Reflective Parenting Program

“When my daughter climbed into my lap today and looked up into my eyes, I felt all warm in my heart. I felt like a mother for the first time…”

— RPP Parent Participant

Reflective Parenting Program

Why should parents aim to be reflective? The short answer is: Kids do better when parents are reflective. The Reflective Parenting Program (RPP) aims to enhance parents’ capacity to be reflective so that they can find meaningful solutions to everyday concerns with their children. By increasing reflective skills, parents feel greater confidence in their ability to deal with the stress and conflict that can arise in typical parent-child interactions such as sleep issues in infancy, supporting independence, leaving for school, doing schoolwork, dealing with siblings, transitioning from one activity to another, and maintaining friendships.

The Reflective Parenting Program is an innovative and experiential 12-week workshop designed to enhance critical parenting skills, most notably the capacity to make meaning out of a child’s behavior. RPP utilizes a reflective learning process, in a group setting, to help parents address everyday challenges with their children. Each weekly workshop includes instruction, discussions, and exercises to help parents reflect on topics such as:

  • Temperament

  • Responding to Children’s Emotions

  • Separation and the Development of Independence

  • Play and Parental Involvement

  • Discipline

  • Emotional Life of the Parent

Specific topics are introduced in order to stimulate discussion and, most notably, reflection about the relevant issues in a family. Workshops enable parents to discover new ways to think about the links between behavior, feelings, and actions while learning new strategies and techniques designed to enhance their reflective functioning. Parents will begin to recognize how their capacity for reflection can serve as a powerful tool toward building stronger and more satisfying relationships, as well as to reduce emotional discord and maladaptive behavior in the child. There are three types of RPP groups:

Reflective Parenting Program (RPP) is a parent group for 8-10 parents. The RPP group model is grounded in the most up-to-date research in child development, psychology, attachment, mentalization, and neuroscience. RPP is recognized as an evidence-based Prevention and Early Intervention (PEI) program that helps protect children from growing up with Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and helps prevent the intergenerational transmission of trauma.

Reflective Parenting Program for Two (RPP2) is a dyadic parent group for 8-10 parents along with their infant or toddler. RPP2 is designed to meet the specific needs of parents of very young children which includes spending time observing children followed by a reflective discussion and prioritizing parents’ urgent questions about their child.

Prenatal Reflective Parenting (PRP) is a group for 8-10 parents who are expecting a child. PRP is designed to meet the specific needs of parents during the prenatal period with a focus on the parent’s expectations of, and feelings toward, their as yet unborn child and issues related to the possibility of postpartum depression.

Bring a Parenting Group to Your Community

CRC can provide a tailor-made parenting class to your school, community center, support group, or other community settings.  Our programs offer:

  • An approach that helps make sense of children’s behavior. Our goal-focused parenting workshop introduces the building blocks of reflective thinking in a supportive and flexible manner.

  • Parenting skills and strategies for dealing with everyday struggles. Our programs teach parents specific capacities and tools that are relevant to their unique family situations.

  • Greater confidence and competence in the parenting role. Parents who are able to clarify the motivations behind their children’s behavior can manage their anger and deal with difficulties in a more compassionate way.

  • Better relationships with their children. When parents are reflective, they are better able to understand behavioral triggers and respond to or repair difficult situations with creative and workable approaches.

  • Parenting that is more satisfying and mutually gratifying. Parents who learn how to “turn down the heat” during a conflict or get curious in a moment of uncertainty feel greater satisfaction with themselves and their children. This process builds resilience and strengthens parent-child relationships.