Communication

4. Understanding the ‚other side’ – be it professionals, ‚mainstream’ parents and other minorities

4.1. Family diversity

ACTIVITY		45 minutes without interviews
	Should I do the activity alone?	If you are a two-parent family, try to do it with your partner.
	After completing the activity…	I /we should be able to: Identify strengths and possible limitations different families might have when raising and educating their children. Understand those families' circumstances and respect them. Identify some possible suggestions to enhance social understanding of family diversity.
	Before start, what I will need to do this activity?	Sheets of paper, pencils and maybe an audio recorder.
What do I have to do? From the following list of diversity criteria choose two of them to think about: Two families who differ according their structure: a two-parent family and a one-parent family (you may know these families). One family could be heterosexual and the other one homosexual (two dads or two moms). Also, one of the families could be a reconstructed family (stepfamily: two-parent family having children for former partners). Or maybe one of the families could be an adoptive family. You might want to choose two families from this diversity, or maybe you could think about of all of them. Two families who differ according the geographical area they are living in: rural and urban (you may know these families). Two families with parents having different levels of education, having different employment status: one where both parents are unemployed, one where somebody is employed and works. (you may know these families). Two families with different ethnicity backgrounds, one of them being a Roma family and the other being a family from another ethnicity group you might think of (you may know these families). Two families with children having special health or development needs: one having a child at hospital and another one having a child with a special need you think of (you may know these families). Once you have chosen those two diversity criteria and their related four families, try to find out for these four families their strengths and possible limitations when raising and educating their children. If you know families with these four characteristics who are close to you, talk to them to collect direct information to complete the activity. You may record their information. Then you can check your own ideas on this matter. Finally, add some suggestions on how those limitations could be faced, who can help, which measures should be taken into account. You may like to complete this activity considering other additional diversity criteria. For example: Bicultural families, families having children of different ages, etc. In the link you will find an example of a writing template to fill in your information.
	What to do next?	We will help each other if we share some key ideas to the forum. Any insight you learned from? Was it helpful? Are you feeling especially happy or worried about something related? Will you apply it in your daily routine? …?