The OACCA is inviting the public to attend an event that will focus on: Triggers of Adoption-Related Crises & Telling the Truth to Adopted and Foster Children.
It’s all happening at the OACCA headquarters in Columbus on November 28th from 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Go here for more information or to register to attend the event.
Overview: This single day training includes two topics: 1) Triggers: What Can Cause Adoption-Related Crises? and 2) Telling the Truth to Adopted and Foster Children. It is designed to appeal to therapists, case managers, foster and adoptive parents, and others who work directly with children in foster and adoptive placements.
Part I – Triggers: What Can Cause Adoption-Related Crises? This part of the training aims to help adoptive parents identify and prepare for common triggers of adoption-related distress. The behavior, adjustment, and feelings of children are affected by normal child development and by their experiences and perceptions. When their experience includes adoption, children will be affected by their feelings about that history. It is often difficult for parents and professionals to determine which behaviors are related to normal maturation and which are related to adoption. Often, the answer lies in the triggers or identifiable situations and events that create emotional upheaval for the adopted child or young adult. The training should assist parents in developing strategies for preventing or ameliorating crises that can “derail” a child as he or she grows into a healthy adult.
Part 2 – Telling the Truth to Adopted and Foster Children This part of the training is designed to equip foster and adoptive parents with the knowledge and tools to communicate with their children about the complex, troubling and often painful aspects of a traumatic past. The training will answer many questions such as: How do I find further information about my child’s history? How do I share difficult information about my child’s history in a sensitive manner? When is the right time to tell my child the whole truth? The training will give parents the knowledge to help make sense of the past for foster and adopted children of all ages.
About the Trainer
Betsy Keefer Smalley is the co-author of Telling the Truth to Your Adopted or Foster Child: Making Sense of the Past (2000, 2015) and Wounded Children, Healing Homes (2009). She has 45 years of experience in child welfare, adoption placement, post adoption services, and training.
In 2000, her first edition of Telling the Truth received the Pro Humanitate Award from the North American Resource Center for Child Welfare, as the book making the most significant contribution to child welfare that year.
Betsy worked almost 20 years as the Foster Care and Adoption Training Manager for the Institute for Human Services in Columbus, Ohio. In that role, she created an extensive Preservice Training Curriculum for Foster, Adoptive, and Kinship Parents, used by several state systems in the US, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan for foster and adoptive parents, as well as training for adoption and foster care workers, also used in Canada and Belarus.
Betsy is the recipient of multiple state and national awards, including North American Council for Adoptable Children National Adoption Activist Award (2010), National Staff Development and Training Assn. Lifetime Achievement Award (2010), Adoption Network Cleveland Adoption Triad Advocate Award (2000), and the Dan Schneider Award for Leadership in Child Welfare Training (2012).
Semi-retired in 2014, Betsy remains involved in adoption and foster care work as an independent trainer, consultant, and author.
Michaela Madison Reporting
(Photo-OACCA)
