Group Parent Education: Promoting Parent Learning and Support

" . . . Provides a particularly good discussion on feminist perspective, male privilege, and gender-responsible leadership. This is a real highlight for this book and one that is missing from much of the current literature. I would recommend this book for family/parent education preparation courses and I look forward to using this text in the parent education course I teach!"
--Kim Riordan, University of Minnesota, Duluth

"I see this book as a valuable work that will contribute to the field of parent education training in an effective manner. It is appropriately targeted to professional parent educators who would like to improve and refine their facilitation skills; potential parent educators; and university students being trained to become child/parent/family educators."
--Roberta Magarrell, Brigham Young University

Group Parent Education: Promoting Parent Learning and Support is a unique and important contribution to the growing field of parent education and support programs. The book builds upon the rich traditions of group parent education while incorporating contemporary theory and practice. The authors draw upon their experiences as parent educators and their expertise as teacher educators to combine different conceptual frameworks for understanding group processes with practical strategies for leading parent groups that blend education and support. The book also includes a chapter on parent-child interaction time as a rich component that enhances parent discussion and learning in parent group settings.

• In-depth focus on group dynamics in group parent education
• Integration of diverse conceptual frameworks (developmental, levels of involvement, systems theory, feminist perspective) to examine group parent education
• Focus on the educator-parent relationship and the process for developing caring and trusting relationships
• Careful analysis of parent group dynamics and difficult situations.
• Examination of the stages of professional development for parent education
• Broad appeal to professionals and programs that provide group parent education

Group Parent Education will be a valuable resource for students in the field of parent education, as well as child and family studies, social work, early childhood education, psychology, and related fields that work with parents in groups. Current parent education practitioners will also appreciate the detailed case studies and examples and the discussion of specific techniques for addressing important issues in typical parent groups as well as populations of parents with greater needs.

Deborah Campbell (M.S., Parent Education & Counseling, St. Cloud State University) has been a licensed parent educator for 20 years and has facilitated parent education groups, including ones with teen parents and others with complex issues. She is Director of Early Childhood Family Programs for the Sauk Rapids - Rice, School District in Minnesota, where she supervises and mentors licensed parent educators and develops and oversees educational programs that serve families with young children. An adjunct professor in the Child & Family Studies Department at St. Cloud State, Deborah teaches classes addressing group process and advanced facilitation skills in parent education. She works with other parent education and support programs, providing staff training and consultation on professional boundaries, levels of involvement with families, collaboration, and other related topics for helping professions. She presents at local and state conferences and training sessions dealing with parent education issues. She has also co-authored a training manual on levels of involvement and has written training curricula for Minnesota′s Department of Children, Families & Learning on team building, family literacy, and collaboration. Her two adult children, Ben and Elizabeth, provided her with many life lessons on parenting that inspired her interest and commitment to parent education. She lives with her husband, Larry, in St. Cloud, Minnesota.

Glen Palm (Ph.D., Social & Educational Futures, University of Minnesota) is a Professor of Child & Family Studies at St. Cloud State University. He has been a licensed parent educator for 25 years and is a Certified Family Life Educator. He teaches courses in child development, parent education, and parent involvement in early education and has long supervised student teachers in the Parent Education licensure program. He is also a part-time parent educator and coordinates the Dad′s Project in District 742 in St. Cloud. Glen′s major research and practice interest has been parent education with fathers. He has written extensively in this area as co-editor of Working with Fathers: Methods & Perspectives (1992), as a regular contributor to Family Information Services, and as author of chapters and articles on fathers. He also has worked with the Ethics Committee of the Minnesota Council on Family Relations to develop a set of guidelines for ethical thinking and practice for parent and family educators and has served as an outside evaluator for Even Start Family Literacy and Early Head Start Programs in Minnesota since 1990. In 1996, Glen was a Visiting Scholar at the National Center for Fathers & Families. He has been a frequent presenter on fathering and parent education issues at the state and national levels for the past decade. He has held leadership positions with the Minnesota Council on Family Relations and the National Council on Family Relations and has been a Board Member of the National Practitioners Network for Fathers & Families since 1998 and was a Council member of the National Parenting Education Network and is a current member of the Minnesota Fathers & Families Leadership Network. Glen is the father of three children, Marisha, Noah, and Allison, who have grounded him in the joys and challenges of daily life as a parent. Jane Ellison, his partner of 25 years, has been a colleague in parent education and a constant source of support, insight, and inspiration.