In addition to working with incarcerated populations, working with children also presents a host of limitations and hurdles to overcome. Numerous safeguards are required when working with children, particularly because children may not be mature enough to give informed consent. The study will follow respective IRB protocols in working with children, including receiving informed consent from the child’s guardian, explaining the research to the child in an age-appropriate manner, and receiving consent from the child. Questions will be crafted in a way that minimizes trauma for the child, licensed social workers will be made available to the child and family throughout the study, and social workers will be consulted if it is believed that the study may need to be terminated due to trauma or harmful impacts to the mother/child relationships. Again, by using triangulation, information that may not be appropriate to receive directly from the child, information that the child cannot recall, or information that the child may be hesitant to disclose due to the fact that researchers and social workers are often mandated reporters will be triangulated from other interviews and observations. A further limitation is the fact that the large boundaries of the study -including the school system, incarceration system, and entire family structure- are daunting and can potentially result in a lack of depth within each case. However, having just five to ten cases that include
When working with children and young people it is important to know the aims and responsibilities for your setting.
Children are forced to forfeit their homes, their safety, their public and self-image, and their primary source of comfort and affection (Bernstein 2005). A national survey found that almost 70% of children when present when their parent was arrested (Bernstein 2005). Researcher Christina Jose Kamfner interviewed children who had witnessed their mother’s arrest and found that many suffered from post-traumatic stress symptoms; they could not concentrate or sleep and had flashbacks of the arrest (Bernstein 2005). The majority of the children at the scene of an arrest are taken away in a police car which is more intimidating than to say if they were taken away in a child welfare worker’s car (Bernstein 2005). Many of these children (is no other family is available) are shuffled around in the course of an arrest; the hospital for physical examinations first, then the police station for appropriate , “paperwork,” then to a juvenile detention center and lastly, they are deposited at a foster home (Bernstein 2005). Anyone can vouch that the process of what to do after the arrest is clearly a traumatizing one at that. After the arrest, children wait anxiously for the level of the sentence that their parent has to face. In most cases, children are unaware of why their parent is being sentenced because they were unaware that their parent was involved in the crime. Carl, for example, only remembered
1. In your own words summarise the major learning points from the whole of the study programme with particular reference to:
Many people have different passions, some might share the same ones while others might have some that no one has heard of before. Mine would have to be anything that had to do with working with kids. I love teaching them, babysitting them, and even playing with them, it's a new and different experience every time. I find it amazing that you could learn more than you think from someone who is 10+ years younger than you. They can teach you the smallest things that you never realized they could. For example how they treat everyday like a new one, they don't focus on the past events from the previous day they always have a fresh look on things; which can be hard to do as you grow older. Children have this energy to them that can’t be found in adults
Statistics have shown that one in every five children has seen their parent’s arrest. For young children, who were present at the incarceration have numerous short term effects. Children that are under the age of seven experienced nightmares and flashbacks from
Another issue of doing research with foster children is the reality that some of those children might be being abused. The issue of consent is again complicated because of the relationship between abused child and abusive guardian. Kinard provides three special situations where procedures for interviewing an abused child might need provisions: when a child is distressed by the interviewing or testing; when a child’s answers or test results indicate emotional problems; and when a child’s answers or comments indicate that the child is being abused. Kinard comments that the decision regarding whether to inform the guardian and/or others about the child’s answers must balance a guardian’s right to know against the child’s right to privacy. However, she notes that the decisions made under these circumstances require intense deliberations (1985).-need to put in quotes? Or change wording-exact copy from study
Many of these incarcerated men and women play various roles in their communities. They are parents, siblings, sons, and daughters and have family members who depend upon them for social and economic support. The incarceration of a parent has a particularly destabilizing role in a child’s life, oftentimes leaving the child in the care of a single parent, relative, or foster home (Levy-Pounds, 2006). Parental incarceration is considered an Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE), a designation for certain
stress and adverse interpersonal issues such as fear of getting close to anyone, lack of
- Discussions and teaching sessions of children washing their hand prior to meals, and after the toilet.
Children of incarcerated parents are a vulnerable group in August 2000 The Bureau of Justice Statistics analyzed a 1997 survey of inmates in State and Federal Corre ctional Facilities to examine parenting stats of prisoners. The survey showed that
This unit will be assessed practically. To complete this unit you will need to show that you will:
The children may experience the ill effects of different mental issues including strain, apprehension, remorseful, humiliation, and anxiety. Adverse behavior indicators can consist of grief, removal, low self-worth, and deterioration in school performance, truancy, hostility and a risk of drug or alcohol abuse. A research of thirty-six children from five-years-old to sixteen-years-old of age who were taking part in a visitation program at a female's correctional institution found that seventy-five percent of the children reported side effects (Zaitzow, 2010). Such side effects include depression, trouble with sleeping, focus issues, and flashbacks about their mother’s offenses, arrests, and imprisonment (Zaitzow,
As my experience working with children grows, I would like to gain the skills necessary to run a preschool program. I have worked primarily with infants and toddlers in the past few months, which has become a new focus of mine. Working with such young children allows me to have a productive impact on their cognitive development. This opportunity has been a great encouragement and I hope to run an infant-toddler program within a larger school. My more immediate goals are centered around gaining experiences in different facilities. By exposing myself to different programs and their unique styles, I will be able to see how different procedures, like those for resolving conflict, work for children. With time, these ideas would be integrated into my own program.
Child development is an umbrella term that includes social, emotional, and physical. There may be many instances in a child’s life that may put a hold on any or all of the aspects of development. Having one or both parents sentenced to a substantial amount of time in prison definitely has a negative impact on a child’s development. The bill, which will be further discussed, proposes the proper use of resources to ensure a healthy development of children whose parents have been incarcerated. Though no specific budget is discussed nor any specific programs, the ideas suggest by the bill can be highly effective, as supported by empirical research.
Every day in America individuals are sentenced either at a state, local, or federal level. The U.S. Department of Justice stated “in 2014 an estimated 6,851,000 persons were under the supervision of U.S. correctional system” (Kaeble, Glae and Minton). With this staggering number, America has become the country that incarcerates more of their people than any other country in the world. Due to these extreme circumstances, the correctional system affects children by at staggering rates in our country. Although not every prisoner has children, one can assume that half of the nation’s prisoners have at least one child. This simple deduction would leave 3,425,000 with an incarcerated parent. During childhood, the impact a parent has on a child’s emotional and mental shapes their daily lives. When a child faces life with an incarcerated parent, they face separation for a period of months to years. Given the amount of children affected by the correctional system in our country, maintaining parental bonds should be a priority.