PLUK News feed

15 Tips and Techniques to Help Maintain Your Sanity While Raising Children - Billings - Oct. 24, 2009

15 Tips and Techniques to Help Maintain Your Sanity While Raising Children:
Help for Resource Parents and Others Involved with the Care of Foster Children

Stacy York is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in the State of Montana. She currently owns a private practice and provides, individual, group, and family therapy to children, adolescents, families, and adults. She is a member of the National Association of Social Workers.

She is also a member of NAMI and volunteers as a facilitator for their family to family support group. Throughout her educational career, she has worked for several local organizations including: Youth Dynamics, Inc., Tumbleweed Runaway Program, and Yellowstone Boys and Girls Ranch-Community Based Services.. Ms. York is also an advocate of Dr. Bruce Perry’s The Stress Model.

Date:
Saturday, October 24, 2009

Time:
9:00 am - 4:00 pm (lunch on your own)

Place:
St. John's Lutheran, The Lillis Center, Poly and Shiloh

CALL A FAMILY RESOURCE SPECIALIST BY OCTOBER 22 TO REGISTER AT 657-3120.

SPACE IS LIMITED

Free to foster and adoptive families and staff of the Department and agency members.

All other personnel will be charged a fee of $25. Presented by Forever Families and Child and Family Services

Transportation Conference - Missoula - October 2

"Transportation Safety for Wheelchair Riders and Children with Disabilities"

Presented by: Institute for Families and Professionals

Oct. 2, 2009 - Holiday Inn, Missoula, MT

For more information, please contact: Tamara Kittelson-Aldred, OT Access Therapy Services, LLC 406-549-9521 or (mobile) 406-370-3689

Children's Festival of the Book - Bozeman - September 19

Please join us in Bozeman on Saturday for an entire day of celebrating children and books!

Featuring: artist Chris Raschka, poet Paul Janeczko, authors Dorothy Hinshaw Patent, Sneed Collard, and Ben Mikaelsen, plus lots of other programs and activities!

Bozeman Public Library - 9:30am to 5:30pm

For more information, call Cindy at (406)582-2404

Download Schedule of Events

Statewide Youth Prevention Conference - Missoula - September 23-24

The Missoula Forum for Children and Youth Invites You to Join Us...

Unite For Youth: The Future of Prevention - Keynote Speaker, Dr. Richard Catalano

MCT Center for the Performing Arts - Missoula, MT

A Special Early Bird Registration Rate applies if registration is received on or before September 10th

Registration closes September 17th

Download Conference Flyer

Download Registration Form and Workshop Details

Early Childhood Reading Web Resource

Link: GRTR!  Get Ready to Read! (GRTR!) is a national program to build the early literacy skills of preschool-age children. The program  brings research-based strategies to parents, early education professionals, and child care providers to help prepare children to learn to read and write. Our goal is to ensure that all children have opportunities to become successful readers. Get Ready to Read! is an initiative of the National Center for Learning Disabilities.

GRTR!'s program vision is that all preschool children will have the skills they need to learn to read when they enter school. This Web site is a part of NCLD's initiative to provide parents, educators, health-care professional and advocated with information to help build early literacy skills by integrating emergent literacy screening and learning activities into routine early childhood education, child-care and parenting practices.

Writing About Values Lifts Some Students Grades

Link: Self-Esteem Some seventh graders who were struggling in class did significantly better after performing a series of brief confidence-building writing exercises, and the improvements continued through eighth grade, researchers reported Thursday. The students who benefited most were blacks who were doing poorly, the study found; the exercises made no difference for white students, or for black ones who were already doing well.

Experts cautioned that the writing was hardly transforming. Those who benefited were still barely getting C’s, on average, by the end of middle school. Yet the results were surprising, because interventions to improve school performance tend to have short-term benefits, and the writing assignments were simple 15-minute efforts.

Screening Babies for Broken Hearts

Link: Broken Hearts In the middle of one night in August, a seemingly healthy 1-week-old infant named Ryan Olson suddenly began gasping for breath at home in Massachusetts, and his frantic parents rushed him to the hospital. There, emergency room doctors noted the critically ill baby had bluish feet and no pulse in his lower body. That almost certainly meant the boy had a “coarctation,” or blockage of his aorta. Ryan’s story isn’t that unusual. How can we identify these normal-appearing newborns before they leave the hospital, become critically ill like my patient and perhaps die? Recently, researchers have identified a promising new method called pulse oximetry to screen all babies for heart defects.

Sesame Workshop- Resource for Families Experiencing Military Transitions

Link: Military Families In recognition of the contributions made by the United States Armed Forces, Sesame Workshop presents this bilingual educational outreach initiative designed for military families and their young children to share. This bilingual (English and Spanish) multimedia outreach program is designed to support military families with children between the ages of two and five who are experiencing deployment, multiple deployments, or a parent's return home changed due to a combat-related injury.

Tots 'n Tech Research Institute

Link: Tots 'n Tech The Tots 'n Tech Research Institute (TnT) is an inter-university collaboration between Thomas Jefferson University (TJU), Philadelphia and Arizona State University (ASU), Tempe. TnT’s mission is to provide up-to-date information and resources about AT use with infants and toddlers for states, Early Intervention providers of all disciplines, and families across the country. In order to achieve this mission, TnT provides technical assistance to states to help them enhance the use of AT with infants and toddlers and conducts a national research program about use of assistive technology (AT).

P.A.W.S for Reading returns for 5th Session at Your Lewis & Clark Library Helena, MT

Kids, unleash your reading skills! PAWS for Reading is returning to Your Lewis & Clark Library! “We’ve received such positive feedback from parents and teachers, that we are excited to be able to offer this great service to our young readers again,” explained Youth Services Librarian, Candice Morris.