1. Relationships as Environment
Courtney Kirk, B.S.
Director of Baby TALK Early Head Start
Deb Widenhofer, B.S.
Director of Learning Institute, Baby TALK
2015

3. “All learning comes to us through relationships which mean something to us personally.” Mister Rogers

4. Where do you have your first encounter with a family?
What typically happens?

5. Key finding:
Young children experience their world as an environment of relationships, and these relationships affect virtually all aspects of their development.
--Harvard Center on the Developing Child

6. Evolution of Engaged Scholarship and the Role of a Knowledge Broker
National Academy of Sciences Committee
on Integrating the Science of Early Childhood
Development (From Neurons to Neighborhoods)
MacArthur Research Network on Early Experience and Brain Development
National Scientific Council on the Developing Child

7. Go to their website to read the working papers—12 as of today.
These working papers have taken the scientific information discovered about the brain and translate it into knowledge we who are not neurobiologists can use.

8. Urie Bronfenbrenner:
“In order to develop normally, a child requires progressively more complex joint activity with one or more adults who have an irrational emotional relationship with the child. Somebody’s got to be crazy about that kid. That’s number one. First, last, and always.”

9. In the mother-infant relationship,
gene expression is influenced in areas of the brain that regulate social and emotional function and can even lead to changes in brain structure.

10. “Serve and return” interactions:
Young children naturally reach out for interaction through babbling, facial expressions, and gestures, and adults respond with the same kind of vocalizing and gesturing back.

11. “Serve and return” interactions…
build and strengthen brain architecture and create a relationship in which the baby’s experiences are affirmed and new abilities are nurtured.
Feeding as the root of conversation. Suck, pause, response teaches turn-taking and mutuality.
Children are learning about their own competence from the responses they get from the adults in their lives. By 7 months, babies will demonstrate to you whether they expect to succeed or fail.
Beach Ball Exercise Watch person A /watch person B What do you notice?
What happens when “serve and return” are not fully functioning.
SHOW ALLIGATOR BOY
SHOW SOMETHING ELSE
30% of the time is good enough.
Table TALK #2 Impressions from the videos/ Where in your daily work/life do you see “serve and return?”

13. A Toddler in Child Care
Damian is sitting at a table in his day-care center slowly moving his jaw and mouth while staring into space. “What are you chewing, Damian?” asks his caregiver. “I’m chewing mommy,” replies Damian.
Alicia Lieberman, The Emotional Life of the Toddler
Anywhere we work with children, we are working with the parents. They are there, not only in the physical child, but also in the cognitive and emotional child.
This child’s mommy is the curriculum. How we treat the mommy in her absence has a real affect on the parent-child relationship.
NIHHD Child Care Study from the late nineties showed that the single most critical quality indicator for child care is the relationship between caregivers and parents in contributing to positive outcomes for kids.
Child care as a cultural shift - feeding, sleeping, toileting, discipline - all the themes that we talk about are areas of significance in home-child care communication. And, the nature of that communication requires that there be consistency for the child. Whenever possible adopt the caregiving strategies of the parents.

14. Young children learn from each other
how to share
to engage in reciprocal interactions
to take the needs and desires of others into account, and
to manage their own impulses.
Where else do we learn what works in human relationships?

15. Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development

16. In a child care setting…
Warm and supportive caregiving promotes the development of greater social competence, fewer behavior problems, and enhanced thinking and reasoning skills at school age.

17. Off to school
Children who develop warm, positive relationships with their kindergarten teachers are more excited about learning, more positive about coming to school, more self-confident, and achieve more in the classroom.

18. Research finding:
“Strong relationships between programs and program participants had a greater influence than use of resources on the program’s ability to engage parents.”
Aimee Hilado, Leanne Kallemeyn, Christine Leow, Marta Lundy, & Marla Israel. “Supporting Child Welfare and Parent Involvement in Preschool Programs,” Early Childhood Education Journal, June 2011.

19. Early Childhood Adversity Can Influence a Range of Lifelong Outcomes
Research on the biology of stress helps explain some of the underlying causal mechanisms for differences in learning, behavior, and physical and mental health.
ACEs study from CDC Adverse Childhood Experiences.

20. Positive Stress
Moderate, short-lived stress responses, such as brief increases in heart rate or mild changes in stress hormone levels.
Precipitants include the challenges of meeting new people, dealing with frustration, getting an immunization, or adult limit-setting.
An important and necessary aspect of healthy development that occurs in the context of stable and supportive relationships.

21. Tolerable Stress
Stress responses that could disrupt brain architecture, but are buffered by supportive relationships that facilitate adaptive coping.
Precipitants include death or serious illness of a loved one, a frightening injury, parent divorce, a natural disaster, terrorism, or homelessness.
Generally occurs within a time-limited period, which gives the brain an opportunity to recover from potentially damaging effects.

22. Toxic Stress
Strong and prolonged activation of the body’s stress management systems in the absence of the buffering protection of adult support.
Precipitants include extreme poverty, physical or emotional abuse, chronic neglect, severe maternal depression, substance abuse, or family violence.
Disrupts brain architecture and leads to stress management systems that respond at relatively lower thresholds, thereby increasing the risk of stress-related physical and mental illness.

23. Adverse Childhood Events and Adult Depression
Odds Ratio
ACEs
Chapman et al, 2004

24. Adverse Childhood Events and Adult Ischemic Heart Disease
Odds Ratio
ACEs
Dong et al, 2004

25. Adverse Childhood Events and Adult Substance Abuse% %
Small Group #3 Think about a child you are concerned about. Can you identify the type of stress the child may be experiencing in his/her environment?
Self-Report: Alcoholism Self-Report: Illicit Drugs
Dube et al, Dube et al, 2005

26. Think about a child you are concerned about
Think about a child you are concerned about. Can you identify the type of stress the child may be experiencing in his/her environment?

29. The good news: A loving relationship with a primary caregiver neutralizes the effect of toxic stress.
Measurable biochemical changes in children when they can count on loving support from adults in their environments.

30. Relationships are the “Active Ingredients" of Early Experience
Nurturing and responsive interactions build healthy brain architecture that provides a strong foundation for later learning, behavior, and health.
When protective relationships are not provided, persistent stress results in the activation of physiological systems (e.g. elevated cortisol secretion) that can disrupt brain architecture by impairing cell growth and interfering with the formation of healthy neural circuits.

31. Brains, Skills and Health are Built Over Time
The early years of life matter because the interactive influences of both early experience and gene expression affect the architecture of the maturing brain and the function of the developing immune system.

32. All parents have 2 critical questions:
1. How am I doing?
2. How is my child doing?

33. Joining parents in the task of raising their children
Listen for their story
Set aside our agenda to respond to needs
Recognize parents as experts on their own children
Support parents’ mastery
Promote parent-child interaction
“Hold families in our minds”

34. Affiliation Listening Skills
Use OPERA listening
O Use Open-ended questions
P Pause
E Make Eye Contact
R Repeat
A Avoid judgment, Ask opinion, Advise last
Dr. Constance Keefer,
Brazelton Touchpoints Center

35. Relationships matter.