Parents and Families External Resources

Sesame Street in Communities: Resettlement

Resettling can be a long, challenging process. Big changes bring big feelings, too. But children and adults can learn ways to cope with their big feelings and adapt to a new way of life, all while finding strength and comfort in the many memories, practices, and traditions they bring with them. Sesame Street in Communities has put together this collection of resources to support families as they find strength in their own stories and begin a new, hopeful chapter.

20 Shared Reading Tips to Share with Parents

Shared storybook reading is one of the greatest gifts a parent can give a child. At its best, this one activity can promote strong parent-child attachment, nurture key early language and literacy skills, strengthen a child’s pride in their cultural and personal identity, expand their knowledge of the world, and help them process strong emotions and deal with life’s challenges. Share these 20 practical shared reading tips with families, and help them make the most of their special storytimes with young children.

42 Easy Activities to Share With Parents

When parents are trying to work, it can be tricky to find things to keep the kids busy. Here's a great list of activity ideas to share with parents - and most require no special equipment, just common household items!

A Beautiful Collection of Parenting Resources in Many Languages

The Australian Parenting Website has a lovely collection of parenting resources that are available in many languages - including articles, posters and videos on topics like daily care, nutrition, sleep, special needs and more... all free and available for you to download and share with the parents in your program.

New Safe Sleep for Your Baby Booklet

Take a few minutes to read this important information on how we can help babies sleep safely and share it with families!

Multilingual mental health resources for newcomers

As part of the Promising Practices in Accessing Virtual Mental Health: Supporting Refugees during COVID-19 project, funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Ontario Ministry of Health, service providers working with newcomers and refugees share these multilingual mental health resources.

Making Caring Common

Making Caring Common has a variety of resources for families, parents, and caregivers. They offer activities, tips, resource lists, and discussion guides to help you and your team foster kindness and caring with the children in your program.

Newcomer Tips for a Fire-Safe Winter

Mississauga Fire is proud to serve a vibrant and growing community that is home to many new Canadians. To ensure that family homes are safe this winter, they've put together a helpful list of winter fire safety tips and translated them into multiple languages. It's full of great information and resource links that you can share with the families you work with as they establish roots in your community!

5 Ways Immigrant Parents Support Children’s Home Language Learning

It is important to preserve and develop a child’s home language for their cultural, linguistic, and social development. Yet, languages other than English are often not welcomed or encouraged the way they should be in classrooms. Here are 5 important ways that immigrant parents pass along their important linguistic, cultural, and social knowledge to support children's home language learning.

Building Responsive Relationships Remotely

Science tells us that responsive relationships—like those with serve and return interactions—between children and adults, adults and other adults, and children and other children help buffer us against the effects of ongoing stress. These relationships act as a core building block for resilience and help us navigate life’s ups and downs. How do we maintain and promote responsive relationships during the coronavirus pandemic? Harvard Centre on the Developing Child reached out to care providers and others on the frontline of the early childhood development field to learn how they are building relationships with families from afar. Here are their tips for navigating remote interactions with children and families during this unusual time.