Someone to Be With

Children don't develop relationships with caregivers. It's relationships with caregivers that develop children. Since interactions between children and adults are the primary mechanism for development and learning, children who have strong relationships with caring adults do better in learning environments.

Follow the journey, from the caregiver's perspective, of a young child to feel connected and supported in a classroom while away from their primary attachment figures. Everyone has a job and the Teacher, Parent, and Child all work together to create a predictable, consistent structure at the beginning and the end of each day. This book was written for educators and families supporting first relationships for young children in early care settings.

Someone to Be With is part of the Circle of Security Classroom Approach, a two-tier approach to support secure relationships in early care settings. In the first tier, early care professionals engage in an 8-week reflective, professional learning series. In the second tier, early care professionals work with a registered COS Classroom Coach to implement the learning in a classroom setting. To learn more about how to support children's relationships at home and in the classroom, please visit the Circle of Security International website.

As part of the second generation of Circle of Security International (COSI) leadership, Deidre Quinlan is passionate about finding ways to bring the Circle of Security model to early care settings. As a mother, she is deeply grateful to the early care providers who partnered with her in the early care of her own three children. As a clinician, Deidre has worked with educators both as an early childhood mental health consultant as well as an early care center director. With COSI, Deidre is focused on finding ways to ensure that children have opportunities to achieve optimal health and developmental outcomes, school readiness, and ultimate school success. To that end, she firmly believes that early care professionals need access to a systematized approach to enhancing relationships with the children in their care. As a result, for many years, Deidre has partnered with the co-originators of the Circle of Security to develop and manualize what is today called the COS Classroom Approach. With this approach, the pragmatics of moving attachment theory to practice is unfolding. In particular, this book looks at the importance of building relationships between parents, early care providers, and children. So often children at separation are offered reassurance that their caregiver will return. This book addresses a vital concern that's on the mind of all children, "While my caregiver is away, who will be with me?"

You can learn more about Deidre's work with Circle of Security International on our website at https://www.circleofsecurityinternational.com/the-leadership-team/