First Class

Last night I attended my first GPS training class. GPS stands for Group Preparation & Selection. The main goal of this class is to prepare folks to make an informed decision about becoming foster or adoptive parents. The people who are training my group are from the Alabama Baptist Children's Homes. They basically went over the rights of foster children, foster parents, & biological parents. We are to go ahead and be thinking of our strengths (what we can offer a child) and have homework to turn in on this for the next class:) We compiled a list of feelings and behaviors a child might have when entering foster care based on different backgrounds. We did some role-playing (and this is something that we will continue to do in these trainings) in order to work on our communication skills. Current foster parents say that the most critical skill for success with these children is listening. I know I always try to "fix the problem" too fast, so this exercise taught me the importance of being quiet:)

I was happy to have another single woman in the class who sat next to me. She is considering respite care (which basically means you can relieve foster families by taking a child for a weekend or helping out for a day or week in emergency situations). I guess this is something I may consider to do at first, but we'll see...I didn't feel too overwhelmed when leaving last night:)