Supporting the creative use of technology to improve life story work for vulnerable children- trove as a case example from REACT

This proposal is intended to enhance the value and wider benefit of the knowledge exchange originally funded under AHRC REACT- trove. Trove is a digitally enabled memory box that allows children to attach stories to their precious objects and to take control over the telling of their life story through their precious objects, underpinned by Watson's work on life story books for adopted children. The original REACT funding provided the opportunity to rapidly develop a prototype and to test it with a small cohort of children. The project gave a positive indication that this type of technology could have transformative potential. However, it became apparent that the potential of such a technological intervention would have an implication on social and family worker practice and their role in supporting children to construct their own identity narrative using trove. It also highlighted key concerns around such solutions, namely security and affordability.
Trove has the potential to inform more positive outcomes for society's most vulnerable children and young people but for it to become purchased and used the value it offers needs to be better understood by the sector. Such a change in practice requires an in-depth understandings of the importance of material objects to identity: how the technological life story solution might work in the most challenging social care spaces for children and what the barriers and therapeutic benefits are. This is why it is essential to widen the skills and knowledge in this creative economy partnership.
The proposal therefore combines new academic partnerships (with computer science and industrial design) and new sector partnerships (Mulberry Bush School and Bristol Children and Families Services) with existing sector partner Coram and creative partner Studio Meineck. The partnership will focus on addressing the known challenges for the prototype and further our understanding of the sector needs and route forward for this technology based intervention to be adopted. This intelligence will enable the creative partner to progress the prototype and position it within the social care market. The proposal is also supported with an in kind donation from the Hadley Trust and with academic and sector specific knowledge provided through the team's association with the Hadley Centre- world renown research centre on adoption and fostering. These partnerships would not be enabled through any other funding mechanism and represent an unparalleled opportunity to embed the technology within the sector and positively enhance the creative partner's ambition to get the trove solution to market.
The aims for the proposal are:
-To support children who have been taken into care to capture their early childhood stories and memories and to keep objects of meaning securely
-To support children to have advocacy over their story and to communicate and share this with their adopted families or carers where they wish to
-To support social workers and care organisations to best support children in care
-To create a sustainable business model and ensure the uptake of the solution
These aims will be addressed by 6 concurrent work packages with user centred design and co-production principles underpinning the work: Understanding system, mapping networks, and stakeholder needs; Developing Academic justification for technologies in life story work; Co-designed digital intervention development; User trials and analysis; Sector engagement event; Developed and extended evidence-based business plan including route to market. There are a number of planned outputs: a scalable, maintainable, secure and trial ready prototype; a short film dedicated to capturing trove developments and sector endorsements; a good practice guide for social workers; a toolkit for adults supporting children's use of trove; a policy briefing; a sector seminar in Bristol; a joint sector engagement event in the Foundling Museum or Coram Headquarters.

Direct beneficiaries will be children in care and adopted children. We will work with two distinct groups of children (approx 100) in very different care environments to test our assumptions, and feedback into the design process. We expect them to benefit from being part of the project, by giving them a chance to voice their experiences of life story work so far, by giving them independence and confidence by being our 'experts' whilst addressing the design aspects and functions of trove. Long term it is hoped that the benefits of technologically enhanced life story work and a focus on material objects will have impact on high numbers of children and young people in care and those who have been adopted. It is hard to estimate exact numbers of potential beneficiaries but there were 70,440 looked after children at 31 March 2016 (DfE, 2016) and over the last 12 years in England alone 40,000 children have been adopted. In addition 200,000 children are being brought up by relatives rather than birth parents. Such a product may also have huge benefits for asylum seeking children and young people who have experienced dislocation and loss. Latest figures for unaccompanied migrant children in the UK (BBC, September 2016) quote over 4000 yet recent arrivals from Calais will have inflated this further. These young people enter care and could potentially benefit a great deal from a product focused on re-constructing their memories and sense of coherent identity narrative.
Social workers will also be major beneficiaries in respect of the focus on an aspect of practice that currently has little training or resource afforded. Feedback so far from social work practitioners suggests that whilst they personally see the crucial role of good life story work (including production of a book and curation and storying of material objects) it is not a practice that is well understood or supported by managers when competing safeguarding demands are prioritised and staffing shortfalls are common. They will benefit from their contributions to the design process as well as to engaging in the sector seminar (Bristol) and the sector event in London where this aspect of practice will be foregrounded and supported with a good practice guide and toolkit for practitioners and carers.
Those caring for children in care will also be beneficiaries in respect of foster carers and adoptive parents who engage with the events and who benefit from the support provided by the associated toolkit and good practice guide. Initial consultations with parents and carers has raised concerns about the symbolism (pandora box) of trove and how they are to manage sensitive disclosures and the unfolding memories and understandings. The work with the residential therapeutic school is particularly important in this context as we need to better understand the risks and benefits of engaging with trove for children affected by trauma.
Our partners will also be key beneficiaries and their letters of support outline in what ways they feel participation in the project will enable them to foreground and improve life story work practice that engages with technologies to include children's material objects. Across the three partnerships this could potentially have impacts across 9 local authority children's services (Coram has influence in 7 + Oxford and Bristol) and disseminated across practice networks with national reach. This could potentially reach thousands of beneficiaries in the looked after and adoption sector.
Finally we expect our work to have impact on policy making decisions as one of our outputs focuses specifically on addressing policy makers, commissioners of services and research in the sector and academics. This could for example be through adoption of the trove solution as a therapeutic intervention that could be funded for children under the Adoption Support Fund or in recommendations for changes to initial social work training.