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Neighbourhood support for young familiesLin a & Geoff Poulton aa SouthamptonPublished online: 28 Nov 2010.

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Neighbourhood support for youngfamilies

LIN and GEOFF POULTON

Southampton

Based on nearly a decade of action-research experience in Yorkshireand Hampshire, the article traces the shift of emphasis reflected inthe authors' work with young children and their families. Much ofthis work is concerned with strategies of intervention, initially relatedto curriculum development but later, setting the education of youngchildren firmly within a social context. This has led to current workwhich emphasises the need to match the resources of people inneighbourhoods with those provided by social agencies.

EIGHT YEARS ago a small-scale intervention programme was setup for a group of pre-school age children in Denaby Main, Yorkshire,by the West Riding Educational Priority Area Project. It formedpart of a much wider-ranging series of programmes and actionsinvolving the full age-range of school pupils as well as adults in thetown, using Red House Education Centre as a base. The context ofthis pre-school work is important since it was firmly linked notonly to the homes and families of the children but also to social,educational and health provision established by the Project or bythe West Riding County Council.

Initially the assumptions of the Project were based on Americanevidence of the effectiveness and desirability of early educationprovision for young children. All of the Project's formal researchwas concentrated on testing the effectiveness of various curricularapproaches, both in the short and long term, by measuring thecognitive performance of children involved and comparing theresults with a control group. The time and resources availablelimited the research team to monitoring programmes set up duringthe first eighteen months of work with the under-fives in DenabyMain. But it became increasingly apparent as the work proceeded

Early Child Development and Care © Gordon and Breach Science Publishers Inc.0300-4430/79/0601-0073 $04.50/0 Printed in Northern IrelandVol. 6, 1979, pp. 73-82

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74 L.ANDG.POULTON

that a more important factor in early education than curriculardesign and approaches was the degree of understanding and partici-pation of parents as educators of their children.

Over the next three years the pre-school groups at Red Housedeveloped increasingly sophisticated ways of involving mothersand fathers in the education of their children. The results of thiswork had to be treated subjectively. Although two of the groupswere subjected to the English Picture Vocabulary Test on com-pletion of their year's involvement with Red House, resulting insignificantly higher scores than in the initial groups, accurate com-parison with the first waves proved to be unsatisfactory. We had todepend, therefore, on our own observations of the children andthe perceptions of their parents, together with those of reception-class teachers who were receiving children with experience of apre-school group for the first time. The teachers noted that somechildren were able to read sentences, were more confident, curious,questioning and articulate than those in previous intakes. Further,the parents were positively interested in their children's educationand wished to continue the contact with the school in partnershipwith their child's teacher in order to reinforce their own under-standing and to strengthen the work of the school.

Work with parents in the Red House pre-school group, and intheir homes, challenged our assumptions on early education andour approach moved from strategies aimed directly at improving achild's intellectual and social skills through various curricula toothers based on the relationship between parent, child and teacher.Unless the parents could be shown their educative role with theirchildren, there was little chance of any momentum gained throughthe children's involvement in early educational activities beingmaintained. Our aim was still to find ways of helping children toreach their maximum performance levels in cognitive and socialskills, but we were hoping to maintain early gains over long periodsin the child's life. This concern was caught up in the search forequality of opportunity and the life chances open to the children.However, there was the problem of how to encourage parents tojoin in the activities of the pre-school group. The key to its solutionlay in the attitude of the pre-school teacher towards the parents

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NEIGHBOURHOOD SUPPORT FOR YOUNG FAMILIES 75

and the children. She relied heavily upon introductory visits to thefamilies in their homes so that the work of the pre-school groupcould be explained carefully. Here the expectations of child,parents and teacher could be projected in the security of thefamily setting. This helped to establish a feeling of trust betweenmembers of a future partnership and allowed the teacher to showthat she was in the presence of an expert who knew more aboutthe child concerned than anyone else. It also allowed the teacherto look for "continuity points" in the home which would help thechild to feel more secure when he arrived in the group and allowedher to build on the child's known experience.

Once in the pre-school group the parents soon adopted theirown arrangements for spending an afternoon, once or twice aweek at Red House taking part in the activities with individualchildren or with small groups. We were thus able to examine therole of the teacher in a setting designed to enhance the adult-childinteraction centring around language, cognitive, motor and socialskills. There was little doubt that the role required a high degree ofprofessional skill as well as a clear understanding of the families'needs and interactions. It was necessary not only to interpret theresponses of children and parents in a classroom setting but alsoto relate such interpretation to the social environment of the family.Some children who had difficulty adjusting in a social group,developing language skills, improving manipulative skills, etc., wereclearly being held back by stressful situations at home. This wasnot a new discovery. The National Children's Bureau study (1972),"From Birth to Seven", produces evidence to show that linksbetween learning aptitude and social conditions exist. We wereinterested however in the role of a teacher as a supportive agentfor families. By maintaining close contact with the parents it waspossible, in a number of cases, to make an early diagnosis ofbehavioural problems in children and take action through otherhealth, psychiatric or social agencies in the area in an attempt toalleviate learning disablement, emotional disturbance or neuro-logical impairment.

By the time we left Red House in 1974, we were convinced ofthe need for much closer relationships and interaction between

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76 L. AND G. POULTON

health, social services and education in helping families faced withdifficult social problems. In general, much could be done to enhancethe role of parents as educators of their children which would havea powerful influence on children's performance at school, butthere were a disturbing number of families in each of our intakes,who needed to make some form of social adjustment in order forthe children ultimately to be able to come to terms with learningin a formal school setting. The work showed a need for some formof sustaining agent who would maintain contact with families andgroups. Two models had been developed at Red House, oneinvolving a teacher who worked with parents and children in agroup, and the other concerned with home-based work withfamilies using an educational visitor. In each case a full-time workerwas employed in this role. Although the input by the workersinitially was high in stimulating interest and generating a feeling ofconfidence in the parents, it lessened as they responded and theirmotivation increased. It became clear, however, that continuingsupport by the worker was necessary throughout the period ofcontact with families. Our experience showed us that tc withdrawcompletely once a group appeared to be established and funct-ioning well, was questionable. The skills required to sustain thefunctioning of a group, often under difficult circumstances, werenot developed sufficiently among its members. Our recent work inSouthampton has provided a more effective model for groupsupport, but the system still requires a full-time sustaining agent.

In Hampshire we found the large Local Authority housingestates, situated in pleasant surroundings, to be idyllic after theVictorian rows of blackened pit houses in Denaby Main. We soonfound however that provision of new houses does not necessarilyease individual social difficulties. Initial work with groups of parentsin central Southampton led to those living in estates on the peri-phery of the City, as families were rehoused. In these groups therewere mothers who had a desperate need for some form of supportin bringing up their children. It was necessary in such cases, toconcentrate on helping the mother to develop self-esteem andconfidence, before attempting to work with her child. As the workwith groups of women developed, health visitors and social workers

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NEIGHBOURHOOD SUPPORT FOR YOUNG FAMILIES 77

began to refer families in increasing numbers.The groups were based on neighbourhoods and they met in halls

and community centres within pram-pushing distance of members'homes. Our aim was to reach the child through the parents, usuallythe mother, by a gradual process of increasing her sense of herefforts being worthwhile and her sense of her status, which fairlyquickly led to a group identity and a sense of belonging. By reducingisolation and giving the members a reference point to which theycould turn each week, we hoped to reduce their dependence onmedically prescribed drugs. Although we were surprised by thenumber of referrals to the groups, the probability of finding womenon these estates suffering from various forms of loneliness anddepression was known to be high from other studies conducted inthe United Kingdom. Richmond (1974) and Brown (1975) bothproduce evidence showing a greater tendency for women living oncouncil housing estates to suffer from depressive moods as well aslack of energy, heightened anxiety and various forms of sleepdisturbance, particularly when they have children under the age offive years. As in Denaby Main, we were concerned with developinga strategy which would enable work already started to be main-tained and possibly expanded. By now we held a number ofassumptions related to the growth and development of youngchildren and their families. These were:

1) The early years of a child's life are very important to laterdevelopment, but not irreversible. The period during pregnancyand from birth to thirty months is particularly vital.

2) Close, consistent and loving adult contact is necessary for achild during this period if stable emotional, intellectual and moraldevelopment is to occur. Diet, hygiene and housing are importantbut follow a loving relationship in order of priority.

3) Where consistent adult stimulus exists for a child then it islikely that development will be near to his potential development.The natural parents are in the most advantageous position toprovide such stimuli in the majority of cases.

4) Where close consistent adult contact does not exist tostimulate a child, behavioural difficulties frequently arise.

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78 L. ANDG. POULTON

5) Low self-concept in parents contributes to low achieve-ment in children.

6) Group work in neighbourhoods can effectively help toreduce low self-concept and loneliness in adults.

By 1976 four groups were meeting on a weekly basis in differentneighbourhoods led by Lin acting as convenor, coordinator, liaisonperson with social agencies, organiser of creches, home-visitor andrecruiter. The pressure on her was becoming increasingly severe.The key to further development lay in creating a support systemwhich included all the groups as well as encouraging active partici-pation by members of professionally run agencies. In order toextend the sense of identity already generated in the groups, it wasvitally necessary to involve the members in designing and planninga new form of agency.

We had to consider a new form of agency because the workcrossed the boundaries of health, education and social services.Flexible development was necessary if we were to start wherepeople were and build on the strengths and resources of familiesin neighbourhoods. The rules set by the large institutions were tooconstricting to allow such a tenuous growth based on relationshipsto flourish. Ground rules for the agency would have to be definedby those involved as the work progressed. We would need to watchthe development of the agency carefully and encourage all theparticipants to feel that their perceptions, ideas and actions wereessentially building blocks in its structure. After some deliberationbetween professionals from the three services and group membersand a successful application to a Trust fund for a grant, SCOPEwas established.

SCOPE is really a small supportive organisation for a networkof neighbourhood groups, but it also offers considerable potentialfor learning. One of its first ground rules, for instance, was to set alimit on its size. It would not be possible to provide in-depthsupport for families, or groups, if numbers were allowed to growbeyond manageable limits. This was to be eight groups containingtwelve to fifteen families. The organisation would provide fundsfor rent and expenses incurred in running the groups. It would

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NEIGHBOURHOOD SUPPORT FOR YOUNG FAMILIES 79

organise fortnightly support group meetings, led by a psychiatristand a senior social worker for group convenors and others whowanted to express and perhaps release some of their tensionsabout the work. Training sessions in group skills would by pro-vided for group convenors on a regular weekly basis, led by thecoordinator. Since the convenors all were members of the originalgroups, we needed to learn from their experience and observationsof the work in order to create an agenda for training. New con-venors would emerge from group membership and they would addto the bank of experience and knowledge accumulating from thework.

During the first year of its operation from June 1976 to July1977, fourteen groups were formed in various parts of the Cityand over three hundred families have been involved for varyingperiods of time. Some have joined the groups because they haveheard or read about them, but the majority have been referred tothe coordinator of SCOPE by health visitors, social workers orteachers. Although the growth of the groups has been rapid, it hasbeen possible to find convenors within their membership. A con-venor's role includes attending training sessions, organising meet-ings, developing group discussion, organising the creche andvisiting group members at home in order to maintain contact.Usually there are two convenors per group, sometimes assisted inthe creches by students or school leavers. The coordinator (Lin)accepts referrals, makes initial home visits, holds training sessionsand regularly visits each group, as well as covering emergencies asthey arise. She obtains professional supervision from a seniorsocial worker and support from the groups themselves.

Roughly fifty per cent of SCOPE'S membership consists of one-parent families. Many of the members would not have approachedplay-groups or mother and toddler groups for a variety of socialand financial reasons. Their morale is often low and the task ofbringing up children without the encouragement of other relativesor friends in the neighbourhood leads to a high incidence ofdepression and poor motivation amongst the mothers. Ourobservations support the view that the children in such circum-stances are likely to behave deviantly. Certainly they reflect the

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stresses of the home in their relationships with others. Much ofSCOPE's work is concerned with elevating the self-esteem ofmothers and fathers, enhancing their consciousness not only abouttheir role as educators of their children, but also their functioningas members of a larger community. By sharing in the control andrunning of the organisation the members feel more confident intaking positive action within their families and neighbourhoods.

We hope that for many people SCOPE lives up to its name andopens up a wider vista of opportunity for the future. It is a start-ing point not an end in itself. Members are encouraged to developnew personal initiatives and, when they feel ready, to leave thegroups. We feel that, contrary to Denaby Main, where strongbonds and family ties existed in a long-established community, lifeon the housing estates reflects a much more general pattern to befound throughout the country. Here local support systems areneeded to replace defunct extended family networks. Suchsupport at present is not being stimulated by the statutory socialagencies, the reverse, in fact, appears to be true; they actually limitthe possibility of personal initiative and development over time,especially amongst clients, patients or students who fail to meetinstitutional requirements.

We have been privileged to work in a continuous developmentalway with families in a variety of settings. The early optimismprojected by studies into curricular approaches to pre-schoolingwas shifted to a need to emphasise the powerful influence ofparents on the learning potential of their children. Close involve-ment with parents has shown the importance of placing educationwithin its social context. Although early education may lead tolong-term gains in the performance of children,, the short-termeffects are equally important. Much of the work described brieflyin this article follows a cyclic pattern of support at a time whenit is most needed. Family crises flare up and disappear withinvarying lengths of time producing periods of stress which stronglyinfluence the development of children. Stress frequently affectsthe functioning of parents and produces poor self-esteem and adepressed sense of worthiness. Any service which sets out toremedy such situations becomes involved in health, educational

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NEIGHBOURHOOD SUPPORT FOR YOUNG FAMILIES 81

and social welfare procedures.People continue to join SCOPE and the groups themselves have

become involved in a range of activities which suggest growingconfidence and dynamism. We are currently engaged in participa-tory research with the members in which our main concern iswith knowledge development, rather than evaluation of SCOPE'Seffectiveness. The underlying theme of the work is that flexiblesupport systems are needed which start where the families (parentsand children) are, and build on the human resources which existin neighbourhoods rather than on the terms of institutionsdevoted to specific forms of provision. One probable result of sucha process is the establishment of a greater understanding of theservice institutions, which will certainly lead to more questioningof their viability by consumers. Strategies of provision whichremain inflexible to changes in the pattern of life occurringparticularly amongst young families in this country must beinadequate. Building on the positive attributes of the family helpsto reinforce its members. Using the collective strengths of familiescan produce a considerable neighbourhood resource to be matchedwith the resources of social agencies in an area. We are concernedwith a service which complements existing forms of provision forthe under-fives but would argue strongly from the cumulativeresults of several years' reflective action in the field that an inte-grated provision, catering for the needs of young families isbecoming increasingly necessary.

References

Armstrong, G. (1975). A description of the West Riding Educational Visitorprogramme. An experiment in early learning, Concern, 18.

Brown, G., M. Bhrolchain and T. Harris. (1975). Social class and psychiatricdisturbance among women in an urban population. Sociology, 9, 225-254.

Davies, V. (1977). Helping isolated families through the use of neighbour-hood groups in London boroughs. Neighbourhood Families: six familygroups in action, London Council of Social Service.

Davie, R., N. Butler and H. Goldstein. (1972). From Birth to Seven, NationalChildren's Bureau, Longman, London.

Poulton, G.A. and Terry James. (1975). Pre-school programme developments

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after the end of the West Riding EPA Project in Denaby Main. Des-cribes a range of strategies in pre-school education. Preschool Learningin the Community, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London.

Poulton, G. (1977). A report on the development of SCOPE a.neighbour-hood scheme for families with young children. SCOPE — the first year1976-77, Department of Sociology and Social Administration, Univers-ity of Southampton.

Richman, N. (1974). The effects of housing on pre-school children and theirmothers. Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology, 16, 53-58.

Roberts, J., K. Beswick, B. Leverton, M. A. Lynch. (1977). Group therapy toprovide help for families with child-rearing problems that could lead tochild abuse. Prevention of child abuse: group therapy 'for mothersand children. The Practitioner, July, 219, 111-115.

Smith, George (Ed.). (1975). The final report of the West Riding EducationalPriority Area Project provides a full account of the pre-school pro-grammes and early results of tests. It also details the educational home-visiting programme's first year of operation together with descriptionsof work carried out during the first two years at Red House EducationCentre. Educational Priority, Vol. IV, HMSO, London.

Smith, George and Terry James. (1975). Examines evidence on effects ofpre-school education and provides the results of follow-up studies onthe West Riding EPA pre-school experiments. Oxford Review of Educa-tion, Vol. 1, No. 3, 223-239.

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