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Dedicated to promoting children's social-emotional development through responsive and nurturing caregiver-child relationships.

Who We Are

Promoting First Relationships is a prevention program dedicated to promoting children's social-emotional development through responsive, nurturing caregiver-child relationships.

We train service providers in the use of practical, effective strategies for promoting secure and healthy relationships between caregivers and young children (birth to 3 years).

Why Promote First Relationships?

All children are born into this world totally dependent on the relationships they develop with their parents and their caregivers, the people who are closest to them. These first relationships are the foundation for young children's development, particularly their social and emotional development.

Providers who work with parents and other caregivers of young children have a unique opportunity to positively influence these first relationships. The Promoting First Relationships training program gives providers the in-depth knowledge, tools, and strategies to do so.

Features of the training program include:

Videotaping caregiver-child interactions to provide insight into real-life situations.

Giving positive feedback that builds caregivers' competence with and commitment to their children.

Focusing on the deeper emotional needs underlying children's challenging behaviors.

By supporting parents and caregivers to be loving, responsive and tuned in to their children's feelings and needs, we can achieve the desired goals: happy children who engage in trusting and caring relationships with others and are free to explore and learn about the world around them.

What Trainees Say…

"The most important thing that I learned in this program was to identify my daughter's cues and the ways to interact with her positively. I went into this training thinking this was more work and very stressful. In the end, this bonding with my daughter and being able to interact with her relieved my stress. It was a pleasant experience. It was comforting and safe. It was just invaluable — and it's lasted."
Parent

“I loved the training. I thought it was wonderful, and gave me practical knowledge to put right into play. This was one of the best trainings I have ever received in my line of work. It was easy to implement. I was impressed by the positive focus of the program, and the very comfortable learning atmosphere the trainers provided."
Nurse Consultant

"In my nine years of experience working with homeless families, the Promoting First Relationships project has been the most relevant technique I have learned to help parents promote their child's development."
Social Worker

"The child was going through a lot of changes in his life and seemed unsettled. I realized how important I was to him as an attachment figure."
"I learned this little boy needed the attention from me. He bonded to me and I needed to respond to this. When I wasn’t in the room, his behavior got worse. I began to make a point of connecting with him every hour. This made a difference."
Child Care Providers

"Promoting First Relationships is such a different way of working with families. In particular for CPS involved families, it may be the first time that someone has ever really noticed that they are doing well and celebrated this. PFR provides us with a way to encourage and reflect on parents' interactions and to increase and build upon the strengths that they bring to parenting." Social Worker

“I think that the Promoting First Relationships training is very, very valuable. I think that whether or not you specialize in seeing families with children 0-5 years, it’s valuable for any clinician to do home based work that’s really strengths based and has a great foundation based on attachment. I think that the families I’ve seen have benefitted from this immensely.” Mental Health Therapist