out the stories from Facilitators who work caregivers in prison or in transition from prison. It is clear from both qualitative and quantitative research, that one key aspect of the COSP is that it can be used as an engagement tool for stressed caregivers. Caregivers are almost always interested in connecting with their children and, as a video-based reflection program, it’s clear that the COSP program functions as an engagement tool.

Of course, as with any tool, it’s important to determine whether COSP is the right tool for the job. It is one thing to engage caregivers with multiple life stressors with a tool that was designed as a preventive intervention; however, COSP was not designed to deliver lasting change to families at greatest risk for attachment disturbances. Well-trained and supported COSP Facilitators can engage these families using COSP but often find that adding further intervention–whether with the COS-Intensive model or other ongoing therapeutic interventions–is needed. Building a therapeutic alliance with families is an important first step. However, using COSP as the only parenting intervention with child welfare involved families before reunification is misguided.

COSP Facilitators and Professional Development

Trained COSP Facilitators, of which there are more than 50,000 worldwide, come from many professional and paraprofessional disciplines. It’s no surprise that COSP Facilitators use the COSP Program tool in many ways. Beyond using COSP as an engagement tool, Facilitators are also to build skills in understanding attachment and reflection (sometimes also called ‘mentalization’) with caregivers from teachers to foster parents. In other words, the COSP program is also used as a professional development tool.

We are pleased, for example, that both paraprofessionals and professionals who are seeking Endorsement in Infant and Young Child Mental Health can use our COSP training as evidence of competency in a number of areas necessary for endorsement. You can find out more about this competency-based system overseen by the Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health and available in many US states and several other countries by visiting their website. For more information, visit the specific crosswalk linking the COSP Facilitator Training with Endorsement for Culturally Sensitive, Relationship-Focused Practice Promoting Infant & Early Childhood Mental Health(R).

We’re often asked by Facilitators about the best ways to build skills in facilitation of the program. In many ways, COSP is an engagement tool for Facilitator’s too and we’ve been dedicated to providing more professional development opportunities for all COSP Facilitators. A good starting place is what we call the Path to Secure Hands series of online courses focusing on skill-building for COSP Facilitation.

The Circle and Supervision

The COSP program presents a roadmap–the Circle of Security Diagram–that caregivers can use to identify the needs their children have as they navigate their world. We’ve revised the Circle roadmap and applied to the focus on another intimate relationship, namely that of the Supervisor and Supervisee. The figure below is called the Supervisor’s Circle and is now being used as a simple way to think more deeply about supervision, which is another key aspect of professional development.

A recent article dove more deeply into the use of the Circle of Security as a framework for clinical supervision.

We also offer a form of reflective supervision–we’ve named it Fidelity Coaching–for trained COSP Facilitators. Working with an experienced Fidelity Coach is a terrific way to build skills. For an overview of Fidelity Coaching click here. If you are already a COSP Facilitator and want to learn more about Fidelity Coaching and watch video testimonials of how this form of supervision helps, visit the member’s side of our website and check out this page.

The COSP program is a tool that caregivers of many kinds and professionals from many disciplines are using to learn about attachment. If you’re ready to sign up to be trained to facilitate the COSP program, we’re ready to have you join our family of facilitators around the world.