1. Grandparents Matter Home Visiting comes to Three Gen
6th Annual Home Visiting Summit
November 16, 2016
Janice M. Gruendel, Ph.D., M.Ed.
Senior Fellow, Institute for Child Success

2. We all have mental images of our own
“three generation” families.
Home for the holidays, all around the table…
Nana and Poppi there when the baby comes…
Family photos filled
from end to end with smiling faces…
Dropping off the little ones
for a long weekend with
grammie and gramps…
And then we all go home, our kids safely in tow…

3. 1 in 12 “Having my grandchildren move in was not planned, but it is
very rewarding and also crazy to manage at times
because kids nowadays are just very different
from how I grew up.”
1 in 12

4. “There is never enough money to make ends meet and pay the monthly bills… If I didn’t get free diapers and formula, I don’t think I could fulfill my duties as a grandmother. “
Grandparents raising their grandchildren come in all shapes and sizes, ages and races. They live in my community, and yours.

5. “There are too many programs and services that help
for a short while or have waiting lists….”
“If I was a regular foster parent or an adoptive parent, I could get a lot more help. Sometimes I feel like a dumping ground.”

6. We call them kinship foster families,
informal child care, respite parents….
They connect with our services and systems
in ways may meet the systems’ needs
but may not meet their needs.

7. What if…. ….we were committed to support grandparents raising
their grandchildren in ways that were BETTER
than the best we have done so far?
How can we be “science-informed”?
What would we do differently?
What policies do we need?
How could home visiting become our partner?
How can we learn to see and feel and know the world through the eyes of our elders who have taken on this extraordinary responsibility?

8. We must become “three-gen science-informed…”
Science of poverty, scarcity & racism
Science of adversity, trauma & toxic stress
Neuroscience: Early brain development
Attachment, Serve and Return
Executive function & self-regulation skills for children, youth & young adults
Science of health aging
Mindfulness, Empathy and joy
Science of resilience: Internal and external Protective Factors
Implementation Science: Fidelity to model

9. We can make four sensible changes
Use the Science
Adopt a three-generation ”theory of change” informed by both the science of adversity and the science of resilience
Teach gently about “the new child development” in a way that honors grandparents own experiences as a parent
Learn about the science of elderhood
Adapt medical home, home visiting and kinship care models to meet the special needs of elders caring for young children
Wrap Around the Family Unit
Deliver community supports and services to the child and grand parent simultaneously as well as individually, and wrap them around the family as a whole.
Attend to social-emotional realities involving the grand parent and birth parent who has become “the absent parent”
Commit to support over a longer duration that may, in fact, increase as the grandparent ages
Focus on Strengths and Resilience
Services and supports quickly focus on individual and family strengths and assets, including within the extended family
Build on community protective factors including peer networks
Use music, art and writing to give “voice” to grandparents and foster connections with their grand kids
Respect grandparents’ needs for peer time and alone time
Build a Connected System
Build new partnerships within the service sector, including
Transportation
Housing
Child care for respite
Mental health services for adult and child anxiety and depression
Elder health
Public School System
Child and adult “preventive services”
Real-time data sharing
Professional development anchored in elder and young children /adolescent development

10. “Perception is highly personal, made from our life experiences and our temperaments.
It’s almost as if each of us goes through life wearing a pair of glasses that alters the world so that we see it the way we need, want, or expect it to be.”
The Power of Understanding: See the World Through Your Child’s Eyes

11. We need to recognize that we
may have become part of the problem….
Understanding what “grandparents
raising their grandchildren”
see, feel and need enables us
to become part of the solution.

12. Grandparents caring for their grandchildren are:
Weirdly wonderful
Wise but stubborn
Worried but hope-full
Wondering where
“they” went wrong
Wishing they weren’t so tired
Wanting to be valued
Welcoming help

13. These are precious times and grand parents
really matter…
No excuses. We can do this.

14. Remember, elders rock !!! Jgruendel@instituteforchildsuccess.org