A new Casey Family Programs illuminates the importance of HOPE—Health Outcomes of Positive Experiences—a framework that studies and promotes positive child and family well-being. Balancing Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) with HOPE presents data that reinforces the need and opportunity to support families and communities in the cultivation of relationships and environments that promote healthy childhood… More
Every child entering foster care has experienced some amount of trauma—if nothing else, removal from his or her home and placement into foster care is itself traumatic. In most cases, children in the child welfare system have multiple experiences with trauma, often referred to as complex trauma. Parenting a child who has been separated from… More
Children do best when they know the truth about their lives. But sharing difficult information with children is not easy. This webinar will give participants the tools to discuss the most challenging situations (abuse, parental incarceration, death, HIV, incest, termination of parental rights) with children of all ages. Please bring your own challenging questions to… More
Research is revealing that the typical youth brain is not capable of true adult functioning until 20+ years of age – information that has critical implications in terms of cause and effect understandings, critical thinking skills and maturation. For youth who have experienced foster care and adoption, this developmental process can be significantly affected. This… More
Parenting a hurt child calls for innovative, creative, and nurturing ideas. Too often, parents can’t understand why techniques used to successfully parent other children simply have no effect. This session will explore which parenting tools do not work and why, and help parents retire those tools without guilt. Parents will then learn new ways to… More
All children, particularly those who have experienced trauma, need help and support learning to express and manage a wide array of emotions in order to feel and be safe. Once they learn to safely express feelings ranging from excitement to sadness to anger and confusion, their behavior will often improve. However, teaching children specific strategies is… More
Every child in foster care and adoption has experienced trauma—often abuse and neglect, but at a minimum, separation from their birth family. In recent years, we’ve learned that the trauma children experience can have serious, even lifelong, effects. Ongoing trauma can affect children’s ability to concentrate, control their emotions, respond to conflict, develop healthy relationships… More
Children and youth in the child welfare system want a life free of pain and full of love. If possible, most want to live with their parents. We in the system cannot discount or minimize the power of love between children and their birth parents. While parents may have had inadequate parenting capacity, most have… More
The most important property of humankind is the capacity to form and maintain relationships. These relationships are absolutely necessary for any of us to survive, learn, work, love, and procreate. The ability and desire to form emotional relationships is related to the organization and functioning of specific parts of the human brain—systems that develop during… More
“Why did you adopt?” The therapist asked my husband. Glancing at our four children, I offered a silent prayer and held my breath while we waited for the response. “We adopted because for us it was right–and that didn’t change just because the going got rough,” my husband responded. I exhaled; our shared sense of… More