The purpose of these socialization activities for
the children is to emphasize peer group interaction though age-appropriate
activities in a Head Start classroom, community facility, home, or on a field
trip. The children are to be supervised by the home visitor with parents
observing at times and actively participating at other times. The Head Start
Bureau Information Memorandum titled Child Development Services during Home
Visits and Socializations for the Early Head Start Home-Based Program Option clarifies
the purpose of socializations for infants and toddlers. Socialization
experiences for infants and toddlers are designed differently than
socializations for preschoolers.
The purpose of socialization experiences for infants
and toddlers is to support child development by strengthening the parent-child
relationship. The content of the group experience reflects this emphasis and
incorporates the goals of the program and participating families such as:
helping parents to better understand child development; encouraging parents to
share their parenting challenges and joys with one another; providing
activities for parents and children to enjoy together; offering structured and
unstructured learning opportunities for both children and parents; and modeling
successful strategies for engaging children and supporting their development.
Infants and toddlers are only beginning to build
their first and most important relationships: the relationships with their
parents. Socialization experiences focus on the parent-child relationship as
the foundation from which children will then be able to develop close,
trusting, and respectful relationships with peers and other adults as they
grow.
In contrast, socialization experiences for preschoolers
provide opportunities for peer group interaction because 3-to-5-year-old
children are at a developmental stage where they are beginning to form deeper
relationships with their peers and where the peer group is beginning to have a
greater influence in their lives. The group setting provides opportunities for
parents and staff members to learn how children act in a group. The importance
and influence of peer relationships grow as children enter preschool and,
later, the elementary school environment. The socialization experiences for
preschoolers provide a supportive place in which they can practice skills in
taking on leadership, developing friendships, and negotiating conflict. Integrating
the Goals of Home Visits into Socialization Experiences
Socialization experiences offer additional
opportunities to work on the goals you have established with families during
your home visits. Socializations should build on the activities and topics you
address in the home. For example, if you have a number of families working on
early literacy skills with their children, you might develop a number of
experiences on this topic.
socialization experience for infants or toddlers
could include time for parents and children to choose and read board books
together; activities involving listening to audiotapes of children’s songs and
demonstrating finger plays for parents and children to do together (e.g., The
Itsy Bitsy Spider or The Wheels on the Bus); or a field trip to a local library
to participate in a parent-infant story time. You can develop a socialization
on pre-literacy skills for preschoolers that includes an activity for parents
and children to make a book together with pictures from magazines or the
child’s drawings; a dramatic play around a favorite story; or various
activities built around the theme “the letter of the day.” For example, if the
letter of the day is B, then plan activities that begin with B (balls, block
building, or bubble blowing) and serve snacks that begin with B (bananas, bean
salad, broccoli, and blueberry yogurt). Be creative and have fun! Many of the
above examples are activities that the parents can recreate at home. You play
an important role in linking the socialization experiences and the home visits
so parents understand how both aspects of the home-based program work together
to help them reach their goals.
Parents benefit from socialization experiences in a
number of ways: by observing how other parents and staff members interact with
their children; by participating in facilitated discussions on a particular
topic related to the socialization; or by conversing informally with other
parents or staff members as they interact with their children. However,
socialization groups are not the time to conduct formal parenting education classes.
More structured parenting education that focuses exclusively on the adult
learner should have its own designated time. Reserve the socialization time for
experiences that include both the parents and their children as a special time
for them to be together, enjoy one another, and learn with others who share
common interests and goals. You play an active role in the socialization
experience because your relationship is the most powerful tool you have to
provide families with the support they need to reach their goals. As part of
your ongoing family partnership agreement process, you must build in specific
roles for parents in home visits and socializations. These roles provide a way
to involve parents in all aspects of socializations, including planning them,
carrying them out, and evaluating them. Parent participation ensures that the
goals and experiences of socializations are culturally sensitive and relevant
to participating families. Parents help you to individualize the curriculum for
their particular child.
Socialization experiences are an ideal time to use
observation as a tool for parent education. Child observation is a skill that
parents and staff members can use to learn about child development, identify
individual differences, and create meaningful learning experiences for
children. During socialization experiences, you can help parents hone their
observation skills by together watching their children at play and noticing
aloud what their child’s interests, skills, habits, and preferences are. For
example, as you sit on the floor with a parent and his 8-month-old, you might
notice, “She sure lets you know she wants that ball. Look how she’s trying to
crawl over the pillow to get it.” Or you might ask, “Does she always turn her
head away and fuss like that when she’s had enough food?” With the parents of a
preschooler, you might observe how imaginatively he or she uses the large
cardboard boxes to create “houses” to hide in and “cars” to drive. Or you might
reflect on how a preschooler is trying to join in a group of peers: “It looks
like Brian really wants to play trains with those kids but he’s not quite sure
how to get in on the action.” As you observe and reflect on the child’s
behavior, you are teaching parents about reading their child’s cues. You can
then build on those insights to foster parent-child interactions that best
support the child’s development and learning.
Your agency may have a designated staff person to plan
and carry out the socializations. This staffing pattern enables the person in
this role to devote focused time to coordinating, planning, and carrying out
the group experience. Ideally, this staff person would be an individual with
expertise in both child development and in leading activity groups for parents
and children together. However, even if a designated staff person manages the
socializations, you still play an active role to collaborate with that person
because you are the one who has the strongest relationship with the families in
your home-based program. You are the one who is consistently available to the
families, who is trusted, and with whom the families are most comfortable.
Group socializations provide you with new
perspectives on your work with families as you interact with parents and
children outside of the home environment. Group experiences, when conducted in
collaboration with your colleagues, also provide you with the support of fellow
staff members as you share insights into family strengths and challenges. You
should have enough time in your work schedule to fully participate in
socializations. If you find that your schedule does not give you the time you
need, talk with your supervisor to make the adjustments necessary for your full
participation in this important aspect of the home-based program. You determine
the size and composition of your group socializations based on child and family
needs and goals. First, identify families who are working on similar goals and
who could benefit from a socialization experience on a common theme. The
socialization experiences should be meaningful for the families and relevant to
the goals you are working on in the home.
Next, consider the individual needs of the
children. Individual temperaments, learning styles, or other special
considerations may indicate a smaller and more intimate setting to optimize the
children’s comfort and ability to interact. Groups of infants and toddlers
should be small to enable the trust, predictability, and responsive caregiving
that very young children need. In some cases, you might group your
socialization experiences according to developmental level—young infants,
mobile infants, toddlers, or preschoolers—and in other circumstances, you might
prefer a mixed age group. Each grouping has different advantages. Separate age
groups may be easier to plan for and facilitate, and they may allow parents to
socialize with other parents who have the common bond of raising a child who is
at a similar stage of development. Mixed age groups allow parents with more
than one child to participate in a single socialization that involves all the
siblings. They also provide older children an opportunity to be a leader,
teacher, or helper with younger peers. Younger children learn from their older
peers as the older children model self-help skills or new ways to play with
objects.
The setting of your socialization experiences
should be developmentally appropriate and should support the goals of your
socializations. You should have a designated space for your socializations so
families have a predictable, stable, and safe environment. This space should
have adequate facilities for diapering and toileting, hand-washing, food
refrigeration, and temperature control. You must make sure that the setting is
accessible to children with disabilities so they can actively engage with
others and fully participate in the activities. The setting you choose should
be comfortable for both children and adults. For example, you can provide
comfortable seating for adults that also promotes parent-child interaction. You
might place portable stools around a child-size table for the adults to sit
next to their children. Offer adult-size chairs that can easily be moved around
the room or places such as a hammock or rocking chair where a parent and child
could snuggle together. Young infants need safe places to lie down; newly
mobile infants need space to crawl and pull themselves up to stand; and
toddlers and preschoolers need large spaces for climbing, running, and
tumbling.
Socializations are a time for fun, learning, and
support. In addition to the structured learning that takes place, they provide
informal “teachable moments” that offer rich, responsive, and relevant learning
experiences in unplanned and often unexpected ways. These are the learning
experiences that usually have the greatest effect. Recognize how the unique
qualities of the socialization experience strengthen and enrich the work you do
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