BUSHkids Annual Report 2018-2019

Section CPSS

Engaging parents and carers, empowering skills and building resilience BUSHkids’ Children and Parenting Support Services (CPSS), funded by the Department of Social Services (DSS), provide early intervention and support services for parents and carers to strengthen their positive parenting skills, empowering them with techniques they need to help their child’s development and wellbeing.

The prolonged drought and spate of natural disasters which has dogged Queensland during the past 12 months have also taken a profound human toll, not least in the emotional impacts — real and potential — on children, their families and communities. Building children’s resilience has therefore been an even sharper focus of our efforts in the three DSS-funded areas of Stanthorpe , Kingaroy and Agnes Water . Building a ‘language of resilience’ in communities experiencing hardship is vital to help not only the shared wellbeing of the local community itself but also that of its children. Widely used throughout BUSHkids, the Australian-developed FRIENDS Resilience programs, endorsed by the World Health Organization (WHO), have proven particularly important in CPSS work in these areas. Across the Agnes Water region, a whole-of-school approach to resilience building has been adopted, with all children taking part; in other areas, services have been tailored to target specific student groups. A new approach has been tried in Agnes Water for parenting programs, with the 1-2-3 Magic ® and Emotion Coaching program delivered as part of playgroups. Delivered in parallel, parents from one group receive training while the other group of parents supervise the children, and vice-versa . This has allowed parents to take on the peer support role and work together as a community. Playgroups continue to be a key area of work for the CPSS teams, with the specialty Mother Goose program — a song and oral storytelling style of playgroup — being delivered in Agnes Water. Playing and Learning to Socialise (PALS) is also routinely facilitated through playgroups, providing early years social skills learning with kindy- and prep-aged children. Read and Grow continues to be a key foundational program to help parents connect and have fun with their children, and improve their emergent literacy skills experiences. In Wallangarra, an area with poor AEDC (Australian Early Development Census) results in language and communication and where there is no library, BUSHkids supports a lending library and facilitates the Read and Grow program for the local playgroup and childcare centre.

CASE STUDY: STANTHORPE Building kids’ disaster resilience

As if unending months of parched paddocks and dry dams weren’t bad enough, the Southern Darling Downs district was just one of many Queensland regions ravaged by bushfires in the final months of 2019. Over the past year, our Stanthorpe-based CPSS team has focused on supporting primary school children from Prep to Year Six with the Fun FRIENDS and FRIENDS for Life programs. Our Early Intervention Facilitator, Adela Caruso, has been conducting FRIENDS programs in Stanthorpe and Wallangarra on the New South Wales border, areas not only particularly badly afflicted by the drought but also the dire scene of some of the most horrific bushfires. “A number of children taking part in the FRIENDS programs work on the farm before and after school, feeding livestock and helping their parents with farm chores,” said Adela. “Each FRIENDS session includes an activity for children to complete and general resilience skills to practise, including being kind to others, outside time, relaxation or mindfulness. “A young boy called Nick* came to me very worried that he didn’t have time to complete his FRIENDS program activities at home as he had to help his parents on the farm. I reassured him that by being outside feeding animals he was being kind to other living beings, he was helping others by completing the jobs for his parents, and it counted as outside time. “We talked about practising his breathing and being mindful of the sounds, the things he could see, smell and touch while doing his farm chores and I reassured him that he didn’t need to sit at a desk to practise the resilience skills we were learning. This helped change Nick’s thinking from a ‘red thought’ — not being able to do his homework — to a ‘green thought’ — ‘ I am doing helpful kind things supporting my parents on the farm .’ “These kids are working hard for their families and it’s fantastic that we can support them and help them get through this difficult time.”

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*Not his real name

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