Assessment Tools

My Family provides training to equip practitioners to develop skills and ideas for engaging parents in exercises to explore the functioning of their relationship(s) with their child/ren. This includes exercises that specifically explore: the Disruptive Risks to the parent-child relationship(s); the parent's understanding of their child/ren's basic care needs, emotional attunement and how they manage their own self-care needs, and the parent's support network.

Disruptive Risks

Using pictorial cards and short animated videos, practitioners help parents to think about the different types of Disruptive Risks that might be impacting on the functioning of their relationship(s) with their child/ren.

A Disruptive Risk refers to anything that disrupts the functioning of a parent-child relationship. In children's safeguarding, Disruptive Risks are extremely common and include things such as domestic abuse, substance misuse, and/or parental mental health difficulties.

Disruptive Risks disrupt the functioning of parent-child relationships because they negatively impact a parent's ability to respond to their child/ren's needs. For example, if a parent was heavily under the influence of alcohol or misusing drugs, they would not be able to appropriately respond to their child/ren's basic care needs. Also, when a child is exposed to parental alcohol or drug misuse, they may not feel able to communicate their needs effectively to their parent(s). This could be due to the child feeling frightened about their parent's emotional and behavioural presentation.

External Disruptive Risks

Practitioners engage parents in a visual exercise to identify and reflect on any External Disruptive Risks that may exist. External Disruptive Risks refer to factors that sit outside the immediate family and that can disrupt the functioning of parent-child relationships. Examples include: poverty, poor housing, community anti-social behaviour, and/or social isolation.

The influence of poverty and other socioeconomic stressors on parent-child relationships is highlighted by Foster et al (2025), who explain that such stressors can lead to a decrease in a parent's positive feelings, and an increase in feelings of helplessness and fear. Furthermore, such stressors are associated with less sensitive caregiving, a greater frequency of alarming caregiving behaviours, and a reduced capacity for mentalising.

Basic care needs

An important element of any parenting assessment is to evidence a parent's understanding of how they meet their child/ren's basic care needs.

To do this, practitioners use pictorial cards to explore the parent's understanding of their child/ren's basic care needs. For instance, the cards help parents to reflect on how they implement routines for mealtimes, play, and bathing.

Emotional Attunement

Emotional attunement relates to a parent's ability to perceive, understand, and respond appropriately to their child's emotional states. It essentially involves being in a synchronised dance with the child, whereby the parent responds to their child in a way that makes them feel seen, heard, and understood. This sensitive and responsive interaction can potentially be crucial for a child's emotional, social, and cognitive development.

With the use of short, animated videos, practitioners help parents to reflect on the functioning of parent-child relationships. This creates opportunities for parents to reflect on the functioning of their relationship(s) with their child/ren, including how they respond to their child/ren's cues for emotional warmth and connection.

The Family System

As highlighted by Foster et al (2025), Attachment Theory and wider research suggests that the existence of multiple relationships that serve as Safe Havens and Secure Bases can be of benefit to children by increasing the likelihood of them having someone to turn to when they need someone to satisfy their needs. With this in mind, My Family places an emphasis on looking beyond the primary family system - this includes the functioning of the parental relationship and the impact it has on the parents' caregiving - and exploring the support parents can access from the wider family system(s).

By using visual aids, practitioners help parents to identify individuals, who can provide them and their child/ren support. As a result, clarity is gained in relation to the nature of the support and how it can potentially increase safety within the parent-child relationship(s).

"It takes a village to raise a child."

African Proverb