Discussion: Research Background
Community service-based practices are known to be effective in providing children and families with protection and care against social conditions. According to Lawson, Piel and Simon (2020), the Early care and education (ECE) experts are regarded as the population who researches on the viability of communities utilizing the resources to connect the communal sentiments as a bridge to connect the various areas of services for children and families (Nearchou, 2018). This family proposal serves the purpose of conducting significant research over the impact of community-based family support programs to combat the issues of child neglect or abuse. The paper is designed as a proposal for a community support project specifying the kind of negligence or abuse often encountered by the children.
The community-based services include a series of a variety of supports and programs that are obligated to safeguard the rights of the children and their families. These services focus on the development of the skills development and other needs of the children from an early age. Other services also include the intervention of families to support parental involvement at the growing phase of the children (Citizensinformation, 2022). The literacy needs of the children must be met with the involvement of the parents. However, the community service agencies also work to provide affordable housing to the deprived sections. To analyse the importance of the influence of parental attention on developmental needs it is necessary to contemplate the meaning of family engagement (World Health Organisation, 2022). Family engagement directs to the involvement of the parents and family members besides the ECE professionals to be a part of the children’s learning and development within the community.
The project aims to develop a family proposal for a community-based family support project. The areas where the child abuse rates are high has been included as the prime target sampling area for the project. The project would specify on emotional abuse of children and teenagers under 18 years of age (Zeanah and Humphreys, 2018). To estimate the drivers behind the situations leading to emotional abuse of the children within the household. For this reason, the types of families selected for the project are coupled parents in both nuclear and joint families and single parents.
The main objective of the community project is listed as-
- To communicate with the children for developing an idea about the level of emotional damage they might be suffering from.
- To spread the idea behind the importance of a healthy family in shaping the character development of the children.
- To survey collecting pieces of evidence on the various preventive measures that can be applied in these situations.
- To prepare a constructive community service project with significant approval from families on the proposal.
It has been noticed that the interaction of the children with the different people in their lives is it their family, friends, teachers or any other caregivers, often impact their learning habits. According to Christ et al. (2019), learning is considered to be an intricate concept emerging through the significant interactions and social relationships shared by individuals. Considering the biology of the children it can be understood that most of their experiences are shaped through familial interactions. Concerning the issue of the increasing rate of emotional abuse to the children, the social workers must spread awareness about the conducive issue in the community. Emotional damage can result from various actions including traumatic experiences which often rises in the children when they witness domestic violence occurring within the family (United Nations, 2022). Other drivers can be subsequent negligence from parental supervision which pushes them to indulge in unsocial activities to seek attention. Through these circumstances of emotional damage, the rate of mental disorders like anxiety and depression has gradually increased in society. The UN Study on Violence against Children has significantly agreed in developing consistent legislation to protect children from a traumatic childhood while safeguarding their right to a free and healthy life (Unicef, 2022). The Children First Act 2015 in Ireland has been considerably implemented in the country for combating the instances of assaults related to cruelty and endangerment of the children. The country has also significantly developed several service commissions for safeguarding and formalizing the procedures of protecting child rights (United Nations, 2022). The community service project would be developed to serve the purpose of Irish traditional beliefs related to Meitheal guidelines in supporting individuals in need.
Aim and Objective
The Child and Family Agency has been the most prominent example to direct the efforts of the legislative framework of Ireland (Citizensinformation, 2022). Moreover, the amendments to the Non-Fatal Offenses Against the Person Act 1997 promises corporal punishments for household violence. Emotional abuses for the children can be quite fatal harming the cognitive receptions of the children which intricately damages their confidence level and learning abilities (World Health Organisation, 2022). Moreover, to the UNICEF and other global organisations, the convention to human rights follows the legislative frameworks of Right based approach under the Convention of Rights of Child, 1989 (Unicef, 2022). With this context, it has been noticed that partnering with the families has subsequently shown impressive results in providing proper support and care to the children. The socio-emotional, cognitive, literacy, physical well-being, language and other skills are better incorporated into the children when the families feel supported (Working For Kids, 2022). The development of successive charitable services to protect the rights of the children are also effective in the context. Considering the Children 1st which is Scotland’s National Children’s Charity aims to build loving families within strong communities (Children 1st, 2022).
It is essential to learn about the community and the available resources before planning the course of action for social care roles (Working For Kids, 2022). Planning about the resources can be beneficial to decide on the nature of supportive services to be provided to the families. For this particular proposal for the community service project the-
Targeted Population- Children and Families in specific areas of Ireland where the rates of neglect and abuse rate of children have been reportedly high.
Selected Family Structure- Single Parent, Couple Parenting, Co-parenting in both nuclear and joint families.
Age of the Children- 5-18 years, categorised as adolescents- 5-10 years, early teenagers- 11-14 years and teenagers- 15-18 years.
The age group of the parents- 21-40 years.
Marital Status of the parents- Married, Separated, Divorced, Single, Living together.
Gender identity- Neutral
Duration- Once a Week
Time- About post 3 pm which would be changed considering the afterschool hours of the children
Activities- Interactive sessions with both the children and families, creative workshops for engaging the children and parents into learning activities, family and group activities to increase interaction between the children and families.
The following list can be identified as the criteria that are going to be followed while developing this specific community service project. The social care team would be stationed in conducting significant surveys and interactive sessions with the target participants to develop proper ideas behind their situations and communal beliefs (Working For Kids, 2022). The reason behind selecting the activities to be conducted once a week after school hours was to encourage the participation of maximum families. Moreover, keeping a gap between the sessions would provide the workers enough time to evaluate the progress rate of the service programs.
The effectiveness of the programs would be measured to understand the rate to which it has been successful in improving the situations of emotional abuse for the children. The objective behind the evaluation of the program is significantly important to determine the value of the offered service (Nearchou, 2018). The progress of the program would be evaluated in the following steps-
Step 1: Reviewing the situation: Evaluating the different participation rate
Volunteering participation rate- The number of volunteers and the employees needs to be calculated to understand the success in the engagement of the project.
In-Platform rate of participation- The percentage of employees who made a significant contribution on the platform to be evaluated with the total number of accounts to identify the potential of the entire workforce (Lawson, Piel and Simon, 2020).
Step 2: Evaluating the empirical shreds of evidence
Number of activities created- Evaluating the total numbers of the empowering activities created in the entire timeframe.
Employee engagement rate- The active participation of the employees would be evaluated to understand the contribution of each employee in every activity (Zeanah and Humphreys, 2018).
Step 3: Analysing the evidence
Assessment of the total reach of the program-The total impact of the project would be evaluated at the end considering the social media reach, the fundraised and portability compared to the investment (Christ et al. 2019).
Conclusion
From the above analysis, it can be concluded that the issue of emotional exploitation of children has been a major concern in the present times. Human rights protection organisations all over the world have been gradually contributing to creating significant legislative frameworks to combat this issue. Support from the families has subsequently reflected strong and positive results in the initial development of the children and overcome negative influences of neglect and abuse. This family proposal has been developed incorporating theoretical and legal frameworks and empirical evidence to create a successful community service project to serve emotionally abused children.
References
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Zeanah, C.H. and Humphreys, K.L., 2018. Child abuse and neglect. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 57(9), pp.637-644.