Topic 9 - Mindfulness and Well-Being for Families and Caregivers

Welcome!

Care for the Caregivers

Welcome! We are so glad our shared efforts to support parents, children, and families have led us to cross paths. Supporting families on their parenting journey means you can be a companion to their greatest joys and struggles as they do their best to nurture their children. Being a reliable presence as parents navigate their way through both small and big moments with their children can be profoundly fulfilling work. Parents are uplifted when they know that practitioners show up in their cheering sections to be sources of encouragement and support.

Why did we create these modules?

Parenting is a collective effort made by a community of caregivers, including you, a parenting practitioner. We need a community of caregivers who are well so that our children are well. These modules provide resources to “care for the caregivers,” which research summarized in the National Academies of Sciences 2019 report Vibrant and Healthy Kids shows is vital for the healthy development of children. Additionally, these modules provide resources for you to use for yourself and to share with parents to care for themselves and their children.

The mix of ease and hardship in our work requires that we, as practitioners, are nurtured, too. Our social and emotional well-being is intricately connected to our ability to support the well-being of the parents and children we work with. What’s more, the well-being of our community both gives rise to and depends on the well-being of parents, children, and families as well as our well-being. These modules offers parenting practitioners practical lessons and activities to help prioritize cultivating your social and emotional well-being while additionally supporting you in sharing these insights and practices with the parents and families you serve.

These modules have three broad learning aims. You will:

• Identify important keys to social and emotional well-being for yourself as a practitioner and for parents and children;
• Understand the underlying research behind the development of these keys to well-being in practitioners, parents, and children;
• Learn actionable practices to nurture these keys to well-being within yourself as a practitioner, as well as for parents and children that you can incorporate into your programs for parents.

Family Well-Being for the Greater Good:  A science-based workbook for people who support parents