Adoption and Fostering books and resources

Nurturing Attachments

Supporting Children who are Fostered or Adopted

Kim S. Golding

Nurturing Attachments combines the experience and wisdom of parents and carers with that of professionals to provide support and practical guidance for foster and adoptive parents looking after children with insecure attachment relationships.

Big Steps for Little People

Parenting Your Adopted Child

Celia Foster

'…all those involved in the adoption of children, old hands and new, will be stimulated and encouraged by this infectious read.'
- from the Foreword by David Howe, Dean of the School of Social Work and Psychosocial Sciences, University of East Anglia

A Child's Journey to Recovery

Assessment and Planning for Traumatized Children

Patrick Tomlinson and Terry Philpot

This book shows how carefully planned and assessed treatment can help traumatized children. It outlines how to set up a process for measuring a child's progress towards recovery. Uniquely, the book describes a practical outcomes-based approach that can be provided by an integrated multi-disciplinary team.

Managing Children's Homes

Developing Effective Leadership in Small Organisations

Leslie Hicks, Ian Gibbs, Helen Weatherly and Sarah Byford

Managing Children's Homes focuses on leadership, effective management, the allocation of resources, and ensuring positive outcomes for young people in residential care.
The book develops an interdisciplinary understanding of what needs to be taken into account when establishing and maintaining good practice on behalf of young people living in children's homes. The authors explain the considerable variation in quality achieved by children's homes and how this relates to management style, working environment and staff structures. The skills and qualities that make effective managers of homes are explored. These, along with factors such as the provision of resources, are investigated to demonstrate how to attain a successful children's home environment and longer-term achievement for looked-after children.

The Pursuit of Permanence

A Study of the English Child Care System

Ian Sinclair, Claire Baker, Jenny Lee and Ian Gibbs

Children in public care complain that they have too many placements. Professionals agree but little is known about the reasons for this instability or how it affects different groups of children. The Pursuit of Permanence explores this core issue for children's services.

Understanding Looked After Children

Psychology for Foster Care

Jeune Guishard-Pine, Suzanne McCall and Lloyd Hamilton

Understanding Looked After Children is an accessible guide to understanding the mental health needs of children in foster care and the role of foster carers and support networks in helping these children.

Young People's Transitions from Care to Adulthood

International Research and Practice

Edited by Mike Stein and Emily R. Munro

The transition from care into adulthood is a difficult step for any young person, but young people leaving care have a high risk of social exclusion, both in terms of material disadvantage and marginalisation.

Costs and Consequences of Placing Children in Care

Harriet Ward, Lisa Holmes and Jean Soper

It costs more to place a child in the care of a local authority than it does to send a child to a top boarding school, and there are substantial variations in costs both between and within authorities.

Great Answers to Difficult Questions about Adoption

What Children Need to Know

Fanny Cohen Herlem

Why was I abandoned?
Why did my parents adopt me?
What if I want to meet my biological parents?
Children who find out they are adopted have many questions that are difficult for a parent to answer. This book explores children's thoughts and feelings and...

Kinship Care

Fostering Effective Family and Friends Placements

Elaine Farmer and Sue Moyers

Children are frequently cared for by relatives and friends when parents, for whatever reason, are unable to care for their children themselves. Yet there has been very little information about how well children do when placed with kin or how safe they are in these placements.