To undertake this course, we ask that you have:

• a minimum of the equivalent of twelve months full-time experience of working with children, young people and their families. Approximately half of this work must have been completed within the last five years.
• an interest in learning about unconscious processes, emotional development, observation, and psychoanalytic thinking
• a willingness to engage in thinking about the way that culture and individual/group identity shape emotional development
• a willingness to engage in experiential learning
• a first degree or the ability to demonstrate that you can meet the academic demands of the course and/or have completed one year of the Tavistock and Portman course, Emotional care of babies, children, young people and families (EC1)

For the duration of the course, you have to be working directly with children, young people, parents or families, usually for a minimum of one day a week for students with considerable prior experience or two days a week for students with the minimum of prior experience.

In order for you to be able meet the academic requirements of this master’s programme your work must be in an organisation with a safeguarding lead.

You must be in a working role which meets all the course requirements prior to enrolment.

Home (2025/26)

£6,650 per year for first and second year. Third year fees are £3,200.

International (2025/26)

£13,300 per year for first and second year. Third year fees are £6,400.

You will be charged course fees for each year of your course. If your course is longer than one year, the fees that you will be charged after the first year will be subject to an annual uplift, which is not normally expected to exceed 6% or the Consumer Price Index (as stated on 01 September of that academic year) if higher than 6%. At its discretion and in rare instances, the Trust may determine a figure greater than either, to reflect costs associated with the activity (e.g. assessment, teaching, administration etc.), which shall not exceed 10%. Please refer to our Terms and Conditions, and Student Fees & Refund Policy for further information.

Financial support may be available to help you fund your studies at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust.

Assessment

In the first two years of the course there are written assessment tasks relating to each of the modules studied.

In both years, the written assessment tasks require the integration of detail from observational and work discussion material with theoretical concepts drawn from psychoanalysis and other fields of child development theory.

In the first year, you will also complete short essays on concepts studied in psychoanalytic theory and in child development research. Progression in the course is dependent upon passing this assessed work.

To gain the master’s award, you need to pass the postgraduate diploma of study and then undertake a third year of study to complete a dissertation.

In this dissertation year, you attend a specific seminar for the first term to develop your dissertation proposal. This proposal is based on a question or theme drawn from your earlier studies in the course. In this thesis you will draw upon observational material gathered through your infant observation, young child observation or work discussion studies.

Once the proposal has been accepted you complete the dissertation through personal study, supported by your dissertation supervisor.

Attendance

Year one (Wednesdays, 10am to 3.15pm)

• theoretical perspectives
• work discussion seminar
• infant observation seminar

Year two (Wednesdays, 10am to 4.45pm)

• psychoanalytic theory/experiential group
• work discussion seminar
• infant observation seminar
• young child observation seminar

Year three

Dissertation (this will be taught through a combination of seminars/workshops and one-to-one supervision on your thesis).

Please note that you will also need to set aside one hour each week for observation of an infant and/or young child during the first and second years of the course. It is your responsibility to arrange these observations, but you will be given guidance and support with this task prior to starting the course.

Graduates have used this course to deepen and develop their work with children and families and apply their practical observation skills and a psychoanalytic lens to their practice in a range of professional contexts, including their current work and volunteering settings.

Many graduates have used this course as a prerequisite for training as a child and adolescent psychotherapist on the course, Child and adolescent psychotherapy (M80).

Some have progressed to senior practitioner and specialist posts within their own professions and continue to develop their psychoanalytic practice through CPD work discussion groups, using their new skills to increase confidence and potential promotion opportunities.