Promoting non-violent parenting

POPANVA or 'Promotion of Parenting: A Non-violent Approach' is a group of interested individuals in the UK who work in partnerships with groups, parents, local communities, statutory authorities, place of work and faith communities to promote a non-violent approach to parenting.

Facilitators promote the recommended actions of the Ottawa Charter of health Promotion (1996) which provides a socio-ecological framework for parenting initiatives and aims to: (1) put parenting on the agenda of policy makers; (2) recognize the inextricable links between people and their environment and assess the impact of a rapidly changing environment on people in their role as parents; (3) strengthen community action by using a community development approach to parenting; (4) develop personal and life skills so increasing options available to people to exercise greater control over their own lives; (6) reorient health services -- open the channels between the health sector and a broader social, political, economic and physical environment.

1. Childhood and family experiences are often the only models we have on which to base our own parenting style. Sometimes these models are authoritarian and hierarchical, usually creating a division of roles within a household based on gender, and including physical and emotional punishment of children. It is possible that, unless challenged, this model may be practised in the wider community, workplace and institutions and wherever people make decisions which affect the lives of others.

1. Increasing effectiveness of parenting

1. Befriending violent parents in public