Handout 1:
Family Growth:
The Development of the Family Over Time

Overview

Exploring family growth provides staff a framework for 1) realizing that each family is unique, 2) identifying family strengths, including family supports and coping skills, 3,) recognizing the changes of a family over time, and 4,) helping Head Start programs and community agencies become aware of and responsive to the needs of families. The information gathered often provides the foundation for supporting families based on their interests, strengths, goals, and needs-the basis for the family partnership agreement.
 

PART 1: Five Stages of Development
Generally, as families grow, they move through five stages of development. Families may experience challenges or interruptions in their development, repeat or skip a stage, or be in more than one stage at any given time.

• Formation: Creating a new family identity.
  
• Expansion: Adding new members to the family.
  
• Cooperation: Transferring some responsibility for and control over children to others.
  
• Independence: Allowing children to become more independent and establish their own identities as adults.
  
• Launching: Letting go of children and establishing adult-to-adult relationships with them.

PART 2: The Family Life Cycle
The family life cycle is a way of illustrating the family's growth and development; it recaps all the significant life events or important occurrences in a family's life. Four types of significant life events include:

• Life Transitions: Moving from one stage of development to the next, such as individuals becoming parents, children beginning school, or children leaving home;
  
• Family-Initiated Changes: Major events introduced by the family, such as divorce, returning to school, marriage, co-habitation, moving to a new neighborhood, or finding a new job;
  
• Unexpected Changes: Unanticipated or unforeseen events, such as an unplanned pregnancy, eviction, the onset of a chronic illness, or a sudden job transfer; and
  
• Traumas: A painful emotional or physical experience, such as a serious injury or death of a family member, a natural disaster, or a violent crime.
  
  
  
  
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