Journey Toward Connection and Understanding: Story of Facilitating Attuned Interactions (FAN)
Presented by Linda Gilkerson, Ph.D., LSW
This webinar was presented live on December 2nd, 2022. The recording of the Dr. Gilkerson’s presentation is available here
Linda Gilkerson, Ph.D., LSW
“I never thought I’d feel this way…but I don’t love her.” Those words launched the Erikson Institute Fussy Baby Network nearly two decades ago. Families of fussy babies taught us that we needed to stay in the hard places longer, see the baby through parents’ eyes first, and partner to support them as they found their way with this baby. Because of the intensity of the work, we needed an approach that held the provider as well as the family. FAN (Facilitating Attuned Interactions) is a conceptual model and practical tool for relationship-building and reflective practice which grew from this work. The FAN is generalizable to the helping relationship and now is used widely across service systems, including home visitation, early intervention, infant and early childhood mental health consultation, early childhood centers, child welfare and health care. The presentation will share the history of the FAN, its theory of change and practice model, all of which are built around the concept of attunement.
Linda Gilkerson, Ph.D., LSW, Professor, Erikson Institute, Chicago, IL, USA, directs the graduate training programs in infancy and infant mental health and developed the infant mental health concentration in Erikson’s MSW program. She founded the Fussy Baby Network and is the developer of the FAN (Facilitating Attuned Interactions), an approach that is used widely in the US and internationally to facilitate parent engagement and reflective practice in a range of service systems including home visiting, early intervention, infant and early childhood mental health, child welfare and health care. Her research and scholarship focus on relationship-based interventions and reflective supervision.
The recording of this webinar is available here