Classes
Facilitator(s): Cliff Leonardi, Astrid Dabbeni
Dates:
Apr. 19, 2012
May 17, 2012
June 21, 2012
Time: 6:00-8:00 pm
Location:Q Center, 4115 N Mississippi Avenue, Portland, OR 97217
Cost: FREE! No registration required.
Support group meetings will address common questions that prospective adoptive parents ask at different points in the process of adopting with a focus on LBGTQ interests, as well as the challenges of the new LGBTQ family constellation.
Groups will be lead by a team of adoption professionals and members of the LGBTQ adoption community.
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Where Do We Go From Here? The Journey of Reunion
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This innovative two-part panel will give you unique insight into the process of reunion. In the morning we will hear from adoptees who are in the early stages of their reunion journey. After lunch we will hear from adoptees and their birth parents who have been reunited for around ten years or more.
This panel will address:
- What emotions happen after successfully searching and finding?What if you’re the one who was found?
- How might differences in culture and language affect your reunion?
- How do you build a relationship?
- How do you support a loved one who is experiencing reunion?
- How do you talk to family members about your reunion? What part do they play in reunion?
Date: TBA
Time: 10 am – 3 pm
Location: TBA
Cost: $45*
Pre-Registration is required. Cancellation Policy
*Partial scholarships are available as funds allow. Please contact info@adoptionmosaic.org for more information.
CLASS SIZE IS LIMITED TO 10 PEOPLE!
Instructor: MereAnn Reid, MA, Northwest Adoption Support
When: August 2, 9, 16 & 23, 2011
Time: 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm
Where: TBA, Portland, Oregon
Cost: $120 per person – Class size limited to 10 people.
Registration Form
Lifestory Books Come Alive, a 4-part series, offers:
- Discussion dedicated to why it is important and ways to best to capture and commemorate your child’s adoption journey.
- Space and support to create your first (or next) lifestory book pages
- Practice choosing words for your child’s age and stage of development
- Feedback and ideas for sharing difficult stories
- Ideas for adoption conversation starters with your child and involving them in the lifestory book process
- Strategies for ensuring your one-of-a-kind mementos & photos are preserved making lifestory books that accurately reflect different stories of adopted children in the same family
- Lifestory books for non-adopted siblings
This class is also offered on a request basis. Please contact us to discuss details.
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Cancellation Policy_2011
Connect. Support. Create.
Facilitators: Astrid Dabbeni and Shelise Gieseke
When: TBA
Time: 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Where: TBA
Cost: $180 per person (Full and partial scholarships are available; email info@adoptionmosaic.org for details)
Common Threads is an adult adoptee group open to adoptees over the age of 18. In this 6 week group we will:
- Share our common threads & experience a sense of community
- Explore how our identities can change over time
- Discuss frequently asked questions, such as “Is search & reunion right for me?” or “How do I integrate my birth culture into my life?”
- Inspire and empower the community of adopted adults in the Portland area
- Discover ways to tell our stories through the creative art of your choice (writing, art, music, etc.). No artistic talent is needed to participate.
Join us in building our adult adoptee community; to share and explore how adoption shapes who we are today.
Common Threads Flyer
Cancellation Policy
African-American Hair Care is presented in a three-part series
Instructor(s): Trina Jones and Joy Mack
When: TBA
Time: TBA
Where: Jayah Rose Salon, Portland, Oregon
Cost: $90/person
A common worry among transracial adoptive parents, of a child of African decent, is how to properly care for our child’s hair. There are many things to worry about as a new parent—and while hair care is extremely important for a variety of reasons—caring for your child’s hair shouldn’t be one of them. Caring for your child’s hair can be a fun and bonding ritual.
Adoption Mosaic has teamed up with the stylists at the Jayah Rose Salon to bring you a fun, informative, and hands-on workshop that will cover all the hair care basics.
Topics will include:
- Basic braiding
- Advanced braiding
- Quick styles
- Skin care basics
- Information on hair care products
- The history of cultural attitudes about hair
- Resources
Cancellation Policy
Instructor: Astrid Dabbeni
When: TBA
Time: 9 am to 4 pm
Where: TBA
Cost: $90 per person
The decision to adopt across cultural and racial lines is a lifelong commitment to exploring matters of race, confronting racism in all its forms, and constantly developing new skills and awareness. This 2-day workshop will help you to identify assumptions, provide you with tools and resources, and create a sense of confidence as you explore your future as a transracial family. This workshop is appropriate for adoptive parents, waiting parents, and professionals.
Workshop topics will include:
- Race matters
- Development of racial identity
- Cultural competence
- Tools for creating positive outcomes
- Talking to your child about race
- Confronting racism
- Personalizing culture
Registration Form
Cancellation Policy
This three-hour workshop will include material on post-institutional adjustment factors, as well as helpful
strategies that parents can take home with them. The format will include both presentation and discussion. The presenter will share the latest information on potential adjustment difficulties in the areas of attachment, language, cognition, academic performance, emotional and behavioral development, and social skills. Neurological and medical findings will be highlighted, but not a major focus of the workshop.
Parents will learn how to advocate within the schools and service systems for their children’s needs. We will also discuss innovative interventions that have facilitated positive adjustment of children. Finally, we will discuss participants’ specific concerns regarding their children’s adjustment and brainstorm together about possible solutions. This workshop is designed for parents who already have adopted children from orphanage settings, and material will be tailored to this audience. However, waiting parents are also welcome to attend.
Details
Instructor(s): Ally Burr-Harris, Ph.D.
When: TBA
Where: TBA in Portland, Oregon
Cost: $45.00 per person, $70.00 per couple
Registration Form
Instructor: Ally Burr-Harris
Date: TBA
Location: TBA, Portland, OR
Cost: $60 per person, $90 per couple
Registration Form
This four-hour workshop will provide you with:
- An understanding of the critical role that attachment plays in children’s development
- An opportunity to reflect on your own attachment style and how this may impact your attachment with your child
- An overview of attachment styles, unique attachment issues in adoptive families, signs of an attachment problem, and effective strategies for repairing attachment problems
- Opportunities to practice techniques that you can go home and use with your child. These techniques are designed to address attachment concerns, trauma symptoms, and problems with emotional regulation
- Support from other parents facing similar challenges
This workshop is offered twice a year; for parents of children ages 0-6 and parents of children age 7 and older.
This workshop has also been adapted to meet specific needs of certain groups upon request including foster parents, kinship adoptions, parents who adopted through the state, and parents who adopted children from orphanage settings. Contact info@adoptionmosaic.org to request a customized workshop.
This class is also offered on a request basis; contact us for details.
Strengthening Attachment PDF
Cancellation Policy
The school environment can present special challenges for children whose families were formed by adoption. Some traditional assignments can have unintended consequences, making students feel excluded and even alienated. Our teams of an adult adopted person and an adoptive parent will work with teachers and staff to raise awareness and explore ways to make your classrooms more inclusive of children from different types of families.
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Instructor: Astrid Dabbeni
When: TBA
Where: Portland, Oregon
Cost: $60 per person, $90 per couple
Note: This class is a pre-requisite to the Lifestory Books Come Alive! series that starts January 6, 2011.
Pictures along with age appropriate journaling provide an important connection for children to their unique history of the way they joined their adoptive family. Regardless of the type or amount of background information you have about your child before he or she came to you, it will be essential to create an appropriate record.
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Instructor: Astrid Dabbeni
Date: TBA
Time: 9 am to 1 pm
Where: SE UpLift Building, 3534 SE Main Street, Portland, OR 97214
Cost: $60 per person, $90 per couple
“How much did I cost?”
“Why didn’t my birthmother keep me?”
“Will I every get to meet my birthfamily?”
“Did my birthmother love me?”
“Why did you adopt me?”
Have you thought about how you will respond when your child asks such questions?
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Homeland Tours: Creating a Positive Experience
A return visit to an adopted child’s homeland can be a very positive and rewarding experience. This workshop for adoptive parents will help them to make the most of this trip for them and their child. This class is not country specific and designed to meet the needs of all internationally adoptive families. Topics to be covered include:
- Travel planning, creating a child centered trip
- How homeland tours can help with identity
- What is an appropriate age?
- Preparing your child for culture shock
- The decision to visit the orphanage or not
- Search and reunion?
- Tips for traveling with children
- Staying healthy while traveling
Details
Instructor(s): Mina Bacigalupi
When: TBA
Where: TBA in Portland, Oregon
Cost: $30 per person
This class is also offered on a request basis; contact us for details.
Registration Form
Cancellation Policy
Instructor: Astrid Dabbeni
When: May 5, 2012
Time: 9 am to 4 pm
Where: SE UpLift Building, Portland, OR
Cost: $90 person
The decision to adopt across racial and cultural lines is a lifelong commitment to exploring matters of race, confronting racism in all its forms and constantly developing new skills and aptitudes. This workshop will provide you with information, tools, and resources and create a sense of hope as you explore you and your children’s future as a transracial family. This workshop is appropriate for adoptive parents, waiting parents, and professionals.
Workshop topics will include:
- Race matters
- Development of racial identity
- Cultural competence
- Tools for creating positive outcomes
- Talking to your child about race
- Confronting racism
- Personalizing culture
Here are some comments from past participants:
- I would recommend this class to current and prospective transracial families. This class gives you tools and a sense of competency for being able to talk to your children about racial issues.
- This class is a forum to talk about race. I think everyone learned to think differently about the role of parenting transracially, about the experience of being a minority in this culture, of having the combination of being of color, being adopted and having parents of a different race.
- The thing I like about Astrid’s approach is that it is affirming. I appreciate that Adoption Mosaic focuses on the triad.
- Thank you for your openness and honesty – a model for us as parents.
This class is also offered on a request basis; contact us for details.
View the flyer
The decision to adopt across cultural and racial lines is a lifelong commitment to exploring matters of race, confronting racism in all its forms and constantly developing new skills and awareness. This series of three workshops will help you to identify assumptions, provide you with tools and resources, and create a sense of confidence as you explore your future as a transracial family.
Read the rest of this entry »
When: TBA
Where: TBA
Cost: $30 per person
Facilitator: Astrid Dabbeni
This panel is appropriate for adoptive parents, waiting parents and professionals.
Discussion Topics:
- Importance of birth-family, birth culture, birth country, language
- Identity – Race Identity, Cultural Identity and Family Identity
- Communication with adoptive parents about adoption, race and culture
- Recommendations for today’s adoptive parents
This is a rare opportunity to hear the recommendations and insights first hand of transracial adoptees and an adoptive parent who are willing to share their experiences of raising and being raised in communities with parents, family, friends who were/are of a different race than their own.
Today’s adoptive families and professionals working with them are of a generation who, through education, have the opportunity to mitigate some of the challenges faced by adoptive parents of the past while learning to maneuver new challenges of today. Come listen, engage and learn what it is/was like for them to be adopted into a mixed race family in the United States. This panel of adult adoptees and one adoptive parent will share their experience of living in a transracial family.
This panel is also offered on a request basis; contact us for details.
Registration Form
View the flyer
Cancellation Policy
A 2-Day Preparatory Class for Adoptive Parents
Instructor(s): Mina Bacigalupi and MereAnn Reid, MA
Date: TBA
Time: 8:30 am to 2:30 pm
Location: OHSU, Portland, Oregon
Cost: $250.00 per family (singles are encouraged to bring a support person
Registration Form PDF
View FAQ’s
This comprehensive series is designed to meet most recommended pre-adoption education requirements for international or domestic adoption or to supplement agency trainings. We believe history is important in defining the issues adoptive children face and creating positive outcomes. Successful parenting comes from being fully aware and prepared for potential difficult issues that some families may face. Our goal is to provide participants with tools and resources for the lifelong adventure of being an adoptive family.
This 10 hour class (separated into two workshops) will include:
- Adoption in the U.S.A
- Becoming an adoptive family
- The attachment process, parental claiming, and bonding
- Communicating with and advocating for your child
- Lifelong issues of adoption
- Nurture vs. Nature
- Adoptism, racism, and diversity in the U.S. culture
- Preparing for the first hours and days of being an adoptive family
Here are some comments about this class from past participants:
- Thank you for a safe environment to share our excitement and our fears.
- Very, very eye-opening, and very positive too.
- I liked all the first hand information we got from real experience.
- Gave me brain food to review and plan for how to parent my new child.
- This made me see the adoption process through my child’s eyes.
- I feel much more prepared. Anyone adopting should take this class.
Adoption Readiness PDF
Cancellation Policy
December 4-5
