Working with families facing challenges
Advice and guidance for early years practitioners on working with and supporting parents and carers of under fives who may have experienced mental health difficulties or challenges themselves.
In your role working with under fives, you may encounter families who may be facing difficult challenges. These could range from families experiencing homelessness, issues of substance dependency, or those who may have recently suffered the loss of a baby.
Knowing what to say to support families in these situations can be difficult and upsetting. However, it’s important to remember that, when families are vulnerable or struggling. it’s often possible for early years staff at any setting to make some kind of difference, be it small or large.
The advice and guidance offered here by the Early Years team from the Centre aims to help you support families facing challenges and limit the impact on the mental health and wellbeing of the young children you support and care for.
It's important for you and your team to also look after your own wellbeing during these moments and you might find our Early Years Staff Wellbeing resource helpful also.
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Supporting adoptive parents with toddlers
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Supporting dads
Here we’ll look at some different ways that you can support the dads that you work with, and also explore why it’s vitally important for dads to receive the support they need.
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Supporting families affected by homelessness
Here we’ll look at a range of things to consider when working with homeless families and/or their children. This includes information about their potential backgrounds and their current ...
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Supporting parents and carers affected by substance dependency
Here we’ll look at the different ways parental substance dependency can affect families and children. We’ll also take a look some of the signs that could indicate that a child is being a...
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Supporting parents and carers with mental health difficulties
Effective prevention, early detection and treatment of poor mental health in the perinatal period and early years is important, due to the far-reaching consequences of mental ill-health ...
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Supporting parents with learning difficulties or disabilities
Like all of us, people with learning difficulties or disabilities (LDD) can parent well. Although they may face specific challenges and have complex needs, there are lots of different wa...
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Supporting parents who have experienced the loss of a baby
Losing a baby during pregnancy, childbirth or during the period following a birth, can be one of the most profound losses a parent can experience. Here we offer some advice on how you ca...
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Supporting young parents and carers
Here we’ll be looking at a range of things that early years staff should consider when working with young, or teenage parents, or their children. Some might be to do with factors about t...
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Working with families from diverse communities in the early years
Children in early years settings will come from a wide range of cultural, racial and ethnic backgrounds. It’s important that practitioners support, respect and celebrate the variety of b...