Family to Family Teacher Training

The Family to Family Teacher (F2F) training is a 3 day intensive training that prepares volunteers, who are family members of someone with a mental illness, to teach the program in their community. The F2F curriculum is specifically designed to enable family members to conduct a rigorous 12 week course without a professional in the lead role. This training will cover the content of the classes and provides the basic skills that volunteers need to feel confident and enjoy teaching.

Participants will practice lecture style and delivery as they move through the curriculum. Brain biology and medications will be reviewed in some depth, but generally there will not be a lot of time spent “learning facts” about mental illness. Instead the focus will be on the emotional aspects of the family experience.

Other core areas of focus include:

the emotional reactions of families to mental illness
the needs of families in critical periods of mental illness
developing empathy as the doorway to understanding our relatives with mental illness
learning new problem solving and communication skills to cope more effectively with mental illness
assisting families in self-care by encouraging them to speak their feelings of frustration, guilt and grief

These elements of the course are the “heart of the matter” in family education and they will be the core of the work at the training workshop. In addition new teachers will learn how to advertise their classes and recruit and interview families interested in participating in the class.

Teacher Eligibility: Teachers must have the experience of having a loved one in their life with a mental illness and are required to be members of NAMI NH. It is not a requirement to have taken the F2F course before becoming a teacher, but it is strongly recommended. Teachers are asked to make a commitment to teach a minimum of 2 courses within 2 years. No formal teaching experience is required. All interested parties must complete an application. If you are interested in becoming a Family-to-Family teacher, please contact Annette Carbonneau at 603.225.5359 or via Email for an application.