March 24, 2011

Family and consumer sciences department participates in Child Life Month

The Harding University Department of Family and Consumer
Sciences organized several events during March to observe the
Child Life Council’s Child Life Month, a time dedicated to advocating
awareness of the work of child life specialists across the country.

The department offers a range of degree plans including child life
specialist, a profession trained to help children cope and adjust to
difficult situations, such as foster care, hospitals, court systems,
bereavement and trauma.

Students in the department participated in a number of activities to
benefit local children as well as educate the community about the work
of child life specialists. Several students volunteered at the Searcy
Books for Breakfast Benefit Feb. 26 to support the Reach Out and Read
Program at the Center for Pediatric Health, a program that provides
children’s books at yearly checkups for the first five years of a
child’s life to promote literacy.

The department also collected books to be donated to Hope Cottage, a
local domestic violence shelter for women and children, and
distributed fliers in Harding’s Student Center to educate students on
the child life field.

An informational session was held March 2 in which the department gave
an overview of the field and also provided hands-on educational
activities, such as a medical play booth, academic pathways booth,
family-centered care booth, and coping and grief support booth.

“It is our hope that we can help others see the value of psychosocial
support and developmental care for children in the hospital setting as
well as non-traditional child life settings such as court systems,
trauma teams, grief support agencies and others,” said Dr. Crystal
Whittington, assistant professor of family and consumer sciences at
Harding and child life specialist at Arkansas Children’s Hospital.

For more information on the Harding Department of Family and Consumer
Sciences, please visit their website at www.harding.edu/fcs/.