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Early Birds part 2.
KEEPING
After a child has participated in First Step for 10 days, the consultant holds the first of six once-a-week meetings with the parents and child to go over the at-home program. "It's been my experience that kids who have behavior problems in more than one setting won't get better if you treat them in just one setting," says Kate Kavanagh, research associate and family therapist with the Eugene-based Oregon Social Learning Center, and author of HomeBase, the parent component of First Step. Extending the program into the home gives the child more chances to practice the desired behaviors and helps parents support the classroom changes. "Our model has always been to teach the parents to teach the children," says Kavanagh. HomeBase focuses on six parent and child skills that are important for successful adjustment to school: sharing about school (communication), cooperation, setting (and accepting) limits, solving problems, making friends, and building confidence. For each skill there are recipelike cards with activities for the parent and child to do together for five to 10 minutes a night. Willard's son Michael still likes an activity called "Find a Treasure" in which he hides an object and then gives his mother clues, one at a time, about where it is hidden. This is one of the activities that gives the child practice in communicating. Building better communication skills will eventually open up parent-child discussions about school. Such talks not only alert a parent to any problems, but allow her to enjoy the child's successes. HomeBase also gave Willard tips on effective ways to elicit information from her son. "I ask more questions and more specific questions," she says. Where she used to ask, "How was school today?" now she asks questions like "What did you do in math?" and "Did you learn any new words?" She and her son continue to do a First Step activity once a week. Jacob Patterson still has his recipe-card holder with his activity cards in it. He doesn't let his two older sisters touch it. "Once in a while he'll say, 'Mom, can we do one of those activities?'" says Julie Patterson. "I think he uses it if he's feeling left out or lonely, which is good," says her husband, Mike. "It's not so much parent training," says Golly, "but structure for parents to interact positively with their kids. Now they have a way that makes the child understand that the parent thinks school's important, and everyone has the same expectations." And, she notes, parents are happy to hear it's OK to have rules and limits. Mike Patterson was particularly pleased with First Step's home component, which he felt gave him creative ways to deal with previously frustrating situations instead of yelling and getting upset. "The way I was raised you did it and that was that or you paid the price," he says. "I don't want to be that way. If you can get through to them without losing your own cool, for me in my life that's a major accomplishment." He says he was surprised to discover that he got as much out of the program as Jake did. "Two things First Step taught me," says Julie Patterson. "One is to focus more on the positive, and just kind of let the negative go, which is hard for me. And the second thing is how important it is to spend time with each child, one-on-one."
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Date of Last Update: 9/28/01 
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