The paper describes the planning and development of a new children's day resource in Leicestershire. The principles underpinning the clinical work of the day resource team are outlined and an account is given of the new clinical services provided during its first eighteen months of operation. These include assessments of children in groups and with their families, social skills, dramatherapy and psychotherapeutic groups for children, and an innovative day programme for groups of families whose children present with oppositional‐defiant and conduct disorder