Yangon University of Education

Department of Educational Psychology

MED
(First Year, Second Semester)

Parents and Families

Group - 3
2023
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 Group Members

No. Roll No. Name

1 ၁-မဟာပညာစိတ်-၂ (GC) Ma Khin Win Shwe

2 ၁-မဟာပညာစိတ်-၃ (GC) Ma May Ei Hlaing

3 ၁-မဟာပညာစိတ်-၈ (GC) Ma Hsu Mar Lar Phyo

4 ၁-မဟာပညာစိတ်-၁၀ (GC) Ma Thway Thway Aung

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 Contents
Introduction
Professionals’ Changing Views of Parents and Families
The Effects of a Child with a Disability on the Family
Family Involvement in Treatment and Education
Conclusion

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Parents and Families
Chapter-4
Introduction
 The birth of a child with a disability can have a profound effect on
the family.
 Reactions of family members to the individual with a disability can
run the gamut from absolute rejection to complete acceptance.
 But most important, a child with disabilities does not always threaten
the family’s well-being.
 In fact, having a family member with a disability has strengthened
the family bond.

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Misconceptions About Parents and Families of
Persons with Disabilities
Myths Fact
•Intervention effort only on the parents especially mother
•Siblings are usually unaffected
•Family as well as friends should be
included in intervention
•Professional should provide expertise for the family
•Teachers should respect the privacy of parents and
•Siblings often experience same
communicate them only when absolutely necessary emotional reaction as parents do
•Professional should help parents
involve in making decision
•Teachers should initiate some kind of
contact and establish some rapport
with parents

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Professionals’ Changing Views of Parents and
Families
Today, knowledgeable professionals who work with
exceptional learners are aware of the importance of
the family.
Policy makers and professionals now recognize that
partnerships should not be limited to parents only.
 Partnerships can and should involve
relationships between professionals and other
family member, such as fathers, grandparents,
brothers and sisters and even close family
friends.

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• Professionals' views of the role of parents have changed dramatically.
For at least two reasons we now know that automatically holding parents
responsible for their children’s problems is inappropriate.

First Reason Second Reason

• direction of causation between
child and adult behavior is a two-
way street.
• the behaviors of individuals with a
wide variety of disabilities can
affect the behavior of their parents
toward them.
• researchers have found that the family
can have a positive influence on the
educational process.
• more and more educators now have
recognized that parents often have as
much or more to offer than
professionals regarding suggestions for
the treatment of their children.

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Importance of Families to Teachers and Teachers to
Families
Families
 Provide teachers with personal information that can explain why
certain students' behaviors are occurring in the classroom.
 Reinforce directives that teachers give their students, especially
on homework.
 Help teachers determine students' interests so that long-term
education or vocation goals can be established
 Tell teachers about what types of disciplines and learning
strategies work best with their children.

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Families

 Provide families with documented evidence of their children's

progress and success.
 Help families become more actively involved in their children’s
education.
 Teach and reinforce social skills that are needed for students to be
successful, contributing members of the communities in which
families live.
 Lend a helping hand, a supportive ear, and a friendly face to all
families served.

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 The Effects of a Child with a Disability on the
Family
everyday routines of
most families and
even parents’ career
goals are frequently
disrupted. a child with a disability

can influence family

members' employment.

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Parental Reactions

 A STAGE THEORY APPROACH Traditionally, researchers and

clinicians have suggested that parents go through a series of stages
after learning they have a child with a disability.

 Based on interviews of parents of infants with serious physical

disabilities, a representative set of stages includes shock and
disruption, denial, sadness, anxiety and fear, anger, and finally
adaptation.

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 THE ROLE OF GUILT The parents of a child with a disability
frequently wrestle with the feeling that they are in some way
responsible for their child's condition.

 Uncertainty about the cause of the child's disability creates an

atmosphere that parents themselves are to blame.

 Mothers are particularly vulnerable.

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The mother of boy who was blind and had hydrocephaly, severe intellectual
disability, cerebral palsy and seizures, described:

“The world makes much of the pregnant woman. People open doors for
her, carry heavy parcels, offer footstools and unsolicited advice. All this
attention seems somehow sited on the idea that she is creating something
miraculously fine. When the baby arrives imperfect, the mother feels she
has failed not only herself and her husband, but the rest of the world as
well.”

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 DEALING WITH THE PUBLIC
parents can feel
vulnerable to
criticism from
others about
how they deal
with their child's
problems

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• Parents of children with disabilities sometimes sense that others are
scrutinizing their decisions about their child's treatment, educational
placement, and so forth.
• The public can sometimes be cruel in their reactions to people with
disabilities.
• People with disabilities-especially those with disabilities that are
readily observable-are inevitably faced with inappropriate reactions
from those around them.

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DEALING WITH THE CHILD'S FEELINGS

 This can be a difficult responsibility because parents don’t want to

alarm the child or make the child more concerned about the
disability than is necessary.
 It is a good idea for parents to talk honestly with the child at as early
an age as possible, especially before the teenage years, when so
many parents and children have problems communicating.

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 Parental Adjustment
 Parents of children with disabilities
>>> the average amount of stress
 Serverity and duration of
psychological, behavioural and
health problems
 Family member coming down with a
serious illness, can precipitate a
family crisis
 Family was under stress because of a
multitude

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Parental Reaction to Stress
 Stress doesn’t appear to be strongly
linked to the severity of the child’s
disability
 Types of behavioural problems the chid
might have
 Children who exhibit socially offensive
and distruptive behaviours .
 Parents need social support , extended
family members, friends and others

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 Changing Views of Parental Adjustment
 Parents of children with disabilities were destined for a life of mis-energy
 To become dsyfunctional or depressed because of blame parents for their
children’s disabilities
 Developmental disabilities >>> risk of experiencing depression
 29% not / 71% >>> who cope very well

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 Sibiling Reactions
 Do experience the same emotions fear,
anger, guilt and that parents do.
 Might have more difficult time than
their parents in coping with some of
these feelings (they are younger)
 Might have negative thoughts into
proper perspective
 The interaction between family and
surrounding social system is critical,
beneficial to the family of a child with
disability

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 Family Systems Theory

 Stresses that the indivisual’s behaviour is best undrstood.

 The relationships and reactions will be successful
 Four related components >>> family characteristics, family
interactions, family functions and family life cycle.

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 Family Characteristics

 Include things as size, cultural background, socioeconomic

status, coping styles and special conditions
 Help how family members interact with each other and
with others outside the family.

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 The stresses of raising a child
with disabilities are those
facing additional struggles
arising from poverty or single-
parent status.
 According to changing
demographic, military families
gave contributed children with
disabilities.

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 Challenges in working families of children with disabilities
 Difficult to devote time and energy to working on behalf of
his or her child
 Adolescence, Teens fear rejections by peers, can be a
difficult period for disabilities.

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Siblings Adjustment
 Can adopt well or poorly to having family
members with disabilities
 Are at lower risk than parents of
experiencing depression and anxiety
(Rossiter & Sharpe, 2001)
 Having benefited from having a sibling
with a disability
 Birth order, gender and age differences
between siblings have some bearing on
adjustment (Berry&Hardman 1998)

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 Women show more
favourable attachments
than me do to their sibling
with a disability
 Siblings of the same
gender and siblings who
are close in age are more
likely to experience
conflicts.

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 Can talk with students about the materials and contents of
programmes for their siblings with disabilities.
 The sibshops workshops designed to help siblings of
children with disabilities.

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Family Involvement in Treatment and Education
 Positive influence parents can have on their exceptional children’s
development
 This more positive attitude toward parents is reflected in how parents
are now involved in the treatment and education of their children.

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Family-centered Model
• Encourages the family to make its own decisions with respect to services while mobilizing
resources and supports for the family’s goals.
• Is a model in which the professionals work for the family.
• Reflects a change of viewing parents from as passive recipients of professional advice to equal
partners in the development of treatment and educational programs for their children.
• Does not just provide direct services.
• Achieve the right balance between offering assistance and allowing families to make independent
decisions.

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Essential characteristics of family-centered model

Family is
Respect for the
conceived as a
family’s choice.
support unit.

Emphasis on the
family’s and
contextual
strengths.
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Family-Centered Model

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Family Interaction
• The more the parent responds appropriately to the young child’s body language, gestures, etc., the
more the child’s development will flourish.
• Family cohesion and adaptability are important determinants of the “health” of a family.

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Cohesion
• It refers to the degree to which an individual family member is free to act independently of other
family members.
• Families with low cohesion might not offer the child with the necessary support whereas the
overly cohesive family might be overprotective.
• It’s often difficult for otherwise healthy families to find a right balance of cohesion.

(go overboard or limit their children’s independence)

• Cohesion can also be an issue for adults with disabilities.
• Living in the community demands a number of daily living skills.

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Four Levels of Cohesion

Disengage Separate
Connected Enmeshed
d d

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Adaptability
• It refers to the degree to which families are able to change their modes of interaction when they
encounter unusual or stressful situations.
• In an unstable environment, the needs of the family member who is disabled might be overlooked
or neglected.

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Four Levels of Adaptability

Rigid Structured Flexible Chaotic

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Family Cohesion and Adaptability

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Family Functions
• Family functions are the numerous routines in which families engage to meet their
many and diverse needs – economic, daily care, social, medical and educational.
• Education is only one of several functions in which families are immersed.
• Some families of students with disabilities are a passive degree of involvement in
their children’s education. (Turnbull&Turnbull, 2006)

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Family Life Cycle
• A component of the Turnbulls’ family systems model consists of birth and early
childhood, childhood, adolescent and adulthood.
• Transitions between life cycle stages are often stressful for families, especially
families of children who are disabled.
• A particular difficult issue for some parents with disabled children who are entering
adulthood is that of mental competence and guardianship.

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Guardianship
• It means that one person has authority, granted by the courts, to make decisions for
another person.
• It can range in degree from total to more limited or temporary authority to make
decisions.
• Transitions between stages are difficult because of the uncertainty that each new
phase presents to the family.

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42
A Family Systems Framework

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Facilitating Involvement of Culturally and/or
Linguistically Diverse Families
• Howard Parette and Beverly Petch-Hogan (2000), two professors at
Southeast Missouri State University, offer several suggestions.
Contacts with Families
Problem: Families from culturally and/or linguistically diverse backgrounds
often defer to professionals as the “experts.”
Possible solution: Do not assume that school personnel should always take
the lead in providing information or contacting families.

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Locations of Meetings

Problem: Meetings typically take place in a school

building.
Possible solutions: Provide transportation, or hold
the meeting at a neutral site.

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Supports During the Meeting

Problem: Child care for families can make it difficult to

attend a meeting.
Possible solution: Provide child care.

Provision of Information/ Training

Problem: Parents alone are the targets of information and

training.
Possible solution: Consider involving siblings or extended
family members.

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Knowledge of Family Priorities, Needs,
Resources

Problem: Some families don’t view time in the

same way as many professionals do.
Possible solution: Be flexible in scheduling
meeting times and consider video-or audio-
taping parts of meetings missed by families.

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Social Support for Families
Social Support
• Emotional, informational, or
material aid provided to a person
or a family
• Informal means of aid be very
valuable in helping families of
children with disabilities

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Ethnicity and Social Support

Familial and religious support in ethnic minority families

Heavy emphasis on caring for one’s own family

members, disabled or not

Family’s church, a major social support role for many

minorities

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Parental Support Groups
• Parents of children with the same or similar disabilities
• Unstructured or more structured, meeting infrequently with unspecified agendas
• Means for parents to share their experiences – providing educational and emotional support
• More stress from sharing problems and listening to the problems of others

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Internet Resources For Parent

• An excellent resource for parents of children with disabilities (newsgroups, blogs,

World Wide Web sites)

Parent Centers

• Over 100 Parents Training and Information centers and Community Parent Resource
centers – established by U.S. Department of Education
• Assistance and coordination with the Technical Assistance Alliance

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 Contd.
General Purposes

Understand their children’s special needs

Communicate with professionals

Participate in educational decisions making,

such as IEP and IFSP meetings
Obtain information about services,
programs, and resources
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Positive behavioral Intervention and Support for
Challenging Behaviors
• Require more than just social support from friends and the community
• Help families apply behavioral principles in interacting with their children
• Emphasize rewarding positive behavior
• Make problem behavior less effective, efficient, and relevant
• Make desired behavior more functional

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Activities that
families
routinely visits to going on
engage in Mealtimes relatives vacations

Shopping seasonal eating in

celebration restaurant
Family activity
settings

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Communication Between Parents and Professionals

• One of the keys to avoiding professional-parents misunderstandings

• An invaluable source of information about the child’s characteristics and interests
• Receiving information from parents and providing it to them
• A degree of establishing rapport with parents by sending home a brief form letter, periodic
newsletters or making occasional phone calls

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 Three methods of
communication

• Home –note • Travelling

• Parent-teacher
Programs Notebooks
Conferences

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PARENT-TEACHER CONFERENCES

• Hold individual conferences with parents opening regularly

scheduled meetings
• Be diplomatic if focus on student’s poor work or behavior
• Find something positive to say about the student
• Achieve a delicate balance of providing the objective account of
the student’s transgressions or poor work
• Lose parent’s sense of trust conveying only good news

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HOME-NOTE PROGRAM
• Be a system of communication between teacher and parents
• Evaluate the behavior of the student using a simple form
• Take the form home, get the parent’s signature and return it the next day
• Agree philosophically with a behavioral approach to managing student
behavior

TRAVELING NOTEBOOKS
• Less formal than hone notes
• Appropriate for students who see multiple professionals
• Keep track of what each is doing with the student
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Parent Advocacy

• Another important way that parents can be involved

in treatment and education
• Action that results in benefit to one or more persons
• A method to obtain needed or improved services

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 Conclusion

• Recognize a child with a disability can have the tremendous impact on the
dynamics of a family
• Appreciate the negative and positive influence such a child can exert
• Realize a family can be a bountiful reservoir of support for the child and an
invaluable resource of information for the teacher
• Enable families to provide supportive and enriching environments for their
children
• Harness the expertise of families to provide the best possible programs for
their children

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THANK YOU

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