Family Centred Service Sheets

Family-centred service is an approach to providing services to children with special needs. As suggested by the name of this approach, the family is considered to be at the centre of the services. This makes family centred approaches different than traditional approaches where the focus is on the child, and where service providers are the ones who make decisions about the services a child receives. For family-centred service to be effective, it is important that everyone who is involved understands what family-centred service means. This includes families, service providers, and directors of programs and organizations. The 18 FCS Sheets in this series have been developed to help increase people’s understanding of family centred service. Each FCS Sheet contains information about the topic and specific strategies to encourage family-centred behaviours.