Touchpoints

In 2004 the Onslow County Partnership for Children added another tool to its “arsenal” of preventative strategies by becoming one of 80 national Touchpoints sites.  Touchpoints is a philosophy developed by world-renowned pediatrician and author T. Berry Brazelton to train healthcare, human services and child care professionals to better serve families with infants and toddlers. It looks at children’s development holistically, helping parents anticipate their child’s development and behavior.  Our goal in becoming a Touchpoints site was to reduce the rate of child abuse and neglect by working with a multidisciplinary team of professional trainers to train everyone who impacts families and children.

Ever notice a child engaging in regressive behaviors you thought had been long outgrown?  Such behaviors may simply be symptoms of something else happening in the child’s development. They’re called “touchpoints” – those times when behaviors change as children gear up for major new growth and learning. They are normal stages in development, but often confusing or frustrating for parents.  These are times, if misunderstood, that are vulnerable for abuse or neglect to occur.

As a Touchpoints communities we are working to share this philosophy with parents through child care providers, social workers and healthcare professionals. Since launching Touchpoints in June 2004, 207 professionals have completed the individual level Touchpoints training and the “trained trainers” have increased from 4 to a total of 14, which will allow for more trainings to occur in Onslow County .  The Onslow County Partnership for Children is finding that there is great interest in Touchpoints from the human services, healthcare, and child care fields, with requests for the training coming from both civilian and military groups.

By looking at all of the individuals who have been Touchpoints trained and who they work with on a regular basis, we are able to estimate the number of families and children who have been directly impacted by Touchpoints thus far.

• Approximately 8,191 children have been directly impacted by the individuals who have received Touchpoints training.
• The children who have been impacted results in approximately 6,646 families directly impacted by Touchpoints training.

The Touchpoints training is a total of 16-18 hours and can be tailored to a specific group’s schedule.  The Touchpoints training teams can accommodate weekday, evening, or Saturday trainings.  For more information on Touchpoints training, contact Dawn Rochelle at (910) 938-0336 x222.