Early Head Start puts focus on family

By DAVID GUNTER

Feature correspondent

SANDPOINT – Not so very long ago, the conventional wisdom surrounding childhood education was that you dropped your kid off for the first day of kindergarten and the teachers took it from there.

A more contemporary mindset shows that such an approach is not only outdated, but actually sends the child into life unprepared for school, forced to play catch-up from the get-go.

In fact, brain development experts agree, the task of getting children ready to learn starts much sooner.

“It’s important to start early – that can’t be over-emphasized,” said Brenda Hammond, mental health specialist for the four North Idaho centers associated with Mountain States Early Head Start. “In the last decade or so, the research they’ve done on the development of the brain really centers on the importance of those early years.”

How early? From pregnancy right on through to the age of 3, according to Early Head Start literature on the subject. Brain science has evolved on this topic, pointing to the need for babies to connect with parents as a way to form a learning bridge from home to school.

For some, the very idea of discussing school readiness and infancy in the same breath seems over the top and unnecessary. The statistics, however, beg to differ.

Cori Holman, center director for the Mountain States Early Head Start office in Kootenai, puts it another way. In her world – where lower-income families, pregnant mothers and those who have experienced homelessness are served through the same federal program that funds Head Start – it’s all about relationships.

“Really, the parent-child relationship is school readiness,” she said. “When the parents are involved in a child’s education, they’re much more successful at school.”

Later in life, that involvement might look something like sitting down at the kitchen table to help with homework. In the earliest, formative years, it’s more a matter of supporting the steps that develop physical skills as infants and toddlers learn to explore their environment, leading naturally into cognitive skills such as language and literacy.

The job of Mountain States Early Head Start is to support families as they incorporate these learning concepts. And while some of the work happens at the center itself – where common play areas encourage socialization and specific stations help parents and kids develop a routine for everything from toileting to teeth brushing – most of the work happens in the home.

With a staff of nine, the local center acts as the nexus for a group of home visitors who work directly with families once a week, for about 90 minutes each visit.

“When we go into a home visit, it’s not a teacher coming in to say, ‘OK, let’s learn how to stack the blocks,’” Holman said. “We’re modeling for the parent.”

And, it should be restated, they are building relationships between Early Head Start and the households they serve, as well as between parents and children. In current psychological jargon, all of this falls under the header of what is called “attachment theory.”

“The whole idea is that, if you have good attachment, you do better in life – from children on up,” said Holman.

In Bonner County, Mountain States Early Head Start works with about 40 families, the center director pointed out. They’d work with more, but the federal grant that funds the program sets a cap on enrollment. All young families are met with hurdles to clear, she added, but lower-income families and those living at or just above the poverty face a unique set of difficulties.

Finding quality child care for working parents, acquiring low-income housing and coming up with the money to afford nutritional meals are all on that list.

“Basically, the job we do is supporting families with their children as they get through life,” Holman said. “It can be a challenge. We’re seeing a lot of households with multiple generations living together.”

Mountain States Early Head Start strives to change that focus, even in the most challenging of circumstances, and work with parents from a strength-based perspective.

“We focus on those strengths: You have a roof over your head, you’re a good parent – where can we go from here?” said Holman. “We’re always bringing it back to how things affect a child’s life and helping parents build resiliency and develop a network of resources.”

For many of these families, Head Start will be the next step on the way to public school. Early Head Start acts as both a preparation for and a feeder system into that federal program.

“We do a lot of referrals (to Head Start),” said the center director. “Once a child reaches about two-and-a-half years old, we start talking to the parents about what the plan is when they turn three.”

With additional centers in Coeur d’Alene, Rathdrum and Shoshone County, Mountain States Early Head Start offers its services to most of North Idaho. Here at home, the center just celebrated its 20th anniversary. Quite a milestone, considering that most local residents are completely unaware the early childhood program exists, according to Holman.

“We’re like the town’s biggest secret,” she said.

The secret might be getting out, as other organizations take part in programs being administered through Early Head Start.

Hammond, who consults with and trains staff at all four locations, has been leading a partnership with Kaniksu Land Trust, which has funded a new “Circle of Security” program that offers classes to families at all income levels. The first session took place this past summer, with three sessions having been held to date. Working together, the two organizations have adopted two decades of work by a team of three Spokane-area psychologists who stress the importance of early childhood development.

Now that the staff at all four Mountain States Early Head Start centers has been trained in Circle of Security, the door has been opened to bring early childhood education and the relationships that support it to virtually all parents, Hammond noted.

“We have a treasure here,” she said. “It’s a trained cadre of people who can share this information. We have a great partnership with Kaniksu Land Trust and we’re doing things to increase child development and level the playing field.”

The non-profit Kaniksu Land Trust already has purchased 75 acres of wetlands and forest near Clark Fork and another 100 acres of forest and fields in eastern Bonner County. It currently is working toward the goal of raising $2.1 million to acquire 160 acres to create what the group is calling “a community forest.”

Owned by Joe Weisz, the land sits on top of Pine Street hill and overlooks both Sandpoint and Dover. Once the purchase is final, Pine Street Woods would be set aside as a large, natural space open to the public in perpetuity.

KLT views the project as a perfect outdoor classroom to use in its educational outreach programs. Hammond sees it as a perfect fit with the Circle of Security classes.

“It’s easy for us to get behind Kaniksu Land Trust’s connection with the outdoors,” she said. “Getting outside stimulates brain development in ways that sitting in your living room does not.”

For Holman, who has been with the Kootenai center for 10 years and spent nine years as a home visitor before that, it’s the long-term results of the early childhood development program that get her out of bed and off to work in the morning.

“I think the hook is seeing families grow,” she said. “We’re all here to help – that’s the whole idea.”

Information: Mountain States Early Head Start, 208-263-2569 or msehs.org