Brilliant Parents believe that parenting programmes should be as readily available as ante-natal classes. When offered in school, seminars and parenting programmes can help to improve relationships between school and parent/carer; these programmes encourage positive parenting outside of the school setting and empower parents to be more confident in their role.
We know that schools realise the importance of forging good relationships with parents/carers and how these positive connections lead on to support a child’s learning, development and behaviour. A close partnership between school and parent/carer is essential if a child is to achieve their full potential.
Triple P Seminars are ideally offered to parents/carers in whole year groups or the whole school at the beginning of a new year. This is recommended to ensure that all parents are on a level playing field and no parent/carer feels singled out.
What is a Triple P Seminar?
Usually delivered to between 20 and 150 parents/carers over 90 minutes, a little like a TED talk!
For schools with children aged 4 to 10 years there are three topics, and these follow each other usually over 3 month period:
⦁ The Power of Positive Parenting
⦁ Raising Competent Confident Children
⦁ Raising Resilient Children
For schools with children aged 11 to 16 years there are also three topics, ideally all delivered within 3 months:
⦁ Raising Responsible Teenagers
⦁ Raising Confident Teenagers
⦁ Getting Teenagers Connected
Seminars are designed to give parents/carers a greater understanding of the importance of their role and how their behaviour and reactions impacts on the children and young people in their care, and ideally following a seminar, parents/carers are given the opportunity to attend a 6 week Triple P Positive Parenting Programme. This is a structured programme designed to change attitudes, employ strategies and positively energise families.
Brilliant Parents has been delivering Triple P seminars in many schools including Hampstead School in The London Borough of Camden, for a number of years and Deputy Head Teacher, Heather Daulphin says:
We have worked with Brilliant Parents since April 2016. This has been transforming. Our language around parental engagement has shifted, parent partnership has been strengthened and the impact of parent empowerment felt.
An initial meeting was brokered with Meave Darroux, who outlined the breadth of the Brilliant Parents’ offer: seminars and an intensive 6 part targeted programme. This was fortuitous. It coincided with Hampstead’s decision to introduce a parent empowerment strand to the school improvement plan. We wanted to procure a stronger partnership with parents around student learning and positive emotional health. Brilliant Parents offered this. It elevated parent relationship with school from being talked at about progress data and behaviour misdemeanors to offering concrete tips and solutions to positive parenting. It offered ways to 1. Introduce and 2. Measure the impact of the strategies. Such empowerment was attractive for us. Importantly, it chimed with our increasing focus on ‘growth mindset’ and the belief in reflection and a child’s continuous development.
We are now on our third cohort of parents and the immediate impact has been a change in conversation and dialogue around factors impacting on student success: both academic and emotional. There has been a shift in perceptions of parent responsibility and their role in developing young people who are independent, self- regulating and mindful. Importantly, Brilliant Parents has given us the relationship with the parents that is much more proactive and focused on early help and partnership. Brilliant Parents is open and accessible to all. Not just the vulnerable families. We have some parents who consider their parenting to be good. ‘ I think I’m a B+ parent but I would like to be an A grade parent!
By investing in Brilliant Parents, we are being proactive, strategic and unapologetic. We have come to realise that parenting support is vital. It is informative, developmental and empowering. It has become an intrinsic part of what we do.
OUR FUNDERS
Brilliant Parents is grateful to the following donors and organisations that support our work