STRENGTHENING FAMILIES: THE ROLE OF CHILD CARE

Introduction

Introduction

Conditions for children and families in America continue to deteriorate. Escalating family poverty, unemployment,  homelessness, isolation. and despair. together with growing substance abuse and community and domestic violence, have greatly contributed to the dramatic increase in child abuse and neglect  occurring over the past decade. Much more needs to be done at the community and practice level to prevent abuse and neglect and help families adequately care for their children.

Care

The Child Welfare League of America's *Standards of Excellence for Child Day Care Services* defines child care as a service to support healthy growth and development of children and to support their families by supplementing parental caregiving and childrearing responsibilities.

Quality child care is intended to address children's educational and developmental needs. A stable, nurturing environment promotes a child's physical, emotional, intellectual, social, and cultural development and makes parents feel more secure about the care their children are receiving. Child care may serve as a preventive  service that can help reduce or eliminate social, emotional, or health problems that affect children and parents. It can assist parents with problems of child-rearing and family stress. In some cases, child care may be a remedial or therapeutic service that responds to the psychological harm caused by abuse or neglect, deprivation, family instability, substance abuse, violence, or stress in the home. Comprehensive quality child care that is designed and provided as a child development and a child welfare service can play each of these roles.

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Child Care as a Service To Support and Strengthen Families

The need for child care services is related to the need to strengthen and support families. With more parents in the workforce, child care is now an essential element of family life. Ideally, it strengthens and preserves families by addressing issues that place a family at risk, provides support for the child and family in time of crisis, and eases the transition of a child back to his or her family. Child care promotes and supports family resources by enhancing, not replacing, family responsibilities.

Comprehensive child care, incorporating child development, nutrition, health, and family services, can play a significant role in strengthening and supporting families. It can be a service that effectively prevents child abuse and neglect through family support and education; it can become an element of family-centered casework services; and it can be a vital part of intensive family preservation services. At the same time, parental involvement in child care can strengthen those services on a programmatic level and maximize child care providers' understanding of and responses to the children they serve. Involving parents in meaningful ways can greatly strengthen the quality of child care programs, benefiting children and parents.

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Child Care as a Family Resource, Support, and Education Service

Child care is an important preventive service that serves family resource, support, and education needs. Comprehensive programs that view child care as a preventive service give considerable attention to providing services for parents and families. Parents are encouraged to play a role in determining program policies and practices and in planning child care center activities. They may also participate in structured and unstructured activities designed to strengthen their parenting. The relationships that parents develop with staff members and other parents are important psychological and social supports. By actively promoting and encouraging the involvement of families and serving as an extended support system, child care can make a significant contribution to the prevention of child abuse and neglect.

When developed as a family resource and education service, child care focuses on:

• developing positive relationships with parents
• alerting parents to signs of stress in their own behavior
• providing parents with opportunities to identify and address issues such as alcohol or drug involvement
• providing parents with an understanding of child development
• providing opportunities for parents to become involved in the care of their children and in activities that maximize their children's development
• providing parents with opportunities to enhance their parenting skills
• communicating regularly with parents concerning the status of their children
• providing parent education
• modeling and teaching developmentally appropriate parenting practices
• providing information about community resources
• viewing parents as resources

When programs include these enhanced resources, child care staff, including teachers, nurses, and social workers, are ideally positioned to foster an active partnership with parents. Child care professionals can help parents ream the rewards of their parenting roles; as experts on their own children, parents can help staff members understand and respond to their children's needs. Positive relationships between parents and child care  professionals may be fostered by sharing of culture and/or economic background. Other positive connections are made as staff share optimistic reports with parents about their children and parents' confidence as mothers and fathers. Child care staff can teach parents to recognize and respond appropriately to the normal  growth and developmental stages of children. Staff can model appropriate adult/child interactions and constructive childrearing strategies. Parents' reports to staff about their children's strengths, needs, and interests can enhance the quality and responsiveness of child care services.

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Child Care as an Element of Family-Centered Casework Services

At a more protective level, child care can function as a safety net for a child when parental behaviors place children at risk of abuse or neglect. Child care provides an opportunity for early identification and intervention that can result in better outcomes for children and families and avert crises that could threaten family stability. Because child care providers see a majority of the nation's children under age four, they are in a unique position to identify and respond early to disabilities, developmental delays, and signs of abuse and neglect.

Child care as an element of family-centered casework services can build on parents' strengths by facilitating participation in classes and workshops that improve both parenting skills and parents' ability to respond to the stresses that heighten the risk of child abuse and neglect. Staff can link families to other community resources and help parents make their own resources to services and support. Child care can provide a central location where parents can network with each other and offer mutual social and emotional support. Such support can diminish the sense of isolation many parents, especially young parents, encounter, and can be an effective buffer against stress, reducing a child's risk of maltreatment. For many families who are experiencing stress, quality child care may be the most critical of all services. Few supplemental services may be required if quality child care is readily available.

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Child Care as a Partner to Intensive Family Preservation Services

Part of the success of intensive family preservation services may be attributed to the ability of the caseworker to help family members access the resources and services they need. Particular attention must be paid to child care and its relationship to these services, because most families will require some level of additional support when the intensive intervention is complete. It is necessary to explore and develop strategies and collaborative models that combine short-term, intensive intervention and long-term access to quality child care, ongoing support for the family, and support and assistance for the child care program staff.

Early research has indicated that child care, as a partner service to intensive family preservation services, can improve the physical, emotional, and developmental well-being of children and provide social and economic benefits for families at risk of disruption because of abuse and neglect. Current research findings suggest the need for child care services should be assessed in every intensive family preservation referral that includes young children.

Research further indicates that child care outside of the home can be extremely helpful to children who have been physically or sexually abused. Child care provides a safe and caring place for the child as parents learn how to cope with problems and alter their child-rearing behaviors. Child care furnishes abused and neglected children with structured assistance to maximize their development and ability to engage constructively with caregivers and peers. Such experiences are particularly important because the aggressive and/or withdrawn behaviors associated with abuse and neglect may impair children's efforts to develop positive relationships and learn from stimulating environments.

Child care can offer access to a range of services for the rapidly growing population of families affected by substance abuse. With appropriate training and skill building, child care providers can identify parents in need of alcohol or drug treatment and children who are drug or alcohol affected. Child care staff can refer parents to alcohol and drug treatment, daily monitor how treatment affects parental functioning, and ensure that alcohol- and drug-affected children receive physical and developmental services. Child care can be a source of nurturing, stability, positive stimulation, and relationships for the child; it assists parents who seek community alcohol or drug treatment but cannot participate without child care.

In conjunction with intensive family preservation services, child care can:

• provide an untapped information and assistance resource as well as an often overlooked but vitally needed "wellness" perspective on the family.

• offer, particularly in the form of therapeutic child care, emotional support and therapy for a child who has already been seriously affected by family problems while the child remains in   the family.

• improve the developmental outcome for many drug- or alcohol-exposed children and provide an essential support to families coping with alcohol and drug problems or involved in treatment or recovery programs. Specialized child development services can reduce the developmental risks to children.

• through crisis nursery and respite care programs, give parents   the opportunity to sort out problems while temporarily relieved   of the care for children. Respite care can provide parents with   opportunities to restore their physical and mental well-being so   they can later meet the needs of their children successfully.

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Child Care as a Bridge Across the Array of Family Preservation Services

In addition to its role as a partner service to intensive family preservation services, child care is a consistent source of support to families and an ongoing service connection as they  make the transition from intensive family-centered crisis services to less intensive services. Child care professionals can play an important role as members of multidisciplinary teams and other community responses to the continuum of family needs for prevention, early identification, and treatment relating to child and family well-being.

Because they are directly involved with young children and their families on a daily basis, child care personnel can ensure that the appropriate level of services is in place, thereby contributing to child and family stability and preservation. These issues will continue to affect the evolution of child care services.

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(Compiled from "The Role of Child Care in Strengthening and Supporting Vulnerable Families" by Bruce Hershfield, an article in the Fall 1995 issue of the National Resource Center for Family-Centered Practice's Prevention Report)