WHAT IS A FAMILY SUPPORT PRACTITIONER ?

A family support practitioner is here to support all families that are referred to the Acorn Centre with any stresses that family life may bring. The support will be unique to each family, as every family’s needs are different.

There are no one size fits all!

Support may be direct work with the child, direct support in the family home, weekly face to face meetings with parents or telephone catch ups. The family support practitioners are also able to attend meetings at schools or doctors’ appointments; whatever the family feel will benefit them.

There's a wealth of experience and knowledge to help support families with a range of needs. Some of the areas covered are:

         Managing challenging behaviours         

Setting boundaries & Routines

Confidence and self-esteem   Time to talk

Healthy Eating  Internet safety

Supporting parents at medical and school meetings

Sign posting to:

Parenting courses   Mental Health support

Nurturing and attachment needs

Separation/ Divorce   Mediation

Housing Issues

Young Carers

Debt and finance support

All of the work carried out by the family support practitioner is done on a one to one basis with each family (unless a parenting programme is being attended).

The family support practitioner works on a confidential basis and will only share information with other professionals if agreed beforehand with the parents.* 

*this is unless the information relates to child protection or illegal activity in which case the family support practitioner has a duty of care to pass this information on, but they will tell you they are doing this.