Ready to Relate: Nurturing Connection from the Very Beginning

Babies are born ready to relate. From the very start, they seek companionship and connection – something many of us intuitively feel but few fully understand.

Dr Lisa Milne and Jane Dickens from the Bradford District Foundation Care Trust will present on the Ready to Relate (R2R) resources designed to help parents and practitioners support the vital bond from the very beginning.

The Ready to Relate (R2R) resource was developed to bridge that gap in knowledge, recognizing that the parent-infant relationship is foundational to both infant and parental mental health, influencing everything from emotional bonding to infant feeding.

Many professionals – and parents – are still unfamiliar with the rich inner world of babies. Yet families have a natural hunger for this knowledge. Ready to Relate was designed not only to upskill practitioners but also to empower families with essential understanding about their baby.

The emerging evidence base demonstrates that using the Ready to Relate resource enabled sustained changes in parenting, and further findings are awaited from the research carried out by York and Huddersfield University.

Join us to explore how these research-informed resource cards can be used by any practitioner, during any contact, with any family – whether celebrating meaningful moments or offering light-touch support when challenges arise.

Key Takeaways for Attendees:

  • Recognise the many ways babies are ready to relate—through eye contact, gestures, sounds, and movement—and what these cues tell us.
  • Gain a practical tool – use the Ready to Relate resource across a range of settings, from everyday interactions to low-level interventions.
  • Build confidence in supporting families with accessible, evidence-informed information that helps them connect meaningfully with their baby.

FREE TO MEMBERS

NON-MEMBERS: £15 plus booking fee

BOOK HERE

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