Tagged With "First 5"
Blog Post
Society pays later for not giving vulnerable children a good start [theguardian.com]
Frank Field (Letters, 28 September and 5 October) and Sebastian Kraemer (Letters, 3 October) are right to highlight the £750m cut to services to support vulnerable families. This is indeed a national disgrace, but has gone under the wire partly due to Brexit. Home-Start and Sure Start were truly progressive initiatives, now thoroughly undermined by these cuts. In 2011, Graham Allen and Iain Duncan Smith published a cross-party governmental report, Early Intervention: Smart Investment,...
Blog Post
Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
Blog Post
Strengthening Families: Increasing positive outcomes for children and families [www.cssp.org]
We engage families, programs, and communities in building key protective factors. Children are more likely to thrive when their families have the support they need. By focusing on the five universal family strengths identified in the Strengthening Families Protective Factors Framework , community leaders and service providers can better engage, support, and partner with parents in order to achieve the best outcomes for kids. How We Do It The Strengthening Families framework is a...
Blog Post
Substance Use Disorder and Brain Development
The inputs a brain experiences during its developmental stages have a profound impact on whether that person will develop a substance use disorder (if they choose to drink or use other drugs). In turn, developing a substance use disorder (SUD) as a tween, teen, or young adult dramatically influences that person's brain development. And why is understanding this causality important? The risk factors for developing a substance use disorder are the result of inputs the brain experiences (or...
Blog Post
Teaching Kids to Understand Self Regulation and Responsibility
Sample Lesson from Superkid Power Teaching Kids to Understand Self Regulation and Responsibility Key concepts from the curriculum are how to breathe deeply to stay calm and how to use that inner calm to control how to respond to whatever is going on around you. First, we teach how to take deep breaths using a 3D prop, called the breathing sphere, that expands and contracts to represent the lungs and diaphragm filling with air along with the teacher counting out the beats of...
Blog Post
The Healing Place Podcast - Dr. Kristina Brinkerhoff: Educational Consultant
Dr. Kristina Brinkerhoff, a consultant, keynote speaker, presenter and trainer, leverages over 20 years of experience as a teacher, principal, superintendent and adoptive mom of five foster children, to help educators gain an understanding of the effects Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), and the importance of trauma informed practice in schools.
Blog Post
The Perks of a Play-in-the-Mud Educational Philosophy [theatlantic.com]
Most American kids don’t spend large chunks of their day catching salamanders and poking sticks into piles of fox poop. In a nation moving toward greater standardization of its public-education system , programs centered around getting kids outside to explore aren’t normal. But that’s precisely what students do at the Nature Preschool at Irvine Nature Center in Owings Mills, Maryland. There, every day, dozens of children ages 3 to 5 come to have adventures on Irvine’s more than 200 acres of...
Blog Post
The Preschooler's Empathy Void [TheAtlantic.com]
Back in March, Anderson Cooper famously compared Donald Trump to a 5-year-old. The presidential nominee had tweeted a flattering photo of his wife Melania juxtaposed with a less-flattering photo of the wife of his then-opponent Ted Cruz, and, when Cooper pressed him, he defended the tweet with a kindergartener’s default excuse: “I didn’t start it.” Trump turned 70 this summer. But there may, in the broadest of senses, be science to support Cooper’s analogy—at least when considering what his...
Blog Post
The Relentless School Nurse: Scotland as an ACE Aware Nation - Going on a Bear Hunt
My venture into the #Twittersphere has taken me across the ocean to the lovely country of Scotland. While I have not yet had the privilege of visiting, I have connected with a pioneering group of people who have a collective goal to make the entire country ACEs aware. And guess what...they are succeeding in ways that America should take note and follow in their able footsteps. Imagine an entire nation of 5 million people becoming aware of childhood adversity and the impact on our health and...
Blog Post
The Relentless School Nurse: When the Health Office Pass Includes Emotions
The collaboration between school counselors and school nurses creates safe spaces for students at school. Building a coalition between school counselors and school nurses creates a safety net for our most complex and challenging students while benefiting the whole school community. Promoting connections through intentional relationship building, and ensuring a school environment that is physically, emotionally and psychologically safe changes the culture and climate. Read about an amazing...
Blog Post
The soaring cost of US child care, in 5 charts [The Conversation]
The cost of having children in the U.S. has climbed exponentially since the 1960s. So it’s no wonder the growing crop of Democratic presidential candidates have been proposing ways to address or bring down the costs tied to raising a family. Most recently, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren said she wants to provide universal access to child care. According to her proposal, the U.S. would partner with local governments and other organizations to provide various child care options, paying...
Blog Post
The State of the Evidence for Intervention and Prevention Programs for Child Welfare-Involved Populations [CEBC]
As of May 2019, the California Evidence-Based Clearing House (CEBC) has reviewed and rated over 450 programs. These programs are organized across 47 unique topic area s and each topic area varies in the number of programs with published peer-reviewed research evidence. The topic areas with the smallest number of research-supported programs are listed in the first table below in order to illustrate where gaps in effective services exist for child welfare-involved populations. The second table...
Blog Post
The Trauma-Sensitive Parenting Summit & Commentary
"Having a history of trauma or loss does not by itself predispose you to have a child with disorganization. It is the lack of resolution that is the essential risk factor. It is never too late to move toward making sense of your experiences and healing your past. Not only you but also your child will benefit." That's a quote from the book Parenting from the Inside Out: How A Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive, which was published fifteen freaking years ago. It's...
Blog Post
To smooth transitions from home to pre-K to kindergarten, states must invest in every aspect of early ed [hechingerreport.org]
By Peggy Barmore, The Hechinger Report, July 8, 2019. LEWISBURG, W.Va. — Shenandoah Cochran, 34, greeted the two teachers at the front door of her elevated house in Greenbrier County, West Virginia, like family friends. Her youngest children, 5-year-old Daniel Pearson and Shenabelle Pearson, 3, abandoned a late-morning snack of fresh-sliced strawberries and mandarin orange pieces to join the trio of adults at the door. “He’s been asking when you all were going to get here,” Cochran said as...
Blog Post
Trauma and Resiliency Informed Systems Change in Los Angeles County
First 5 LA and its partners are calling for a commitment within organizations and systems to help individuals, families and communities heal from trauma, strengthen their resiliency, and become trauma and resiliency informed. This work began in 2016 with a kick-off event to hear about promising practices underway in other counties and progressed to a workgroup of foundations, community-based organizations and Los Angeles County Departments that convened for nearly a year to provide...
Blog Post
Trauma Informed Care from the Baby's Perspective
The Association for Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health is pioneering a model of care that includes the baby starting at conception. Our model also includes transgenerational and intergenerational trauma, prenatal experiences, birth and attachment and bonding. We have a conference on this topic October 5-7, 2018, in Denver, CO. See: https://birthpsychology.com/2018-conference/welcome I will be a the Zero to Three conference representing our programs for a poster session. If you are...
Blog Post
Trauma-Informed Classrooms: Educator Self-Care
Working in a school is hard. It doesn’t matter if you work in a suburban, urban, or rural area. It doesn’t matter if you work with 5 year-olds on building empathy, teach 11 year-olds about symbiosis, coach teachers in aligning curriculum, or help high school seniors choose their postsecondary pathways. It is hard work. From the cacophony of lockers closing at dismissal, to the challenge of getting 25 sets of 8 year-old eyes looking at you in synchrony, schools are a special kind of organized...
Blog Post
Virtual Screening of Broken Places on March 21st & Registration for ACEs Connection Members!
Please join us on Thursday, March 21st for a special virtual screening of Broken Places , the latest U.S. documentary on early childhood trauma and resilience. The film will be offered via a private Vimeo link with passcode to all registered members of ACEs Connection, for free, accessible in the United States and internationally. REGISTER TODAY: To register, please visit : https://goo.gl/forms/apdoINwgtQmydEXK2 The viewing portal for the film will open on Vimeo at 6am EST and close at 11pm...
Blog Post
We Need a Healing Movement
What if you had developed a cure for the most painful and costly public health problem in America, you had proven that it worked, and you were offering it for free, but could not reach those who need it most because no one wants to talk about the problem? Tragically, this is my reality and the truth about human nature. It is easier to suffer in silence than acknowledge the painful things that happen to us. Over 20 years ago, researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Kaiser...
Blog Post
What If We Could Reach Families Before the Crisis? There Would Be Fewer Kids in Foster Care [chronicleofsocialchange.com]
It’s no secret that our foster care system is overburdened. More than 250,000 children enter foster care each year. We don’t have enough foster families to meet this demand, and we don’t have enough adoptive families either. At the end of 2017, 123,000 kids around the country were still waiting to be adopted into a family. But what if the only answer isn’t recruiting more foster and adoptive parents? Are there other things we can do? What if the answer is recruiting more communities to get...
Blog Post
Why Does America Invest So Little in Its Children? (theatlantic.com)
How the U.S. became one of the worst countries in the developed world for kids under 5 . Research has shown that unrelenting stress at a young age, known as toxic stress, causes long-lasting brain damage . The worse the damage, the harder it is for children to pay attention, absorb new information, or trust adults—all skills critical for success in school—as they get older. In fact, the fate of all children is largely determined by their first years on this planet. Forming healthy...
Blog Post
Why Focus on Resilience? 2019 BPT Conference Big Idea Session with Teri Barila
“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in” -Desmond Tutu. This quote captures the essence of why resilience matters. To Community Resilience Initiative, Resilience is not about “lifting yourself up by your bootstraps” or “bouncing back” from serious harm or injury. To us, Resilience is about self-discovery and self-awareness based on what the ACE Study, neurobiology, and epigenetics tell us...
Blog Post
How Child Care Enriches Mothers, and Especially the Sons They Raise [NYTimes.com]
As many American parents know, hiring care for young children during the workday is punishingly expensive, costing the typical family about a third of its income. Helping parents pay for that care would be expensive for society, too. Yet recent studies show that of any policy aimed to help struggling families, aid for high-quality care has the biggest economic payoff for parents and their children — and even their grandchildren. It has the biggest positive effect on women’s employment and...
Blog Post
How do these pediatricians do ACEs screening? Early adopters tell all.
Last week, three pediatricians — with a combined experience of 15 years integrating ACEs science into their practices — reflected on the urgency they felt several years ago that prompted them to begin screening patients for childhood adversity and resilience when there was practically no guidance at all. Along their journey , they accumulated a list of lessons learned for other pediatricians and family clinics to use. The three pediatricians participated in the ACEs Connection webinar,...
Blog Post
How do you tell the story of a huge early childhood program over time? [centerforhealthjournalism.org]
Thanks — for nothing, Mr. Reiner. When I started my reporting on the 20th anniversary of California’s Proposition 10 — now known as First 5 — I fully expected to have filmmaker Rob Reiner’s quotations and retrospective as a central piece of the package . After all, he was the sponsor of the ballot measure that created the tobacco tax-funded system for programs serving young children from birth to age 5. And, he welcomed me into his Beverly Hills office for an interview when the measure was...
Blog Post
How do you tell the story of a huge early childhood program over time? [centerforhealthjournalism.org]
Thanks — for nothing, Mr. Reiner. When I started my reporting on the 20th anniversary of California’s Proposition 10 — now known as First 5 — I fully expected to have filmmaker Rob Reiner’s quotations and retrospective as a central piece of the package . After all, he was the sponsor of the ballot measure that created the tobacco tax-funded system for programs serving young children from birth to age 5. And, he welcomed me into his Beverly Hills office for an interview when the measure was...
Blog Post
How to Be Your Own Emergency First Responder! (3 minute read)
https://www.optimalbrainintegration.com/post/how-to-be-your-own-emergency-first-responder-3-minute-read How to Be Your Own Emergency First Responder! (3 minute read)
Blog Post
Issue Brief 61 - Addressing Trauma in Early Childhood [chdi.org]
Young children (under age 7) are exposed at high rates to potentially traumatic events such as abuse, violence, and loss of a loved one. Over half of all victims of child abuse in the U.S. are under age six. 1 Despite this, young children who are victims of trauma receive trauma-focused behavioral health treatments at much lower rates than older children. Since 2008, of the more than 10,000 children in Connecticut that have received effective trauma treatments, only 800 of these children...
Blog Post
L.A. teen moms in program that allows their children in class graduate from high school (abc7.com)
PANORAMA CITY, LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A group of students who studied in a classroom alongside their babies at a Panorama City school received their diplomas Monday. When 19-year-old Teresa Campa attended classes at the Assurance Learning Academy, her 5-month-old daughter Lydia usually sat with her. "Once I found out I was pregnant, I knew I had to finish high school," Teresa Campa said. Campa is one of nine teen mothers who received their high school diplomas thanks to a curriculum called...
Blog Post
New Report: Holding Policymakers Accountable for Kids' Well-Being
New Report: Today’s shifting political sands have put kids at risk, and it’s urgent that policymakers put kids’ needs front and center. We all have the power to hold policymakers accountable for prioritizing the needs of children, and our friends at the child advocacy group Kids Impact have charted a course on how. In their new report, “Accelerating Policymaker Accountability for U.S. Kids’ Well-Being: Charting the Course & A Call to Action,” they help define a collective “True North”...
Blog Post
On the Street: Network Leaders Plus Sesame Street Resources Boost Community Engagement
Guadalupe Mendoza used to drop off her kids for pre-school, then make a quick and silent retreat. “I hid away,” says Mendoza, mother of five children aged 18 to 5; all but the oldest attended the Head Start/ECEAP (Early Childhood Education Assistance Program) at Walla Walla’s Blue Ridge Elementary School. “I didn’t allow myself to have a connection with the staff.” Three years ago, Mendoza began volunteering with the pre-school. Then she attended a moms’ group. Still, she shied away from the...
Blog Post
Only 3 States Have a Gay-Straight Alliance in More Than Half of Their High Schools [childtrends.org]
By Dominique Parris and Brandon Stratford, Child Trends, November 5, 2019 In 45 states and the District of Columbia, less than half of all high schools report having a gay-straight alliance (also known as a genders and sexualities alliance, or GSA), according to 2016 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Among the 48 states (as well as the District of Columbia) that provide data, only three states (New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts) can claim that more than half of...
Blog Post
Positive Discipline in the Classroom Workshop- Apr 2 - May 7
"I love how interactive this workshop is and how open and honest we were allowed to be. I felt respected as an educator and human, and I feel empowered and encouraged..." Elementary School Teacher This Positive Discipline in the Classroom 5-week workshop gives educators tools to create a classroom and school environment where students feel encouraged and engaged in learning, solve their own friendship issues, and feel a sense of connection and value. As an educator you will feel a sense of...
Blog Post
Principals to Get Specialized Training to Tackle Racial Inequities in Their Schools [blogs.edweek.org]
By Denisa R. Superville, Education Week, November 5, 2019 The country's second-largest school district—where 82 percent of students are Latino and African American—is tapping principals to root out racial bias and inequitable practices in their schools. Los Angeles Unified School District and the Race and Equity Center at the University of Southern California have partnered to train principals and other school leaders to tackle systemic inequities. The Racial Equity Leadership Academy for...
Blog Post
Rebuilding Lives while Building Homes: Tony McGuire's Resilience-Building Carpentry Class
Tony McGuire is a great carpenter. He ran his own construction business for years. Then he wanted to get into teaching. He became a Tenured Faculty member at a local community college, and landed in the state penitentiary as a Basic Skills Carpentry instructor. So how could that be connected to saving lives with a 20 buck investment? Tony got touched by CRI’s trauma-informed training. He saw himself past and present and knew somehow that, “with this information comes the responsibility to...
Blog Post
Resource List - Trauma Informed Approaches and Autism Spectrum and Other Developmental Disabilities
Resources for individuals, organizations, and communities moving along trauma and hope-informed pathways in order to: Prevent and mitigate adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Promote resilience and safe, stable, nurturing relationships and environments. Promote equity and racial justice. Prevent substance abuse and promote mental health. … so that all children, youth, families and communities have equal opportunity for educational success, economic stability, health, and well-being.
Blog Post
Resource List - Trauma Informed Approaches and Autism Spectrum and Other Developmental Disabilities
Resources for individuals, organizations, and communities moving along trauma and hope-informed pathways in order to: Prevent and mitigate adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Promote resilience and safe, stable, nurturing relationships and environments. Promote equity and racial justice. Prevent substance abuse and promote mental health. … so that all children, youth, families and communities have equal opportunity for educational success, economic stability, health, and well-being.
Blog Post
Revisiting a Wonderful Resource
Today I stumbled on an "old" resource and was reminded about what great and accessible information it has. Calmer Classrooms was published in 2007 by the Child Safety Commissioner in Victoria Australia. It is full of excellent and...
Blog Post
Sesame Street and the IRC are Helping Refugee Children Overcome Trauma [rescue.org]
By The International Rescue Committee, February 2, 2020 Since fighting broke out in Syria in 2011, more than 5 million children have had to flee their homes; 2.8 million children remain out of school. Many have been exposed to extreme violence and experienced unspeakable trauma that will have lasting impact on their health and future. The International Rescue Committee and Sesame Workshop are working together to give millions of refugee and displaced children in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and...
Blog Post
Sesame Street's Traumatic Experiences Website / First 5 CA Care, Cope Connect Resource
Thanks to Alejandra Labrado from First 5 Sacramento for providing the links to these resources! Sesame Street's Traumatic Experiences: https://sesamestreetincommunities.org/topics/traumatic-experiences/ When a child endures a traumatic experience, the whole family feels the impact. But adults hold the power to help lessen its effects. Several factors can change the course of kids’ lives: feeling seen and heard by a caring adult, being patiently taught coping strategies and...
Blog Post
Considering Family, Environmental, Cultural and Economic Factors, an opportunity to exclude children from Special Education and Address ACES and become more Trauma Informed.
Unfortunately, by putting the problem on the students we are causing more trauma. We are making “something wrong with them” and trying to fix it. But I don’t think it is working. Because the families and the teachers are not addressing the root cause and children are stressed, suicide rates are up, and teachers are leaving the profession.
Blog Post
Day Care Centers For The Most Fragile Kids Struggle To Stay Open (californiahealthline.org)
Beth Kemplin said that for the first several months after the birth of her son, Bear, she had no idea he would be severely disabled. She started to notice something was wrong when, at 10 months old, he couldn’t sit up. He didn’t babble or meet her eye. He cried 20 hours a day. Now, at 5½ years old, Bear’s list of medical diagnoses is long: cerebral palsy, autism, a seizure disorder and pica, a compulsion to eat objects like rocks and toys. Kemplin had to quit a job to look after Bear when he...
Blog Post
Developing Multi-Sector Partnerships in Early Childhood [nichq.org]
A single mom from Alabama with four children lacks the resources needed to correct the cause of lead poisoning in her home. Her 3-year old's lead levels spike, requiring intensive bi-weekly treatments at a hospital that is more than four hours away. Her at-risk 5-year-old goes more than five months before she is tested and diagnosed. A mother in Maine who tries and cannot get treatment for her opioid addiction is separated from her child. That child is placed in a crowded foster-care system,...
Blog Post
Early-childhood development offers a brighter future to entire nations [The Seattle Times]
By Steve Davis and Peter Laugharn, July 29, 2019 The Seattle Times The World Health Organization just unveiled an initiative that could improve millions of children’s lives and boost the global economy by trillions of dollars. The initiative, known as the Nurturing Care Framework for Early Childhood Development , [ PDF attached ] seeks to change how we raise infants and toddlers. Children’s experiences during their first three years of life heavily influence their well-being as adults,...
Blog Post
Early childhood educators learn new ways to spot trauma triggers, build resilience in preschoolers
A hug may be comforting to many children, but for a child who has experienced trauma it may not feel safe.
That’s an example used by Julie Kurtz, co-director of trauma informed practices in early childhood education at the WestEd Center for Child & Family Studies (CCFS), as she begins a trauma training session. Her audience, preschool teachers and staff of the San Francisco-based Wu Yee Children’s Services at San Francisco’s Women’s Building, listen attentively.
Blog Post
Even Infants Need Mental Health Care, so new Chicago Clinic Caters to Those 5 and Under [chicagotribune.com]
By Peter Nickeas, Chicago Tribune, September 20, 2019 In and around Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, long-standing causes of friction like gun violence and poverty have for some families combined with newer fears of immigration crackdowns and deportation of loved ones — and mental health professionals hope to address toxic stress that can have long-term effects on the lives of very young children. Aiming to rectify the shortage of mental health care available to infants and children...
Blog Post
Five Things You Wish Your Community’s Early Childhood Programs Knew [CitiesSpeak.org]
By NLC Staff on May 10, 2019 Cities, towns, and villages are places of innovation and solution finding. If you want to improve early childhood wellbeing—local leaders are key partners. The Networks of Opportunity for Child Wellbeing (NOW) Learning Community is a program of Boston Medical Center’s Vital Village. The learning community’s goal is to support local early childhood coalitions and build their capacity to work together with the broader community to improve the wellbeing of our...