Parenting assistance: for whom, why?
Today, one in five parents say they have often encountered difficulties in raising their children. While parenting support systems have existed since the 1990s, parenting has recently become a major issue. A national parenting support committee was even created by the government in November 2010. So who is this program for?
The evolution of the role of the child, but also the many changes affecting families (single mothers, single-parent families, step-parents, etc.), marital relations and the role of parents sometimes make it difficult to exercise parenthood and education. children. Their place within the family is gradually being redefined. More and more, they occupy a central role and finding a happy medium between authoritarianism and permissiveness always seems more complicated for parents. Questioning traditional education methods, justification of punishments, for or against spanking … the proliferation of information, or even injunctions from pediatricians and child psychiatrists, does not facilitate the task of parents either.
The role of parenting support groups
Whether it is for a badly lived separation, communication difficulties or the accompaniment of mothers of young children, support groups provide personalized help based essentially on dialogue and sharing. No one-size-fits-all solution, no educational guidelines: the goal is to adapt the response to the family context, case by case. For Olga Trostiansky, deputy mayor of Paris in charge of solidarity and the family, “the growth in the number of single-parent families and stepfamilies is one of the primary concerns of parenting support structures”. For parents, in-laws, divorced or not, finding a place in the education and life of the child can be problematic. Parenting support systems are intended for all family arrangements and to all issues, whether intra-family, school or professional. According to the deputy mayor, “the objective of supporting parenthood is to provide answers to families of all kinds, from all backgrounds and from all backgrounds”. The offer of support, put in place jointly by the government and associative networks, also exists thanks to the action of parents, who are sometimes at the initiative of discussion groups or places of parent-child exchanges.
The goal of parenting support groups is increase parents’ confidence in their parenting skills. Often feeling judged and evaluated in the way they raise their children, parents lose confidence in their authority and judgment. Parenting assistance does not replace parents, but guides and supports them.