Keeping Children Safe Assignment Help

Keeping Children Safe
from Harm

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Understanding the concept of significant harm...........................................................................4
Identifying significant harm.........................................................................................................4
Strengths and burdens influencing the parent's ability to care for children.................................5
Identifying main risks and types of harm in the development of children..................................7
Policies and theories related to development of children ...........................................................7
Child Protection Plan...................................................................................................................8
Advantages and Disadvantages of formal Child Protection Plan................................................9
Conflicts that may arise between professionals, agency roles and family members ..................9
REFERENCE.................................................................................................................................11
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It is the prime responsibility of parents to provide safe and secure atmosphere to their
children. Childhood is a very critical stage where children develop their cognitive or learning
abilities and start to see the world from their own perspectives. The behavior of parents, teachers
and peers greatly influence behavioral patterns of a child (Blacklock and Phillips, 2015). But it is
also true that sometimes, parents behave with the children in an undesirable manner which
creates negative psychological impact on minds of the children. Therefore, it becomes very
crucial for parents to understand significance of effective parenting (Ainsworth and Hansen,
2015). They need to protect their children from potential harm. This harm can be in the form of
several abuses such as physical, emotional, sexual abuse and neglect. The present essay explores
critical aspects related to children’s safety from potential harm from family members in the given
scenario. It also identifies risks and types of significant harm and explores relevant policies
associated with protection of children (Rasool, 2015).
The actions taken by the professionals in the given scenario in assessing the risk
factor is satisfactory to a certain extent. but there is a requirement to adopt a better approach to
assess the risk associated with safety concerns of Lara. Health visitor observed the bruises on
girl's arms. After assesing reason for her injuries he advised Emily to take the assistance of
Social Care services. It was a good move. However it can be critically evaluated that the need on
part of health visitor was to dig deeper into the causes of difficult behavior of Lara as well as
reason for her mother's frustration. It can thus be suggested that the immediate concern in the
given scenario was to manage the difficult behavior of Lara and to protect her from the
significant harm.
Understanding the concept of significant harm
Significant harm is a concept introduced by the Children Act 1989. It is referred to as
“the threshold that justifies compulsory intervention of family life in the best interests of children
and provides local authorities a duty to make inquiries to decide whether they need to take
actions to safeguard or promote welfare of child who is suffering or is likely to suffer significant
harm.” (Children Act 1989, 2015).There are several forms of significant harm that can be
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broadly classified into Physical, Sexual, Emotional Abuse and Negligence (Chandler and
Maidment, 2015).
Identifying significant harm
In the given scenario, it was very important for the health visitor to identify the
significant harm to Lara. This is where Common Assessment Framework came into the picture.
The assessment provides necessary information regarding significant harm to child. In order to
understand and recognize significant harm the following aspects need to be considered: Nature
of harm in respect to poor child care, impact on child's physical and mental health development,
capability of parents in meeting needs of their child and the family background. It is also
important to see child's reactions, perceptions and desire into consideration on the basis of their
age. In order to identify the significant harm to Lara in the given scenario, different forms of
harm need to be discussed:
Physical Abuse
Physical abuse involve hitting, shaking, throwing, poisoning, suffocation, burning or
causing any other physical injury to a child. Physical abuse is a result of aggressive behavior of
parents or children, emotional distress and disturbed behavior (Carlton, 2015). In the given
scenario, the health visitor observes bruises on upper arms of Lara. Appearance of Bruises in
children during developing age is a matter of great concern for health professionals. Thus, can be
critically evaluated that it is very important for health visitors to ask for explanation of these
bruises from Emily so as to treat her in the best possible manner.
Emotional Abuse
Emotional abuse hinders psychological development of a child as it negatively impacts
their mental state. It involves beating the confidence of a kid by saying words which demotivate
the child such as they are not valuable or they are worthless (Emerson and Brigham,
2015).Refraining children to express freely, by making their fun in front of others or by silencing
them deliberately is also a kind of Emotional abuse. In the given scenario, Emily stated that Lara
is a difficult kid to manage and refused to obey her. Hence it can be assessed that the need is to
identify the roots of emotional distress of Lara so that she can be protected from emotional abuse
(Blacklock and Phillips, 2015).
Negligence
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