Parent Educator
October 29th-Nov 2nd is Home Visiting week statewide. Home Visiting helps parents provide a safe and supportive home environment, gain a better understanding of their child’s
development, improve parenting skills, obtain access to health care and other supportive services, use positive forms of discipline with their children, and nurture the bond with their child, therefore reducing the risk factors linked to child maltreatment. 
Houlton Pioneer Times photograph/Gloria Austin
SPECIAL VISITOR – Houlton fireman Daniel Norton visited with the Aroostook County Action Program (ACAP) Bird Street Head Start students during Fire Safety Week. Norton went over basic fire safety exercises, along with showing a video geared for younger viewers on fire safety. Gathered with Norton were, left to right, front, Aspen Ledger, Troy Hipsley and Demetry Given; middle, Jaska Malone, Donnell Washington, Autumn McNinch, Jenna Fitzpatrick, Jacob Anthony, Sierra Pielioni and Alexis Larson; back row, Hannah McKissick, Norton, Natalie Britton, Mackenzie Campbell and Isaac Small.
Home visiting is a long-standing, well-known prevention strategy used by states and communities to improve the health and well-being of women, children, and families. Early investments in home visiting programs have been shown to reduce costs due to foster care placements, hospitalizations and emergency room visits, unintended pregnancies, and other more costly interventions.
The home is the first and most important learning environment for children, and parents are their child’s most influential teachers! Home visitation delivers parent education and family support services directly to parents with young children, providing guidance on how parents can enhance their children’s development from birth through entering kindergarten. Home visitation is known to be an effective, research-based and cost-efficient way to bring families and resources together to ensure that children grow up healthy and ready to learn.
Recent studies have shown that parents who have had home visits are more likely to engage in reading to their children. Children who have been involved in home visiting have higher school readiness scores and were less likely to be retained a year between kindergarten and third grade.
Maine has several programs throughout the state that provide home visiting services to families and Healthy Families Aroostook is Aroostook County’s home visiting program. This program is available to all first time parents as well as pregnant and parenting adolescents. Healthy Families Aroostook provides families with valuable information on child development, activities to stimulate their baby’s development and ways that baby’s can bond with their parents. These home visitors are able to visit weekly and stay involved with a family for 5 years or until the child reaches kindergarten. Other available home visiting services in Aroostook County include Public Health Nursing where a nurse visits you and your baby in your home. They track baby’s height and weight and educate parent’s about their baby’s health and nutrition. Aroostook County Action Program also offers Home Base Head Start services through four home visitors in Aroostook County. Home Base Head Start focuses on working with parents to use common resources available in the home to support child based learning activities. It also supports the family in goal setting and accessing community resources to meet their family’s needs and parent education. A home visitor visits each enrolled family’s home weekly and then organizes 2 monthly socialization activities for children and families to participate in.
The results are in and they are good! In the state, 94% of visited families reported a moderate to great increase in parenting knowledge. 93% of participating families say that their participation in the program moderately to greatly benefited their children and 95 percent of parents reported greater confidence in their parenting skills!
Several activities are happening to celebrate Home visiting Week.
•Oct. 24 in Presque Isle: Playgroup at PI Rec. Center from 9:30-11 a.m. for children birth to 5 yrs old.
•Oct. 30 in Houlton: Water Safety for children 4 months to 5 yrs. at the Shiretown Motor Inn from 5:30-6:30 p.m.
•Nov. 2 in Fort Kent: Yoga for children and their parents at the Chippy Center from 6-7 p.m.
Registration is limited so please call (877) 207-2301 for more info or to register for these activities.
