Parenting support

Bringing up children can be difficult and parenting is made more difficult when a young person has challenging behaviour. This can include:

• disrespect
• mixing with the wrong crowd
• missing school
• violence and anger.

The Youth Justice Service supports parents to develop more confidence and reduce the stress that they go through whilst bringing up teenagers.

There are a variety of programmes to reflect the diverse needs of parents, which can be offered on an individual basis or within a group programme. The focus of the programme is to help parents:

• understand the causes of difficult behaviour
• learn about the skills that children need to move successfully from one stage of development to another
• encourage positive relationships between them and their child as they develop
• manage the problem behaviour
• plan for future difficult situations.

Most parents seek support on a voluntary basis, however, a few parents are told to attend by the courts using a Parenting Order.