Curriculum Guide

(Adapted from “The National Extension Parent Education Model,” Smith et al., 1994)

All the materials found in this curriculum guide were originally developed by parent education professionals. They are included in this curriculum guide to illustrate the types of resources available to support parent education programs consistent with NEPEM. This is NOT an exhaustive list, but rather a sampling of the types of resources that are available.

  1. Baby’s First Year Calendar: A calendar for the baby’s first year of life that includes highlights and helpful hints for each month of the child’s age.
  2. Baby Talk: Baby Talk is a cooperative venture between South and North Carolina and is co-sponsored by Kiwanis International. Rearing a baby is one of the greatest challenges families face. We want to make sure that parents know about babies. What do babies need? How do they grow? How can parents help them? How can we help parents? Baby Talk is series of brief publications designed to help new parents begin their responsibility the right way.
  3. Building Communities of Support for Families: The Master Teacher in Family Life program is a training model that teaches natural leaders within poor communities the information and skills they need to 1) create an effective internal communication system to educate fellow residents about important issues such as health, the family, education, and employability, and 2) create and sustain a network of support for those who want to use their new knowledge to make changes in family life, education, and employment. The program is unique in that it builds strengths within the targeted communities in order to support long-term change.

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  4. A Child in Your Life: This set of parent education materials for adolescent or low-income parents is designed with the needs and characteristics of teen parents in mind. The materials include six half-hour videotapes that use adolescent and adult actors and interviews with actual parents and that take into account the common lifestyle of adolescent and low-income parents. Corresponding to the tapes are six booklets written at the second- and third-grade reading levels that include numerous illustrations and photographs. The booklets and tapes can be used together or separately but are most effective when used together. Brief workshop outlines to be used with the materials are available from the author.
  5. Cooperative Communication between Home and School: Research in the past decade has shown the importance of parent’s involvement in their children’s education. The big question for school administrators, teachers, and school board members is “How do you encourage meaningful involvement for today’s busy parents?” Cornell University’s Cooperative Communication between Home and School program, a part of Cornell’s Family Matters project, provides answers based on 15 years of extensive research and field tests involving thousands of parents and teachers in nearly 100 elementary schools.
  6. Discipline for Young Children: This is a five-part series designed to help parents of preschoolers ages two to six years develop a win-win approach to teaching responsible behavior. This series helps parents explore their individual parenting style; understand what to expect from their children at different ages and stages; develop effective discipline techniques; and raise the odds for responsible behavior.
  7. Empowering Families: Home Visiting and Building Clusters:  The Family Matters project includes three workshops for parents and those who work with families. Empowering Families: Home Visiting and Building Clusters, The Employed Parent, and Cooperative Communication Between Home and School are programs based on the empowerment approach to building upon family strengths. Family Matters workshops help parents, school teachers, home visitors, and leaders of parent groups to develop insight, confidence, and skill in communicating with other adults who share their concern for children. This nine-session training program provides hands-on training and skills-development exercises to help family workers understand the empowerment process and to build family strengths through home visiting and support groups.
  8. Footsteps: Footsteps material consists of 30 half-hour videos and 30 accompanying leaflets. Topics include identity, individuality, early learning, prenatal preparation, learning through TV, death, attachment and independence, discipline, food habits, play and fantasy, valued and accepted, listening to children, parenting extremes, social skills, developmental tasks, childhood fears, societal support, teaching competence, creativity, handicaps, step-parenting, problem behavior, values, school preparation, child abuse, understanding your child, sibling relationships, responsibilities, and peers. Developed during the 1980s and now managed by Maryland Cooperative Extension Service. Videos begin with comments from video hosts, followed by a 20-minute family drama, and end with comments from a child expert. Each drama focuses on one of eight different types of families.
  9. Guiding Young Children: The information in the lessons is based on research and common sense relationships. The series is designed to help parents recognize their own strengths and select techniques that seem right to them.

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  10. Little Lives: A Parent’s Guide to Development: These newsletters are similar to those mailed out elsewhere and cover normal child development, cueing parents in on what to expect from the time their baby is born up to 36 months of age. They include information on health, nutrition, and safety, as well as inexpensive games and activities to stimulate early development. In addition, articles suggest ways that parents can deal with stressful issues, such as guidance problems, adjustment to parenthood, and couple relations. There are special articles for moms and dads. Newsletters are presently being revised to update immunization charts and other information.
  11. Parent-Caregiver Partnerships: Relationships between parents and others who care for their children are not always easy. Jealousy, misunderstandings, and other problems are common. Parent-Caregiver Partnerships can help. The facilitator’s packet includes a detailed manual for facilitators (with background material, bibliography, and handouts), booklets for people who have to miss sessions, and Not Another Meeting! (a fact sheet on providing child care at workshops).
  12. Parent Express: Parent Express is a series of 27 eight-page booklets of research-based information on infant development and care. The series is designed to ease the transition to parenthood and to help parents care for their babies and young children confidently, sensitively, and effectively. The booklets, keyed to a baby’s birth month, are designed for monthly distribution the first year of a baby’s life and bimonthly distribution during the second and third years. The program is appropriate for all parents but was designed for low-income and teenage parents. Parent Express was written between 1984 and 1988 by the Human Relations staff of the University of California Cooperative Extension with the help of medical professionals, nutritionists, and child development.
  13. Parenting Renewal:  A comprehensive program designed to empower parents to become more effective with their children. Three notebooks are provided to the leader: infancy, preschool, and grade school.
  14. Parents Show You Care: This is the first of a series of three leaflet programs. The main theme for the material is, “Your children are extremely important; show that you care for them in words and in actions.” Program goals are to empower parents to do things for and with their young children that will help the youngsters grow up to be healthy, confident, and skilled preteens. The program is designed to build in a systemic, irreplaceable support for young children at home. Caring, committed parents are the primary support system for children.

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  15. Parents University: Parents University is a community event designed to involve parents in brief educational workshops and introduce them to community services that support parents. Parents University includes a keynote speaker, brief educational workshops, a showcase of resources, and child care with an educational emphasis. Topics are selected by a local planning group composed of representatives from diverse human service agencies from the community. The 250-page “Parents University Notebook for Program Leaders” has all the materials a planning group would need to create and implement their own Parents University for their community.
  16. Principles of Parenting: This is part of a total parenting program for all parents. The 13 publications emphasize basic principles of understanding, guiding, and encouraging children. Each publication is four to six pages in length and uses simple statements of principles and many stories to communicate the principles. The publications are made interesting and accessible by the use of many customized illustrations. Teaching guides are currently being developed to accompany each unit. The three broad categories of the publications are Strengthening the Parent, Developing the Caring Child, and Developing the Strong Child. Developed 1992-1993.
  17. Supportive Connections: Rural Communities and Single Parent Families: This is a comprehensive program to assist parents and children in coping with the adjustments associated with living in a divorced, single-parent family. Program components are directed to single parents, youth living in single-parent families, and community groups and agencies in rural areas. The program consists of a 375-page, three-ring notebook containing teaching guides, handouts, transparency originals, a youth drama script with accompanying leader’s guide, and three videos. The parent component provides materials for conducting a workshop series on the following topics: the emotional adjustment to divorce, financial management, stress management, and the development of support systems.
  18. Teens as Parents of Babies and Toddlers: A Resource Guide for Educators: This resource guide presents 35 workshop outlines for educators who work with teen parents of babies and toddlers. Outlines are grouped under four major headings: The Social World of Teen Parents, Babies, Toddlers and Two-Year-Olds, and Health and Safety.

Smith, C. A., Cudaback, D., Goddard, H. W., & Myers-Walls, J. (1994). National Extension Parent Education Model. Manhattan, Kansas: Kansas Cooperative Extension Service.

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