This fact sheet defines whole family approaches, as well as the rationale behind them. It also describes the types of services offered by whole family programs.
Children benefit from caring, responsive, and stable relationships. A strong relationship with a parent promotes a child’s development, learning, and increased school success. Relationships with parents help children learn to develop connections with peers and other adults. Supportive relationships with parents also help children learn to manage emotions, cope, problem-solve, and resolve conflicts. Early childhood professionals can encourage strong and positive parent-child relationships through family engagement efforts that include valuing, respecting, and supporting families. (Author…
All parents home school. And, in fact, even if parents send their children off to school to learn, they are almost singlehandedly the only factor that matters in their kids’ educational success. Paul E. Barton of the Educational Testing Service (which administers the GRE among other standardized tests) wrote a piece called “America’s Smallest School: The Family.” He has estimated that about 90 percent of the difference in schools’ proficiencies can be explained by five factors: the number of days students are absent from school, the number of hours students spend watching television, the…
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While they face the same demands as all new fathers, young fathers in their teens and early twenties face additional challenges as they move from adolescence into adulthood. They may not have finished high school, they often are not married or even living with the mother of their child, some feel excluded from the father role, and many young fathers struggle to get a foothold in today’s changing economy. Despite these challenges, most young fathers do want to be involved in the lives of their children. Unfortunately, although data indicates they are generally involved during the early…
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Men are often reluctant to seek medical care unless they are very sick, and they are twice as likely as women to report that they have no usual source of health care, despite health statistics showing that men's life expectancy is shorter than women's and men of color are disproportionately affected by chronic diseases such as type II diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular disease (Centers for Disease Control Prevention; Center for Health Statistics). Recent research indicates that more than six million men in the United States have depression in a given year and at least 10 percent of fathers…
As the American family changes, fatherhood is changing in important and sometimes surprising ways. Today, fathers who live with their children are taking a more active role in caring for them and helping out around the house. And the ranks of stay-at-home and single fathers have grown significantly in recent decades. At the same time, more and more children are growing up without a father in the home.The changing role of fathers has introduced new challenges as dads juggle the competing demands of family and work. This report highlights key findings about fathers from Pew Research Center…
