Children from the Burrell family, who are adopted, display their Lifebooks, where they keep pictures, a record of their history and other significant documents. The Burell Family is also featured in the Lifebook DVD.

PUTTING THE PIECES TOGETHER: LIFEBOOK WORK WITH CHILDREN

Lifebooks are an essential tool to aid children in preserving their life stories and helping them make sense of loss, trauma and change. In this video, you will meet a compelling 16-year-old who shares how Lifebook work has made a significant, positive change in her life. You will also be introduced to other foster and adoptive parents and children, therapists, and child welfare and adoption professionals who are passionate about the importance of Lifebook work. This training video will assist foster parents, adoptive parents and staff in completing Lifebooks with children.

“Caseworkers and foster parents should really try to do this with kids that they have, because it can help and it can make a difference. It made a difference for me and it can make a difference for anybody.” Clarissa Minge-age 16

To order a DVD ($50.00), call 847/635-4592 or e-mail CCS@LSSI.org.

LIFEBOOKS: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

What is a Lifebook?
A Lifebook is a tangible, chronological and evolving record of the child’s life. While a Lifebook contains pictures and facts, it also helps children work through losses and difficulties in their lives, celebrate their strengths, and continue to develop a positive sense of self as they grow. For a child, Lifebook work is a path to their memories and to a reinterpretation of their memories. It is also a path to understanding and integrating their memories.

Why do all children in foster care need Lifebooks, regardless of their permanency plans?
Lifebooks are for all children placed in foster care, regardless of their permanency goals. Lifebooks are not just for children who are being adopted. Lifebook work provides an explanation to children for the reasons they are in foster care. Lifebooks also foster healing based on truth and interpretation at the developmental level of the child.

Brother and sister work together to add memories and understanding to their Lifebooks.

Children who return home to their families need to preserve the connections and memories from the foster families and friends they developed loving attachments with while living and being with them. Children need pictures (of themselves, foster families, friends and special occasions), report cards, artwork, student certificates and other significant documents placed in their Lifebooks and kept safe for them.

Parents often miss out on important events in their children’s lives during the period when their children are in foster care. Lifebooks help parents see the positive experiences and events that occurred in their children’s lives as well as help their children remember that period of their lives.

For children who are adopted, Lifebooks promote healing and provide concrete understanding of the reasons why they were unable to return to their biological families. Lifebooks give children permission to love and cherish their adoptive families as well as their biological families.

Who creates the Lifebook?
The child is the primary creator of the Lifebook. It is the child’s personal narrative of his or her life. Important people who can help children create their Lifebooks include parents, foster parents, adoptive parents, caseworkers, therapists, teachers, mentors, aunts, uncles, and grandparents.

What is included in a Lifebook?
In a well-completed Lifebook, one will find a chronological history of a child’s life, along with information that reflects a child’s understanding of the difficulties and changes that have occurred in his or her life. The Lifebook also highlights and celebrates the child’s strengths, hopes and dreams. The following elements should be included:

• Pictures of the child: baby pictures, birthday pictures, graduation pictures, school pictures, concert pictures and “trips to the zoo” pictures
• Pictures of parents, siblings and extended family
• Pictures of every foster parent and others living in the foster home
• Pictures of child and adoptive family members
• Pictures of friends
• Pictures of the child’s, parent’s and foster parent’s pets
• Explanations for why the child is not living with their biological family from the child’s point of view, and from the caseworker’s or therapist’s point of view
• Information about the child’s heritage and culture
• Child’s placement history and explanations of the moves
• Developmental milestones
• Birth history, including birth weight and length, and hospital name and address
• Birth certificate
• Artwork
• Report cards, student-of-the-month certificates and programs from school events
• Child’s adoptive story
• Adoption decree
• Adoptive family tree
• Child’s new birth certificate
• Pages addressing the child’s strengths, likes, dislikes, fears, worries, hopes, dreams and questions.

To order a DVD ($50.00), call 847/635-4592 or e-mail CCS@LSSI.org.

All photos this page by Nick Loomis