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Baby's Space
and the Baby's Space Partnership:
Integrating STEEP™
parenting support services and high quality child care |
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Integrating high quality child care for
infants and toddlers from low income families with family support
services based on principles and strategies of
STEEP™
(Steps Toward Effective Enjoyable Parenting),
BABY’S SPACE:
A Place to Grow opened at the Little Earth Neighborhood
Early Learning Center in 2000. |
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This innovative model had been developed
by Dr. Terrie Rose and Dr. Amos Deinard, then with the University
of Minnesota's CUHCC Clinic, as an outgrowth of a STEEP™
program that had operated for several years at CUHCC. Baby's Space
at Little Earth subsequently was operated by the Irving B. Harris
Center (now Harris Programs within CEED) but now operates as an
independent nonprofit.
 Seeking
to replicate and evaluate the Baby's Space model, the McKnight,
Bush, and Harris Foundations generously funded the University of
Minnesota's Irving B. Harris Center (now Harris Programs within
CEED) to create the Baby's Space Partnership in 2002, resulting in
Baby's Space Partners at three additional child care sites:
Northside Child Development Center (Catholic Charities), Turnquist
Child Enrichment Center (A Chance to Grow), and Whittier Early
Childhood Education Center (Children's Home Society and Family
Services). All four of the participating centers also are Hennepin County
Strong Beginnings sites, part of a broader initiative to improve
the quality of early care and education for young children in
Hennepin County.
 Based
on research demonstrating that the quality of attachment is the
single most reliable predictor of children's developmental
outcomes (NICHD, 2000), the Baby's Space Partnership incorporates
relationship-based work into all aspects of its programs in order
to promote healthy attachments between parents and their infants
and toddlers, as well as between teacher and child and parent and
teacher. Components of the model include a family facilitator who
offers home visits for individual parent support, family nights to
provide parent education and build mutual support, doula services,
family advocacy, enhanced physical environments to facilitate
exploration and learning, and teacher training and consultation on
attachment-based care and strategies to promote children's optimal
mental health and development.
Dr. Amos Deinard and Dr.
Michael Rodriguez, both with the University of Minnesota, are
completing an evaluation of the Baby's Space Partnership,
Identifying Essential Elements of Child Care. For more
information about this particular project, contact Michael
Rodriguez at mcrdz@umn.edu.
Terrie Rose, Ph.D., LP, serves
as director of Baby's Space.
For more information about
Baby's Space, visit the
Baby's Space website.
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Related Readings
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Egeland, B., & Erickson, M.F. (2003). Lessons from STEEP™: Linking
theory, research and practice for the well-being of infants and parents.
In A. Sameroff, S. McDonough & K. Rosenblum (Eds.), Treating
parent-infant relationship problems: Strategies for intervention. New
York: Guilford Press.
Erickson, M.F. (2000; DVD, 2005). Seeing is Believing™ Training Videos
(DVD). Minneapolis, MN: Irving B. Harris Training Center, University of
Minnesota.
Erickson, M.F. (2005). Using direct observation in prevention and
intervention services in infant and preschool mental health: Training
and practice issues. In K.M. Finello (Ed.). The handbook of training and
practice in infant and preschool mental health. San Francisco, CA:
Jossey-Bass.
Erickson, M.F., Egeland, B., Simon, J., & Rose, T. (2002). STEEP™
Facilitator’s Guide. Minneapolis, MN: Irving B. Harris Training Center,
University of Minnesota.
Erickson, M. F. & Kurz-Riemer, K. (1999; paperback, 2002). Infants,
toddlers and families: A framework for support and intervention. New
York: Guilford Publications.
[Available on Amazon.com or www.Guilford.com]
Fenichel, E., Erickson, M.F. & Weinberg, R. (Eds.). (1999,
October-November). Zero to Three (Bulletin of Zero to Three: National
Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families), 20, 2. [To order,
www.zerotothree.org]
Sroufe, L.A., Egeland, B., Carlson, E.A., & Collins, W.A. (2005). The
development of the person: The Minnesota study of risk and adaptation
from birth to adulthood. New York: Guilford Press.
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