SENSIBLE DISCIPLINE:
A Handbook for Foster Families:
Strategies and Techniques for Family Foster Care
Jacob R. Sprouse, Jr.
The issue of discipline in foster care continues as a cause of concern for placing agencies and an issue of consternation for foster families. That children in care may not be physically disciplined has more often become the issue than has establishing effective techniques and strategies for the non-physical discipline of children in general, and of children in care, specifically.
In the forty-odd state field testing of AFCR's Curriculum: Defensive Parenting, the single, most frequent complaint of foster families has been the placing agency demanding a non-physical discipline environment but offering little or no guidance for the foster families. AFCR has responded with Sensible Discipline. While the goal of Sensible Discipline is to contribute to the discussion that physical discipline is not only "not allowed" but is "non-effective," Sensible Discipline also promotes the concept that there are unlimited positive discipline alternatives available to foster parents, and here is a comprehensive "list" of some of those alternatives.
More than just a laundry list of techniques, Sensible Discipline focuses on:
- Similarities and differences between parenting foster parent's birth children and children placed in their foster care;
- Building a "bridge" of understanding between the foster family and the child-in-care; and,
- Developing and strengthening the bond of trust between the foster parents and the placing agency staff.
Specifically, Sensible Discipline offers:
- Building the case against physical discipline - what it is and why it never works;
- Understanding the differences between discipline and punishment;
- Expanding the traditional definition of discipline to focus on the uniqueness of the relationship between foster parents and the child-in-care;
- Understanding and effectively managing behavioral emergencies;
- Establishing goals of discipline;
- Understanding why children misbehave;
- Recognizing specific behavioral characteristics:
- the stressed child,
- the attachment disordered child,
- the sexually abused child;
- Developing a problem-solving model for understanding and effectively coping with each child's specific behavioral demands; and,
- An inventory of non-physical discipline alternatives.
Designed for a six to nine hour pre-service or in-service training program, Sensible Discipline may be integrated into any current educational program or offered independently as either a group training opportunity or individual foster family self-study.
#2061 Sensible Discipline: A Handbook for Foster Families $6.50 Ea., 25+ Copies $5.55 Ea.
Sensible Discipline: Trainer's Guide: Loose-leaf Curriculum in three-ring binder, one (1) set of seventeen (17) visual vignette transparency masters, thirty (30) text transparency masters, and one (1) copy of the Handbook. #2062 Sensible Discipline $45.00 Ea.