Personal Accounts.
Since Family Links began in 1997, we have trained several thousand professionals to run the 10-week Nurturing Programme. Our reputation is for turning out first-class facilitators with whom parents feel safe, comfortable and accepted. They deliver the Nurturing Programme in many different groups settings including schools, children's centres, mosques, prisons and for parents with all kinds of needs, including foster parents and those whose children have ADHD. Many also use the Programme one to one with their clients.
Quantitative research has shown how the Nurturing Programme can improve behaviour and strengthen family bonds. The latest is a randomised control trial, currently in progress in Wales. We are also one of the programmes included in the National Academy for Parenting Practitioners' (NAPP) Commissioning Toolkit. In 2009, NAPP funded free Family Links training programmes because the evidence shows that the Nurturing Programme works.
Qualitative feedback from parents and trainers is overwhelmingly positive. A Parent Group Leader on a recent NAPP-funded 4-day training course said:
"I am really grateful for the training I have received as I think it has impacted on all areas of my life - not just my professional practice. And my home life is so much calmer."
Her comments are representative of those that Family Links receives all the time. Below are accounts from parents, professionals and children about the myriad benefits of the Nurturing Programme.
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Parents' Accounts.
Lisa* joined a Nurturing Programme parenting group in
2006. Here she explains how the 10-week course
impacted on her and her family. More
Mike Tivey is a Fathers’ Worker in
The Rainbow Children’s Centre in
Portobello, Wolverhampton.
He took part in the Nurturing
Programme and then
trained to lead parent groups. He is
a single dad with a teenage son,
Martin. More
Louise* came up to a Family Links trainer at a conference in 2009 to say how profoundly the Nurturing Programme had changed her own life several years before when she'd done a parenting programme. More
Michael* is a foster
parent based in Northern England who took part in the Nurturing Programme
for parents in 2006. At the
time of writing this account his family were
fostering Kate. This account is based on
Michael’s Open College Network (OCN) log.** More
Fozia grew up in Germany and came to England in 1997. After doing the Nurturing Programme in her local mosque, because of the huge benefits it has had for her family in England and Germany, she has become a passionate advocate of Family Links. More For further accounts of Muslim parents, go to our Islamic page.
Family Links has been working with parents in prisons for the past four years. Alan* and Barry* took part in a parenting course run by Sure Start Children's Centre Middlesborough in 2009. They appreciated many aspects of the programme, including facilitator training Here they talk about how the Nurturing Programme impacted on them. More
* Names have been changed.
** For more information on the Open College Network click here.
Schools' Accounts.
Daniel, Lucy and Jack* were Year 6
pupils at Pegasus School, Blackbird
Leys, Oxford when Family Links interviewed them
in Summer 2007. Pegasus is one of the first schools that trained staff to run the Nurturing Programme. The children talked about their experiences in school of Circle time and being on a steering group for Family Links. More Maeve Duckmanton is Assistant Head
teacher at the John Watson School for children
with special needs in Wheatley, Oxfordshire.
She has worked with children with special
needs for twelve years.
John Watson School took part in Family Links
school training in 2004 and Maeve now leads
Parent groups in the school. More
Practitioners' Accounts.
Mel Charlton is a Senior Family
Support Worker at Child Dynamix
Children’s Centre in East Hull. The
centre provides a range of activities,
facilities, and services to families with
children and young people across
Hull.
Mel trained to become a
Parent Group Leader in 2004. She
allowed us to adapt a report based on
her work with one family in 2007. More
Dr Sarah Davidson is an
Educational Psychologist and Schools Trainer for Family Links. Here she talks about how and why she uses it in her work. More
Lena Cressey works in a Sure
Start Centre in Marfleet in Hull.
She took part in Family Links’
two day Parent Support Skills
Training in September 2007 and talks here about how when she was trained, she felt as though she were being let in on a fabulous secret. More
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