St. James program provides support for parents

Are you expecting? Do you have children under the age of three?

If you answered yes to either of those questions, then St. James Family Center would like to invite you to join them and other local families in a program funded by Thrive by Five, a non-profit organization that focuses on child development and early learning.

The program, Parents as Teachers, is designed to provide support for parents of young children from birth to age three. They even work with people who are expecting.

“It’s about strengthening families,” Katie Turgeon said. “I’m not here to tell you how to be the parent. Because you are the parent and you are the expert on your child. I’m supposed to be a support. I might know more about what child development looks like in the abstract, but you know what your child is doing. I’m there to give you tools and information to help empower you to be the best parent you can be, to help your child develop optimally. You are the best teacher, the most influential teacher your child will have in the first three years.”

“We talk about family strengths at our home visits,” Turgeon continued. “We look at the child’s development and at parent child interaction. We connect families with resources they may want or need and we always do an activity that is centered on one of the areas of child development: Intellectual, social, language, motor, emotional.”

The family center has connections with the WIC nutrition program, the preschool, child care, the Charlotte House, Health and Human Services, with the school and the community at large and they would like to help parents take advantage of those resources.

They also do screenings. They do an informal vision check to make sure that eyes are developing correctly. After a year, they assess the child’s hearing in a more formal manner. They complete an ASQ which is the Ages and Stages Questionnaire and the ASQSE, the Ages and Stages Social Emotional Questionnaire for each child. They ask about immunizations.

Program staff want to assure parents that their child is perfectly normal, but they also keep an eye out for anything that might be wrong.

“We hope to help families catch things early,” Turgeon said.

They do two home visits a month and parents are invited to join them weekly for a group connection at St. James to interact with other parents and children in the program.

“We very gladly welcome anybody in the public for these weekly sessions, not just parents in the program,” Turgeon said.

Program staff have a playgroup that meets on the Westend with Betty Erickson. Patty Phillips works with families on the Westend and Turgeon spends most of her time with families on this side of the county.

Right now there are about 25 families signed up, according to Turgeon. But families come and go for one reason or another and children are always growing up and out of the program, which is only available from birth to age three.

They provide welcome baby baskets to any new parent in the community. The basket contains diapers, clothing items and a free book.

They also have a diaper program.

“We have diapers in all sizes,” Turgeon said. “They are available to families once a month.”

The family center tries to reach every young family in the county, but they fear there are families they don’t know about. If you or someone you know might be interested in learning more about the program, contact St. James Family Center at 795-8612.