Interview Training Workshops

Training Information

The Canadian Child Interviewing Research Team provides evidence-based training on children’s memory, development, communication, disclosure, and best practices for questioning children. Our trainings are designed for professionals who interact with children in legal, educational, health, child protection, advocacy, and service contexts, including police, social workers, lawyers, educators, nurses, and other professionals who may receive information from children.

CCIRT offers different types of training depending on the role of the audience. Some trainings are broadly applicable to professionals who work with, support, teach, assess, or respond to children. These include trainings on child development, trauma-informed communication, receiving disclosures, children’s memory, and developmentally appropriate ways to talk with children.

Our forensic interviewing training is more restricted. Training in the Ten-Step Forensic Interviewing Protocol is intended for professionals whose role includes conducting investigative or forensic interviews with children in legal, child protection, or related justice-system contexts. This distinction is important because forensic interviews are evidence-gathering interviews and must be conducted in a supportive, neutral, non-suggestive, and developmentally appropriate manner.

CCIRT offers customized training for agencies and professional groups. Because of this, training costs vary depending on the needs of the organization, the training format, the length of the workshop, the audience, and any travel requirements.

Many trainings can be offered as half-day or full-day group workshops. In-person training is preferred, especially for sessions that involve applied practice, discussion, or feedback, although virtual options may be available in some cases.

For training inquiries, please email research@ccirt.ca and include your organization, location, intended audience, preferred format, approximate group size, and the type of training you are seeking. We typically begin with a brief meeting to learn more about your training needs, audience, and goals.

Below is a list of regular trainings offered by our CCIRT members.

Ten Step Forensic Interviewing Protocol (version 3.0)

This training is intended for professionals who conduct forensic or investigative interviews with children as part of their legal, child protection, or justice-system role. The Ten-Step Forensic Interview protocol (Lyon, 2021) is a research-based, child-friendly interview protocol based on the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development forensic interviewing protocol. This training focuses on evidence-based interviewing practices, including rapport building, ground rules, narrative practice, allegation-focused questioning, avoiding suggestive or leading questions, and strategies for eliciting accurate and complete information from children. Because this training is designed for those conducting forensic interviews, it is not intended as general training for all professionals who work with children.

Trainers have completed a 14-week in-person training session on the Ten-Step and conducted forensic interviews while studying with Dr. Thomas Lyon at the University of Southern California. The Ten-Step is a research-based, child-friendly interview protocol based on the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) protocol.

This training is offered on a tier system.

Tier 1 is a half-day basic introduction to the Ten-Step Protocol
Tier 2 is a two-day skill-development workshop for those regularly interviewing children, and
Tier 3 is an advanced three-day intensive workshop for child interviewing specialists.

Receiving Disclosures

This training is designed for professionals who may receive a disclosure of maltreatment, abuse, or concerning experiences from a child, but whose role is not necessarily to conduct a forensic interview. This may include educators, nurses, child-serving professionals, advocates, and service providers.

This half-day training focuses on how to respond supportively while avoiding questions or responses that could unintentionally shape, contaminate, or compromise the child’s account.

Trauma Informed Interviewing

This training is appropriate for a broad professional audience. It is a customizable overview of child development as it relates to children’s communication, memory, suggestibility, truth/lie understanding, social influence, emotional expression, and ability to answer different types of questions.

This training may be useful for professionals who interact with children, interpret children’s reports, or need to understand why children’s responses may differ from adults’ expectations.

Perpetrator Photo Lineups: Best Practices

This training is intended primarily for legal, investigative, and justice-system professionals involved in eyewitness identification procedures or cases involving child or adolescent witnesses. The training reviews memory processes, factors that can affect eyewitness accuracy, and empirically supported best practices for photo lineups, including developmental considerations for juvenile eyewitnesses.

Talking to Children: Memory, Cognitive, Social, and Moral Development

This training is appropriate for a broad professional audience. It provides an overview of child development as it relates to children’s communication, memory, suggestibility, truth/lie understanding, social influence, emotional expression, and ability to answer different types of questions.

This training may be useful for professionals who interact with children, interpret children’s reports, or need to understand why children’s responses may differ from adults’ expectations.

What participants say about CCIRT training

Members of CCIRT have offered training for organizations, such as:

Saskatchewan Police College
London Court Family Clinic
Beacon House Child & Youth Advocacy Centre

Recent CCIRT workshop participants rated the training highly across relevance, organization, practical value, and confidence-building.

97% rated the workshop as valuable overall.
94% said the workshop was well organized and easy to follow.
94% felt better equipped to think critically about interviewing children.
91% said the workshop improved their understanding of child investigative interviewing techniques.

Participants especially valued the practical examples, interview materials, and links between child development, memory, and interviewing practice.

“Having real examples to review and walk through. Showing how changing a word or two can alter the response.”

“The materials provided are very helpful, and I will definitely refer back to them in the future.”

“I liked learning about the memory for repeated events and the mental template that kids often form subconsciously.”

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