This first-year evaluation report describes a project in Connecticut that provides parenting education and support services to pregnant teenagers and young mothers. The program, its goals, and its objectives are described. Program evaluation assessed the impact of the program on the clients' knowledge, child rearing, and relationships with their children. The major problems of the program involved finding a site accessible to all clients, providing transportation, keeping the teenagers motivated during the summer, engaging fathers, and developing more precise data collection and analysis. The…
navy dot icon
Training Materials This manual provides guidance in planning and implementing a parenting skills program for adolescent parents, as a means of preventing child abuse and neglect among this population. The curriculum is entitled Partners in Achieving Life Skills, or P.A.L.S. The guide addresses such topics as conducting a needs assessment, which includes assessing the client population's needs, the available community resources, and the sponsoring agency's capabilities; writing a mission statement and creating goals and objectives; establishing a client base; recruiting, managing, and acknowledging volunteers;…
This report on the proceedings of a policy seminar on adolescent parenting summarizes the presentations given at the seminar. Presentations summarized current and pending California legislation affecting adolescent parents and offered measures to protect the children of adolescent parents. These measures included extending workfare programs to parents of young children, introducing limited home health visiting for adolescent parents, and providing adolescent mothers with an opportunity to live in residential facilities. Other presentations covered a national perspective on adolescent…
Other
This paper explains the rationale of interventions designed to support the relationship between children and their battering fathers. Traditional domestic violence services have focused primarily on treating battered women and their children, neglecting to hold fathers accountable for the effects of their abuse. The involvement of abusive men in the welfare of their children forces them to take responsibility. Interventions also help children to resolve their feelings of conflicting loyalties to their parents. Children's groups are often effective in helping children understand the nature of…
navy dot icon
Training Materials This implementation manual is intended to express the program philosophy, assist with selection of facilitators and families, help with implementation of the weekly sessions, and serve as a measure for success for the Nurturing Program for Teenage Parents and Their Families, which enhances teenagers' abilities to care for themselves, others, and their children in functional, nonabusive ways. In addition to being teenagers and parents, teen parents are usually also encumbered with the roles of daughter or son, and perhaps wife or husband. The art of raising healthy children is discussed using…
red dot icon
Journal Article Paternity and child support can be essential to the family stability of children of unmarried teen mothers. While the number of births to teen mothers decreased between 1970 and 1985 from 656,000 to 477,700, the number of unmarried teen mothers increased from 199,900 to 280,300. This paper presents guidelines for counselors to assist young mothers. Establishing paternity is essential for the emotional health of the child, providing a sense of belonging and family ties with the father's family. Child support is important, even at a minimum if the father is unemployed, to establish a pattern…
This final report summarizes the results of an NCCAN-funded project designed to reduce child abuse and neglect among families with adolescent parents. The project consisted of group parenting education programs; peer supports; in-home intensive services when needed; and educational and support services for fathers. An evaluation of the program found that long-term, open-ended group intervention was more effective than a 12-week didactic group model. Recommendations include using a naturalistic evaluation instrument to assess the impact of the program on parent-child interactions and targeting…
The best interests of the child are not being served by court practices that severely restrict a father's access to his children. This book describes the negative consequences of father absence for children and outlines the benefits of joint custody arrangements. The chapters summarize psychiatric and psychological literature about the importance of both parents to child development and provide a history of the evolution of the family and family law. Children's rights and international law, injustice in the court system, and demographics are discussed. The book also provides a father's…
red dot icon
Journal Article The relative extent to which mothers and fathers administer physical punishment sheds light on family relationships, parental roles and, perhaps, the identity of potential abusers. In this study, 362 British mothers and 103 fathers of randomly selected children from 366 two-parent families were interviewed. According to self-reports, the proportions of mothers and fathers who had used physical punishments were similar, as were the frequencies with which they used them. About 50 percent more mothers than fathers smacked or hit their children weekly or more often, whereas fathers were more…
red dot icon
Journal Article Foster fathers play an important part in the development of their foster child by counteracting the child's previous negative experiences with men and by sharing parenting responsibilities with their wives. Discussions held during focusgroups and workshops with foster fathers revealed that men see themselves as a respite provider for the foster mother, as a mediator between their wife and the social worker, as a protector for their partner, as a source of discipline, as a role model, and as an activity leader for the family. However, the men were somewhat reserved in their relationships with…
