Show parents how to help their children break free of the artificial limitations placed upon them by society’s gender and cultural expectations! This book presents both theoretical and practical ideas for integrating gender and culture into parenting. Unlike other books on the subject, this one examines interventions and activities, and suggests discussion topics that provide children with the skills to become critical consumers and thinkers. You’ll learn to help children discover and celebrate who they are, while infusing the message that they should notice and challenge exaggerated stereotypes of gender and ethnicity. From the editor: “If therapists can coach parents in helping to inoculate their children, beginning at early ages, against the negative effects of gender socialization, perhaps the work of developing equal relationships in their friendships and intimate relationships will be less taxing as they grow and mature. Additionally, as children are taught to challenge rigid gender and ethnicity messages, perhaps they will feel a greater sense of flexibility as they dream about who they want to become and how they want to live their lives.” This essential book will teach you to help children defeat the harmful media messages they’re bombarded by. Integrating Gender and Culture in Parenting: presents 20 simple ideas and 5 group activities to teach children about social justice in our everyday lives explores parental socialization practices and the values transmitted to school-aged and young adult offspring, focusing on the way parents’ teaching styles integrate race and gender investigates the parenting practices of middle-class, dual-earner couples who feel that they are successfully balancing family and work—with a look at the specific strategies these couples use to achieve an appropriate balance shows what family therapists should know about sexuality education, and highlights the specific roles that feminist family therapists can play with parents, children, and adolescents to help children be more sexually responsible and less likely to put themselves in sexually risky situations examines the gender messages found in 63 articles from the top three selling parenting magazines in the United States In addition, you’ll find two revealing and insightful chapters in which interviewer Lori Lund discusses the cultural scripting that American boys and girls are subjected to, with: Jackson Katz—one of America’s leading anti-sexist male activists and the creator/director of the United States Marine Corps Gender Violence Prevention Program, and Mary Pipher—respected sociologist, educator, and bestselling author of Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls and Hunger Pains

Don't let hidden cultural expectations sabotage your therapeutic relationships! Integrating Gender and Culture in Family Therapy Training offers positive strategies for teaching your students to understand the ways in which cultural expectations affect individuals, society, the therapeutic relationship, and even the relationship between supervisor and trainee. Integrating Gender and Culture in Family Therapy Training explores the ways you and your students can become more effective by bringing your unspoken assumptions into the light. It presents empirical research and personal experiences dealing with multicultural and gender issues in therapy and therapist training programs. In addition, it offers dialogues with some of the founders of feminist family therapy, cultural studies, and a hilarious spoof of pop-psychology approaches to gender issues. Integrating Gender and Culture in Family Therapy Training offers practical strategies for: working with families in poverty cross-cultural interactions in the supervisor/trainee relationship integrating gender and culture into coursework, supervision, research, service, and clinical environments teaching and modeling multicultural awareness dealing with the inevitable conflicts, misperceptions, and misunderstandings that arise because of clashing cultural expectations This book takes a searching view of the dynamics and implications of power, gender, class, and culture, including such tough issues as: the moral issues of feminist therapy using the excuse of cultural tradition to mask abuses therapists’hidden gender assumptions ways feminist family therapy speaks--or fails to speak--to women of color, minority women, and women in poverty Including case studies, figures, tables, and humor, Integrating Gender and Culture in Family Therapy Training will enhance your effectiveness as a supervisor or therapist and inspire you to rethink your own cultural assumptions.

Decades of research have demonstrated that the parent-child dyad and the environment of the familyâ€"which includes all primary caregiversâ€"are at the foundation of children's well- being and healthy development. From birth, children are learning and rely on parents and the other caregivers in their lives to protect and care for them. The impact of parents may never be greater than during the earliest years of life, when a child's brain is rapidly developing and when nearly all of her or his experiences are created and shaped by parents and the family environment. Parents help children build and refine their knowledge and skills, charting a trajectory for their health and well-being during childhood and beyond. The experience of parenting also impacts parents themselves. For instance, parenting can enrich and give focus to parents' lives; generate stress or calm; and create any number of emotions, including feelings of happiness, sadness, fulfillment, and anger. Parenting of young children today takes place in the context of significant ongoing developments. These include: a rapidly growing body of science on early childhood, increases in funding for programs and services for families, changing demographics of the U.S. population, and greater diversity of family structure. Additionally, parenting is increasingly being shaped by technology and increased access to information about parenting. Parenting Matters identifies parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices associated with positive developmental outcomes in children ages 0-8; universal/preventive and targeted strategies used in a variety of settings that have been effective with parents of young children and that support the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices; and barriers to and facilitators for parents' use of practices that lead to healthy child outcomes as well as their participation in effective programs and services. This report makes recommendations directed at an array of stakeholders, for promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective programs and services for parents and on areas that warrant further research to inform policy and practice. It is meant to serve as a roadmap for the future of parenting policy, research, and practice in the United States.

Gender can be difficult to define, but it's something that's a part of all of us and who we are. This book isn't meant to answer all the questions or tell you how you identify. It's meant to help kids and grownups understand gender and create an open and safe environment for kids to question, experiment, and discover their authentic selves. Meet A Kids Co., a new kind of media company with a collection of beautifully designed books that kickstart challenging, empowering, and important conversations for kids and their grownups. Learn more about us at akidsco.com.

Address the issues vital for women and their families To be most effective, family therapists need to understand precisely what policies are in place and how they influence families and their relationships. The Politics of the Personal in Feminist Family Therapy: International Examinations of Family Policy provides an interdisciplinary look at family public and social policies and the influence they have on families around the globeall from a feminist perspective. Diverse international family policy experts discuss policies family therapists need to know covering gender, ethnicity, religion, and age, and the effects on women and their families. As international family public policy shifts and changes, women and their families’ lives are altered in substantial and very personal ways. The Politics of the Personal in Feminist Family Therapy gives therapists a clear view of policies and diverse issues involving family policy, family relationships, and mental health. The book reveals the interaction between policy and practice, interdependence as a principle of child and family policy, ways to increase women’s labor force participation without causing a fall in birth rates, and intergenerational equity debates around the world. Qualitative studies are presented detailing women’s experiences of family policies’ effects on their lives, including their resiliency in times of disruption and their viewpoints on life-altering events that are used to disempower them. Topics in The Politics of the Personal in Feminist Family Therapy include: the interaction of British social policy with feminist practice supportive rather than punitive interventions in the lives of families an examination of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Babies and Bosses report evaluation of international family policies of elder care research into women’s roles and the way they are shaped in areas of conflict research on Puerto Rican and Dominican women’s perceptions of divorce The Politics of the Personal in Feminist Family Therapy is timely, stimulating reading for psychotherapists, family therapists, psychologists, social workers, counselors, feminists/womanists, sociologists, educators and students in family studies, women’s studies, gender studies, and war studies, and professionals in family policy and family law.

An inside look at the unique challenges of the lesbian experience Lesbian Families' Challenges and Means of Resiliency: Implications for Feminist Family Therapy is a unique collection of interdisciplinary feminist examinations of the resiliency of lesbian couples and families. Leading feminist researchers and clinicians discuss parenting within lesbian families, with a focus on personal resiliency. These thought-provoking and insightful articles address the challenges of having and raising children in a society that struggles to accept alternative family structures. Lesbian Families' Challenges and Means of Resiliency examines a wide range of issues facing lesbian couples, with a special focus on parenting and couple violence. The book's contributors examine the unique challenges of lesbian and gay parenting; adversities facing lesbian parents and the coping methods they employ; violence among lesbian couples and the lesbian community's response to domestic violence; and the application of feminist theory to validate, strengthen, and promote resiliency in lesbian couples. The book also includes interviews with single or partnered lesbians who had children through adoption, artificial insemination, or a previous relationship. Topics examined in Lesbian Families' Challenges and Means of Resiliency include: parenting artificial insemination lesbian family therapy family law couple violence lesbian community feminist research feminist couple therapy and much more Lesbian Families' Challenges and Means of Resiliency is a vital professional aid for psychotherapists, family therapists, psychologists, social workers, and counselors. It's an equally valuable resource for academics working in family studies, women's studies, queer studies, gender studies, and sociology.

This book explores how social workers incorporate issues of culture when evaluating the parenting competence of Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) parents and highlights the gap in how social workers assess safe parenting in BAME families. Drawing on a study that combined a phenomenological research philosophy with frame analysis, the book explores how culturally informed parenting is construed by social workers and BAME parents. It argues that effective assessment of the parenting competence of BAME parents is predicated on understanding how culture frames perspectives of what constitutes competent parenting. Throughout the eight chapters, the book moves the debate within the literature away from the universality of parenting concepts to a focus on a deeper understanding of culture. It highlights the influence that culture has on the way that BAME parents socialise their children, as well as how parents and social workers conceptualise safe parenting. The result is useful insights into the cultural context of parenting. The book will be of interest to all scholars and students of social work, childhood studies, sociology, and social policy, as well as social work professionals more broadly.

This book sets out an integrated systems model which utilizes a public health approach and 'whole of society' philosophy for preventing and responding to child sexual abuse. It guides those engaged in policy, practice and planning concerning gender based violence and child abuse towards a more systemic approach to tackling these problems.

In the domain of education, the crucial connection between families and professionals faces obstacles that create a gap undermining student success. The conventional family engagement model falls short as the concept of "family" broadens to encompass various individuals influencing a child's learning path. Despite recognized significance backed by research and federal mandates, systemic barriers persist, disproportionately impacting culturally, linguistically, and economically diverse families. Furthermore, the absence of a unified resource that integrates disability, diversity, and technology exacerbates these issues, leaving educators unprepared to establish fair educational settings. Offering a groundbreaking solution, Millicent Musyoka's research book, titled Meaningful and Active Family Engagement: IEP, Transition, and Technology Integration in Special Education, disrupts the existing norm and redefines family engagement. Through this pioneering work, both scholars and educators gain a comprehensive manual for navigating the intricate terrain of inclusive education. Musyoka's expertise, spanning multilingualism, multicultural education, and special education, equips readers with strategies to bridge the divide between professionals and families. By highlighting legislative foundations and validated theories, the book offers a roadmap to transform engagement into purposeful collaboration. Meaningful and Active Family Engagement: IEP, Transition, and Technology Integration in Special Education covers diverse topics, including involving diverse families and those with disabilities, and integrating technology for effective communication. Through case studies, conflict resolution insights, and appreciation of diversity's benefits, Musyoka empowers readers to foster inclusive educational environments. The book's innovation lies in its comprehensive approach, addressing disability, diversity, and technology as interlinked components. Academics, educators, and service providers will discover this resource as transformative—a pivotal stride toward achieving equity, social justice, and enhanced student outcomes.