This article provides the reader with an overview of the literature relating to family support services while highlighting a number of key issues for consideration in evaluating these diverse and complex interventions. Drawing on a case example of a family support service evaluation carried out in Ireland in 2014 by the authors, this article will…

Purpose: The main goals were to determine the incidence of preadoption breakdown in Portugal, describe preadoptive parents' reasons for ending placement, compare intact/disrupted placements, and identify adoption disruption risk and protective factors. Method: A matched design involving a case file analysis of 71 disrupted and 71 intact…

Families facing poverty suffer from many other stresses, with children's school performance being one of the common topics. A life of poverty and the related unfavourable circumstances should not define children's life stories. Ensuring this is not the case is partly the responsibility of professionals working with families. It is important to…

An increasing number of children and youth have mental health disorders. To address this issue, federal and provincial mental health policymakers in Canada have recommended: (a) improving the coordination of services, and (b) increasing the role that schools play in providing supports. One way to operationalize these recommendations is to…

Children with Angelman syndrome (AS) exhibit significant social, communicative and cognitive difficulties. The aim of this case study was to describe the profile of communicative abilities of a child with AS, before and after the implementation of the Hanen program "More than Words" (MTW). Additionally, changes on the language directed…

Mind the Gap is a family learning project aiming to facilitate intergenerational engagement with learning in schools through the vehicle of a stop-motion animation project. Implicit in the animation process is reflective and strategic thinking that helps to make the process of learning explicit (Learning to Learn: Wall et al.). The animation…

Spreading and sustaining evidence-informed practice in child welfare is complex. In particular, putting in place an active dissemination strategy requires the recognition of these unique challenges. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how collaborative partnerships between individuals and organizations may represent an opportunity for more…

Traditional approaches to disseminating research based programs and innovations for children and families, which rely on practitioners and policy makers to make sense of research on their own, have been found insufficient. There is growing interest in strategies that "make it happen" by actively building the capacity of service providers…

This paper describes a community-based after-school tutoring project, where families are participants together with their children. There are 50 family members involved in the project, several have multiple children enrolled, and four families were selected for an in-depth case study. The goals of this mixed method study were to determine why…

In today's rapidly changing global economy, "21st century skills" means much more than proficiency in basic academic subjects. One of the most important noncognitive competencies for student success is conscientiousness, which encompasses traits such as perseverance, self-regulation, resilience, and responsibility. Researchers have found…

Public enforcement agencies such as criminal justice, child welfare, and immigration directly or indirectly impact children and families, often through mandated requirements and forced separations. As a result, families involved with these agencies can be wary of trusting early childhood home visitors and mental health providers. Through case…

This cross-sectional study attempts to investigate the effects of the Aprender em Parceria (A PAR) programme, an intervention in early childhood education and parenting support in the suburbs of Great Lisbon which aims to increase the educational achievement of disadvantaged children from birth to six-years-old. A quasi-experimental design was…

Family-centered, community-based programs are particularly suited to support families with at-risk children or maltreated children and achieve family preservation or reunification. In these child protection and child welfare cases, assessment is of great importance to inform decision making. But the implementation of services to support the…

Recently emerging intervention studies for toddlers with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) were reviewed through a systematic assessment of intervention outcomes, research rigor, and intervention features. The review includes published peer-reviewed experimental studies of toddlers with high risk for or diagnosis of ASD in which the majority of…

In West Africa, advisory services for family farms have been promoted to better address producers' needs. The paper aims to show that these services can be understood as a system whose functioning is strongly determined by the financing mechanisms, the governance mechanisms put in place, the quality of human resources delivering advice, and the…