Parenting support

Support and guidance resources.

Each child is unique, and while we can be guided by an understanding of some general patterns of development from pre-birth into early childhood, progression is uneven and unfolds differently for each individual child.

This page offers support, guidance, and details about workshops with everything you need to know about caring for your child and your own wellbeing.

Support and guidance

Courses, groups, and workshops

Birth to 5 Guides

Caring for a baby NHS support

Telephone advisory line

Starting Well resources

Children aged 2 to 10 years

The Starting Well Partnership is offering FREE one-off sessions available to parents and carers.

The Starting Well Partnership offers an exciting array of parenting groups and workshops. All sessions are free to attend and run by trained staff and volunteers from the Starting Well Partnership.

If you would like to know more about any of the groups or courses or wish to register your interest please click on the link: Starting Well Partnership - workshops, courses, and groups.

Support for young people in Worcestershire

Whether you are struggling with confidence, bullying, health or your well being, there is lots of support available to people living in Worcestershire. Starting Well Partnership can offer support and guidance and help to access other services in your area. For more information please click the link: Starting Well Partnership - Support for young people

Family first from YSS

The Families First service delivered in the Worcestershire area by YSS, is a pilot program aiming to support families who have a parent or partner in prison.

The service provides one to one support and guidance in a safe space, to enable the whole family to cope with the demands of having a partner, and parent, in prison.

YSS Families First provides expert support and guidance for families to navigate through the criminal justice system, including preparations for prison visits.

The key workers also provide an one to one emotional and practical support both for the children to process the imprisonment and the family as a whole. The criteria for referral is for the family to be residing in Worcestershire and for the partner/parent to be imprisoned or about to be sentenced.

Childcare

Here you can search for childcare near you. This includes childcare that has spaces for 2, 3 and 4-year old funded children, as well as those that provide before and after school pick-ups and those that specifically cater for children with a disability or special educational need.

England | Childcare choices

Providers information toolkits about childcare for parents.

Children's Centres

Children's Centres in Worcestershire are run by lots of different providers. Many of them are run by schools and early years settings (e.g. nurseries) providing childcare, antenatal and postnatal services and in some cases extra services, such as speech and language and family support, to meet the needs of families in their local area.

Is your child ready for school?

Starting school for the first time can be an exciting time but also very daunting for both the child and the parents. Here you will find some things that will help your child get ready to start school and make the most of their learning.

Worcestershire school holiday, food and activities

Provides information about food, activities and support available to families and children from nursery and primary aged, through to older children and teenagers during the school holidays.

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Advice for new parents on infant crying, including support and techniques on how to comfort your baby, advice on how to cope and be able to relax as a parent with a new-born baby.

Deaf awareness resources

These links provide support, tips, and guidance for communicating with children who are deaf or hard of hearing:

Never, ever shake a baby

The National Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel has identified that non-accidental injuries to babies under 1 years old consist of 27% of serious incidents where a child has suffered serious harm or died.

Abusive Head Trauma can occur if a baby is shaken and this carries a high risk of significant long-term problems, or even death.

These short videos have been developed to help raise awareness that:

infant crying is normal
comforting methods can help
it’s ok to walk away
never, ever shake a baby

Follow these links to access the videos:

For more information about baby crying and resources for parents and professionals, visit ICON Cope.

Parenting courses

Programmes are delivered across Worcestershire by Starting Well Partnership Parenting teams. For more information or to book onto a programme contact:

Starting Well Partnership