Are We Misunderstanding Children? The Hidden Ethical Risk in Family Work

An in-person, practice based training exploring how children’s voices are heard, interpreted and used within family and justice related systems.

Delivered by Katy Harris, UK family mediator and child focused practitioner, and Professor Gigi Gutiérrez, restorative justice expert and international leader in youth voice and equity based practice, this session brings together two powerful and complementary perspectives. Katy offers a distinct UK lens shaped by over 17 years of work with families in conflict, mediation, court connected practice and child focused reform. Gigi brings international expertise in restorative justice, youth voice and systemic equity, grounded in extensive work with young people across education and justice settings.

Together, they invite professionals to examine a vital question at the heart of practice: when children speak, are we always understanding what they are truly communicating?

Rather than focusing on process alone, the training looks beneath surface statements to consider how children’s words, wishes and behaviours are shaped by development, attachment, trauma, loyalty, stress and relational context. Through carefully guided experiential moments, participants explore how interpretation is formed, how professional assumptions influence action and how harm can arise when children’s voices are over simplified, over weighted or used without sufficient context.

At the centre of the training is a clear and accessible framework, child first, not child led. This approach strengthens the importance of children’s voices by ensuring they are held safely, interpreted carefully and used responsibly within adult decision making. Participants leave with a more considered, confident and ethically grounded lens for understanding how children’s voices are heard and responded to across disciplines.