Articles

Welcoming a New Child to Your Home

When you agree to open your home to a relative child, you are agreeing to so much more than providing a clean, safe bed and regular meals. You are agreeing to offer them an emotionally and physically safe place to heal from the challenges they encountered before...

How to Build Your Family’s Resilience

We all want the children we love to be able to face hard times and cope with them successfully. The ability to “bounce back” from life’s challenges can be part of a child’s naturally wired temperament. However, other kids may need help learning how to develop their...

How to Respond When a Child or Teen is Having a Meltdown

What do you do when your grandchild pitches a fit in Aisle 2 of the local grocery store? Or when your teenage niece screams at her sibling, slams doors, or kicks walls? It's a stressful moment for everyone, and your nerves are frayed while you figure out what to do....

Healing from Trauma/Neglect/Abuse

Truths Every Child Needs to Hear

Truths Every Child Needs to Hear

When a child has experienced abuse, neglect, or loss, they often take those events into their hearts and minds and then believe things about themselves that are untrue. They frequently feel guilt or shame as if the abuse or chaotic conditions of their life are their...

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Helping Kids Cope with Change

Helping Kids Cope with Change

Very few humans willingly embrace change. Even the most straightforward changes can create uncertainty, and learning to handle life's ups and downs is part of normal growth and development. We handle these changes differently, influenced by our personality, life...

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Helping Tweens and Teens Manage Money

Helping Tweens and Teens Manage Money

When a child’s developing brain is impacted by exposure to drugs and alcohol during pregnancy, early loss, neglect, or other trauma, they may struggle to understand money. Learning the value of money and how to manage it can also be an overwhelming task for kids with...

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Impacts of Prenatal Exposure to Alcohol and Drugs

Challenging Behaviors

ADHD

Tips for Raising a Child with Attention Issues

Tips for Raising a Child with Attention Issues

Some kids are simply more easily distracted than others. They have trouble focusing in school and at home. They may have a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) or not, but you know that keeping their attention is a challenge. There are some dos...

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Disrupting Birth Order

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Helping A Child Heal from Sexual Abuse

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School Issues for Foster & Kinship Kids

Advocating for Your Grandchild at School

Advocating for Your Grandchild at School

If you’re raising a grandchild, do you know when and how to speak up for them at school? Maybe your grandchild (or nephew or niece) struggles academically or often gets in trouble for challenging behaviors. This can make it especially hard to talk with their teachers....

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Technology/Internet and Our Kids

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Self-Care for Kinship and Foster Parents

Healthy Habits of Self-Care to Build Resilience

Healthy Habits of Self-Care to Build Resilience

When raising a loved one's child, it's easy to lose yourself in this child's needs and forget to care well for yourself. You get focused on helping your grandchild succeed in school. You move things around your calendar to ensure they continue with sports or therapy....

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Self-Care Is Not Selfish

Self-Care Is Not Selfish

Welcoming a loved one’s child into our homes is a gracious and hospitable act of support and care for their struggling family. However, we often forget that raising someone else’s child – even one related to you – can take an added toll on our hearts, minds, and...

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Relationship with Child’s Parent

Helping Family Visits Go Well

Helping Family Visits Go Well

When raising grandchildren (or nieces or nephews), visits with their parents can feel stressful and sticky. There is a history between you and your adult child or family member. Big feelings usually come rushing up for everyone. The challenge is how to help the child...

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Working Together For the Good of the Child In Your Care

Why Raising Your Grandchild Matters

Why Raising Your Grandchild Matters

When raising your grandchild or another loved one's child, it's easy to get lost in the weight of daily work. You are overseeing homework, monitoring screen time, holding the reins of this child’s daily schedule, and much more. However, sometimes, it helps to remember...

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This website was supported with funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families’ Children’s Bureau through the Improving Child Welfare Through Investing in Family grant #HHS-2021-ACF-ACYF-CW-1921. The purpose of this grant is to provide an array of kinship preparation services and ongoing kinship supports, and provide shared parenting to build trusting relationships between all out-of-home caregivers and parents of children/youth in foster care to ensure parents and families remain actively involved in normal child-rearing activities.

This website is supported by Grant Number 90CW1149 (HHS-2021-ACF-ACYF-CW-1921) from the Children’s Bureau within the Administration for Children and Families, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Neither the Administration for Children and Families nor any of its components operate, control, are responsible for, or necessarily endorse this website (including, without limitation, its content, technical infrastructure, and policies, and any services or tools provided). The opinions, findings, conclusions, and recommendations expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Administration for Children and Families and the Children’s Bureau.