Contents:
Children of Neglect: An Overview of the Issues. What is Child Neglect? Definitional Issues. What Causes Child Neglect? Theoretical Issues. What Causes Child Neglect? An Analysis of Causal Models. What Impacts Children of Neglect? Public Policy. What Impacts Children of Neglect? Practice Strategies. What Impacts Children of Neglect? Practice Outcomes. Child Neglect and Culture. Child Neglect and Substance Abuse. Child Neglect an Poverty. The Children of Neglect: What do we Know? What do we Do?

Finalist in the Professional Books category of the 2018 Nursery World Awards. This accessible guide shows early years professionals how to create safe, supportive environments for young children who have encountered adverse childhood experiences. Explaining the impact of trauma on young brains, it gives practical instructions on how to recognise and respond to abuse. These instructions are supported by exercises, case studies, and reflection points that help you identify and improve your methods. Current legislation, policy and procedure are clarified in clear, concise language, providing you with everything you'll need to work with your team towards a happier, safer future for the children in your care.

In the thirty-five years since China instituted its One-Child Policy, 120,000 children mostly girls have left China through international adoption, including 85,000 to the United States. It's generally assumed that this diaspora is the result of China's approach to population control, but there is also the underlying belief that the majority of adoptees are daughters because the One-Child Policy often collides with the traditional preference for a son. While there is some truth to this, it does not tell the full story a story with deep personal resonance to Kay Ann Johnson, a China scholar and mother to an adopted Chinese daughter. Johnson spent years talking with the Chinese parents driven to relinquish their daughters during the brutal birth-planning campaigns of the 1990s and early 2000s, and, with China's Hidden Children, she paints a startlingly different picture. The decision to give up a daughter, she shows, is not a facile one, but one almost always fraught with grief and dictated by fear. Were it not for the constant threat of punishment for breaching the country's stringent birth-planning policies, most Chinese parents would have raised their daughters despite the cultural preference for sons. With clear understanding and compassion for the families, Johnson describes their desperate efforts to conceal the birth of second or third daughters from the authorities. As the Chinese government cracked down on those caught concealing an out-of-plan child, strategies for surrendering children changed from arranging adoptions or sending them to live with rural family to secret placement at carefully chosen doorsteps and, finally, abandonment in public places. In the twenty-first century, China's so-called abandoned children have increasingly become "stolen" children, as declining fertility rates have left the dwindling number of children available for adoption more vulnerable to child trafficking. In addition, government seizures of locally but illegally adopted children and children hidden within their birth families mean that even legal adopters have unknowingly adopted children taken from parents and sent to orphanages. The image of the "unwanted daughter" remains commonplace in Western conceptions of China. With China's Hidden Children, Johnson reveals the complex web of love, secrecy, and pain woven in the coerced decision to give one's child up for adoption and the profound negative impact China's birth-planning campaigns have on Chinese families.

Betsy de Thierry's best-selling Simple Guides tell you what you really need to know about child trauma and attachment. This five-book library covers: * Attachment disorders * Child trauma * Collective trauma * Complex trauma and dissociation * Shame Providing easy routes to understanding difficult and complex concepts, these books give you an understanding of what trauma is and most importantly, how to help children and young people who have experienced it.

Family Support introduces and explores the state of the art in preventative social work with children and young people. Drawing on contemporary thinking and research, the book aims to make a contribution to current debates about how we can best support families in need. Underpinning the book is an analysis of how family support is changing, having moved from prevention through to contemporary debates about family support , early intervention and early help . The authors draw on their own practice experiences to ensure the discussion remains highly relevant to everyday realities. The book consists of three parts: Part I examines the history and context of family support; Part II outlines a number of practice approaches to family support; and Part III suggests how family support work can be further developed. The book provides think points and case studies to support the reader in reflecting on the material presented and how this can be best applied, as well as including a guide to useful resources. Family Support will be a welcome companion for anyone involved in child welfare and safeguarding services, including students at undergraduate and post-graduate level, practitioners, policy makers and academics.

In 1990, disturbing television footage emerged showing the inhumane conditions in which children in Romanian institutions were living. Viewers were shocked that the babies were silent. The so-called 'Romanian orphans' became subjects of several international research studies. In parallel, Romania had to reform its child protection system in order to become a member of the European Union. This book sheds light on the lived experiences of these children, who had become adults by the time the country joined the EU. Uniquely, the book brings together the accounts of those who stayed in institutions, those who grew up in foster care and those who were adopted, both in Romania and internationally. Their narratives challenge stereotypes about these types of care.

This books examines the increased prominence of children's rights in education to ask whether we are witnessing a paradigm shift within the education system. The author uses a wide range of case studies from Scotland and England to examine the extent to which children and young people with Special Educational Needs/ Additional Support Needs are in practice able to realise their new rights of participation and redress. In addition, the book examines the ways in which the child's capacity to make independent decisions is understood and acted upon in different contexts, and the factors which ultimately promote or inhibit the rights of young people and children with SEN/ ASN. The author asks whether, in a context of tight budgets and often limited support, this new emphasis on children's rights can be seen as 'window-dressing' and a distraction from reductions in support for social welfare.

Providing a wide spectrum of views, the authors explore the fine line between normalized physical punishment and illegal or unacceptable physical and emotional abuse of children. It builds on the emerging field of research that provides opportunities for children to speak for themselves about their views and experiences.* Provides observations from children, professionals and several generations from within individual families* Discusses the power of language used by parents, professionals and the media to describe physical punishment* Reflects upon the status of children in societies that sanction their physical punishment, motivations and justifications for its use, perceptions of its effectiveness, and its impact* Presents a combination of personal, social, legal, and language factors which provide significant new insights and suggest ways to move forward

Family foster care is supposed to provide temporary protection and nurturing for children experiencing maltreatment. Although it has long been a critical service for millions of children in the United States, the increased attention given to this service in the last two decades has focused more on its inability to achieve its intended outcomes than on its successes. However, as social and political trends and new legislation reshape child welfare, policymakers and service providers continue to offer innovative policy and practice options for this child welfare service. Though use of the service has changed, family foster care remains important.
Responding to a widespread sense of the "drifting" of children in care, Congress passed the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act of 1980. This legislation became a key factor shaping the current status of family foster care. Its goal was to reduce reliance on out-of-home care and encourage use of preventive and reunification services; it also mandated that agencies engage in planning efforts for permanent solutions for foster children. Yet, despite federal mandates and funding, the child welfare system has continued to struggle to provide the level of services needed for children to reduce the amount of time children remain in temporary foster care. The latest response to these problems, the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, established unequivocally that safety, permanency, and well-being were national goals for children in the child welfare system. To comply with the law, public and private agencies are required to initiate significant program and practice changes in the coming years to improve permanency outcomes and child well-being in family foster care.
The central theme of the volume is accountability for outcomes, certainly a current driving force in child welfare as well as in other public and private service fields. This volume will be of interest to all concerned with the social welfare of children and families at the end of the twentieth century.
Kathy Barbell is director of Foster Care of the Child Welfare League of America, Washington, DC.
Lois Wright is assistant dean at the College of Social Work, University of South Carolina, Columbia.

This book provides an accessible engaging account of childcare policies in Britain and beyond. In examining the progress of women's initiatives and childcare, Marchbank considers subjects including: the history of childcare policy, particularly during the Second World War
childcare policy and women's economic activity across the EC
detailed case studies of policy making in practice
the covert and overt barriers to equality-based policy making
successful strategies and counter-strategies for policy makers and campaigners.

What can schools and social care workers do to help children affected by domestic violence?

Large numbers of children are affected by domestic violence. The problem crosses every social class and culture. It causes distress and anxiety in children and adversely affects their learning and play, as well as their behaviour, wellbeing and attendance.

Education staff may know of a child or family in crisis, want to help, yet feel outside their comfort zone, grappling with a complex issue not covered in their training. This book describes the impact of domestic violence on children and provides support for education and social care professionals. It takes heavy workloads into account and suggests practical ways of meeting the needs of pupils who come from difficult home backgrounds.

The authors provide guidance and advice on:

• identifying and responding to signs of distress
• helping pupils to talk about and make sense of their experiences
• the impact on parenting and how parents can be supported
• the needs of young people in refuges and temporary accommodation
• pupil safety and government safeguarding guidelines
• educating young people and the community about domestic violence
• specialist domestic violence services and other agencies that support schools.

Domestic Violence and Children draws on the expertise of a wide range of professionals, including specialist domestic violence children's workers and counsellors, psychologists, teachers, mentors and family support workers. It provides essential help and information to all children's service directorates, as well as a range of professionals in education, social care, health and the voluntary sector.

In Licensing Parents, Michael McFall argues that political structures, economics, education, racism, and sexism are secondary in importance to the inequality caused by families, and that the family plays the primary role in a child's acquisition of a sense of justice. He demonstrates that examination of the family is necessary in political philosophy and that informal structures (families) and considerations (character formation) must be taken seriously. McFall advocates a threshold that should be accepted by all political philosophers: children should not be severely abused or neglected because child maltreatment often causes deep and irreparable individual and societal harm. The implications of this threshold are revolutionary, but this is not recognized fully because no philosophical book has systematically considered the ethical or political ramifications of child maltreatment. By exposing a tension between the rights of children and adults, McFall reveals pervasive ageism; parental rights usually trump children's rights, and this is often justified because children are not fully autonomous. Yet parental rights should not always trump children's rights. Ethics and political philosophy are not only about rights, but also about duties_especially when considering potential parents who are unable or unwilling to provide minimally decent nurturance. While contemporary political philosophy focuses on adult rights, McFall examines systems whereby the interests and rights of children and parents are better balanced. This entails exploring when parental rights are defeasible and defending the ethics of licensing parents, whereby some people are precluded from rearing children. He argues that, if a sense of justice is largely developed in childhood, parents directly influence the character of future generations of adults in political society. A completely stable and well-ordered society needs stable and psychologically healthy citizens in addition to just laws, and McFall demonstrates how parental love and healthy families can help achieve this.

Attention to children's spiritual and religious well-being is required by legislation, Government guidelines and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989. Margaret Crompton has worked with and on behalf of children as a social worker, lecturer and writer. Her recent publications include Children and Counselling and a training pack, Children, Spirituality and Religion. This jargon-free book develops and adds to those ideas and materials, focusing on everyday practice in social work, education and health care. Reference is made to several religions and to ideas about spirituality, which is not necessarily associated with religious belief and observance. Practitioners' experience is also cited. Topics include, spiritual and religious rights, spiritual development, needs and well-being, implications of religious beliefs and observances for daily life and care, abuse and neglect, death, including suicide and abortion and communication, including stories and play.

This volume adopts a context-informed framework exploring risk, maltreatment, well-being and protection of children in diverse groups in Israel. It incorporates the findings of seven case studies conducted at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's NEVET Greenhouse of Context-Informed Research and Training for Children in Need. Each case study applies a context-informed approach to the study of perspectives of risk and protection among parents, children and professionals from different communities in Israel, utilizing varied qualitative methodologies. The volume analyses the importance of studying children and parents's perspectives in diverse societies and stresses the need for a context-informed perspective in designing prevention and intervention programs for children at risk and their families living in diverse societies. It further explores potential contribution to theory, research, practice, policy and training in the area of child maltreatment.

This book of essays by legal scholars from the United Kingdom, Eire, Israel and Palestine explores the extent to which the recognition of the concept of children's rights is affected by adherence to religious, cultural and ethnic traditions. The aim is twofold: first, to illuminate the interface between internationally-agreed norms of conduct regarding children and national and cultural determination to preserve traditional approaches; and secondly, to reflect upon the conflicts within societies between different cultural and religious groups in their attempts to determine whether 'liberal/secular' or 'conservative/religious' norms predominate in attitudes to children's upbringing. This is the first collection of papers covering and comparing the UK and Israeli/Palestinian jurisdictions. The particular blends of social, religious and cultural diversity in both regions, mingled with the political factors operating as well, render these jurisdictions of special interest as case-studies in the reception of 'western/liberal' norms and values. Moreover, Israel and Palestine, despite their manifestly different cultures as compared with Britain, have been influenced by the colonial legacy of the common law, rendering this particular east-west comparison of special interest.

Broken Three Times is a narrative nonfiction book that chronicles one family's travails through the child welfare system. While this is the story of one family, it typifies countless others who get lost in the system. Each chapter of the family's story provides a launching point for discussing contemporary policy and practice, while it presents scientific updates relevant for understanding risk and promoting resilience in maltreated children, and improving the child welfare system. Emerging insights from genetics and neuroscience research are also reviewed. The book begins with snapshots from the mother's abusive childhood, which sets the stage for discussing trauma-informed systems of care initiatives. These programs include efforts to train professionals on the effects of trauma, implement universal screening of trauma experiences, and disseminate evidence-based treatments to address trauma-related psychiatric problems. The book then fast-forwards to the family's first involvement with Connecticut protective services when the children are eleven and ten. After a brief investigation, the family's case is closed, and despite their many needs, the family is not provided links to any ongoing supportive services. This chapter is then followed by a brief discussion of differential response programs. Like many unconfirmed cases, the family is re-referred to protective services within months of the initial case closing, and after a lengthy second investigation, the children are removed from their mother's care. Over the next five years we see the children pass through nearly twenty placements, while their mother continually relapses on crack and moves from one violent relationship to the next. The prevalence of substance abuse and domestic violence problems in families referred to protective services are also reviewed, together with a range of other issues relevant to improving the child welfare system and the outcomes of the children it serves. Over the course of the decade that is covered in the book's primary narrative, the child welfare system has started a process of significant reform. Trauma-informed systems of care, differential response teams, and strengthening of community-based mental health and addiction services are just a few trends that have begun to transform the system and improve the trajectory of children entering care in many jurisdictions. Judgment is still out on whether these changes will last and will prove effective, but stories like the one that forms the heart of Broken Three Times us of the complexity of the issues involved with child welfare. This book will hopefully provide readers with some ideas about concrete steps to take to improve practice, gaps in our knowledge, and a deepening appreciation of the value of incorporating broad perspectives into this work - from neurobiology to social policy.

This book presents a range of innovative analytical frameworks that can be used to approach the complexities of children's understandings and experiences of well-being in a locally oriented, context-sensitive and multi-nationally comparative way. It addresses the challenges of undertaking research on children's understandings of well-being from a multi-national qualitative perspective. Chapters in the book present results that show how children from various places all over the world conceptualize and experience well-being as well as how this is linked local, regional and national social, political and cultural contexts.

This timely study analyzes the issue of adoptions that cross racial and national lines, and assesses their success and appropriateness. The book's centerpiece is a comprehensive long-term study of the transracial adoption conducted by Rita Simon and Howard Altstein, the result of twenty years of research and analysis. The authors discuss the case often made against transracial adoption and explain the laws that govern these adoptions.

During World War II, as women stepped in to fill jobs vacated by men in the armed services, the federal government established public child care centers in local communities for the first time. When the government announced plans to withdraw funding and terminate its child care services at the end of the war, women in California protested and lobbied to keep their centers open, even as these services rapidly vanished in other states.

Analyzing the informal networks of cross-class and cross-race reformers, policymakers, and educators, Demanding Child Care: Women's Activism and the Politics of Welfare, 1940-1971 traces the rapidly changing alliances among these groups. During the early stages of the childcare movement, feminists, Communists, and labor activists banded together, only to have these alliances dissolve by the 1950s as the movement welcomed new leadership composed of working-class mothers and early childhood educators. In the 1960s, when federal policymakers earmarked child care funds for children of women on welfare and children described as culturally deprived, it expanded child care services available to these groups but eventually eliminated public child care for the working poor.

Deftly exploring the possibilities for partnership as well as the limitations among these key parties, Fousekis helps to explain the barriers to a publically funded comprehensive child care program in the United States.

This book combines perspectives from psychology, spiritual education and digital teaching pedagogies in a transnational framework to discuss the Education in Human Values Program (EHV) for child development, with a focus on silent sitting, mindfulness, meditation and story-telling as tools in the classroom. Through positive guidance in the early stages of child development using EHV tools, teachers will be better equipped to handle disciplinary issues in primary and secondary schools. These practices are also useful for the higher education community, as teachers and educators from tertiary institutions may adopt these practices in their teaching and become reflective practitioners. Topics such as teacher morale and school climate and its impact on children are discussed in relation to building resilience, reflective capacities, and inner strength (shared values) using an intrinsic and transformational approach. The discussions also include perspectives from the neurosciences. With contributions from teachers and educators from the US, South Africa, Malaysia, Australia, Hong Kong and Mauritius, this edited volume addresses the challenges, strengths and weaknesses associated with daily teaching practices in primary and secondary schools and higher education institutions. The content is relevant to policymakers and researchers in child development studies, with a particular focus on the impact of silent sitting, mindful practices, and meditation on children's self-regulation and resilience. The authors collectively espouse that silent sitting techniques can help a child to grow and discover their hidden potential, thus enhancing their social, emotional, spiritual and physical capacities.

This book discusses principles and strategies that practitioners can use to guide their work. These include engaging parents of children in placement, mapping family resources, mobilizing networks, and creating safety plans.

Why must so many children in today's cities struggle just to survive each day, and what programs and policies most effectively help them? In 1989, the United Nations International Children's Fund (UNICEF) began a three-year project to answer these and other questions vital to the well-being of urban children around the world. Based on fieldwork in Brazil, Philippines, India, Kenya, and Italy, this volume uncovers the desperate situations and the resilience of street and working children, and their families, offering critiques and recommendations for national, municipal and community action.

This book contributes to the debate on child sexual abuse and illuminates the trainer practitioner in the process. It shows that human services training is not built solely on scientific theory but rather on the ideology and values of the sponsoring organisation, the participants, and the trainer.

Following high-profile Serious Case Reviews into the tragic deaths of children, including Victoria Climbie, Peter Connelly and Daniel Pelka, information sharing has now become a moral and political imperative for safeguarding the welfare of children. What prompts information sharing and how do we get it right? This accessible book challenges widely held assumptions about information sharing in child welfare that facts about risks to children are clear and that sharing them with other professionals is a straightforward process. End-of-chapter questions prompt reflection and ensure direct practice relevance. This is essential reading for academics and policy makers, students on post-qualifying child protection courses, social workers, managers and all other professionals tasked with safeguarding children.

How to weigh genetic factors while choosing the best psychosocial interventions Psychosocial Interventions for Genetically Influenced Problems in Childhood and Adolescence explores empirically supported psychosocial interventions in light of our current understanding of the genome. It considers how interventions may be modified and enhanced as the products of genomic research continue to expand and why they offer the most promise for making substantial gains in treatment and prevention. Providing a clear, accessible assessment of our current knowledge, both of the genome and evidence based treatments, Psychosocial Interventions for Genetically Influenced Problems in Childhood and Adolescence provides practical advice to clinicians,policy makers, and others invested in treating young people who present with a variety of conditions including anxiety, depression, ADHD, autism, substance abuse, and dyslexia. Rende discusses the current understanding of genetic etiology of psychopathology, and explores the support, or lack thereof, for various modes of treatment in light of new genomic knowledge. The overall premise is that our advances in genetics will be put to best therapeutic use by fueling translational psychosocial interventions. Key points raised include: * The need for treating children suffering today, rather than waiting for a biological "magic bullet" * Discussion of how empirically-supported interventions mesh with genetic vulnerabilities * Ways in which interventions may change as genetic research continues