This paper provides a review of the literature about family centres and other examples of centre‐based practice. The literature reflects a period of some 25 years in which practice has sought to integrate protection, support for families and local development in local centres. The literature shows great descriptive activity in the 1980s, and some Children Act (1989) sponsored studies, particularly of the voluntary sector, in the early 1990s, followed by inactivity before a new and more sophisticated literature emerges in the late 1990s and early 2000. While lacking experimental design, the strengths of the contemporary picture show in the appreciative voice of the user, including those at the very margins; studies of support programmes nurtured by centres; lessons about socially inclusive practice and the melding of formality and informality; theorization about centre‐based practice as a containing space; and attempts to understand complexity and synergy and to develop a theory of change. This domain of practice appears to have much to offer the new UK child care strategy and inter‐professional context if the opportunity is taken.

Eight pre-schools tookpart in offsite and onsite speech and language training to improve their interaction skills with children and learn some group language activities. An evaluation was undertaken where practitioners at one pre-school were videoed running a language activity before and after training. The video was analysed to assess change in adult and child interaction. All practitioners who had undertaken the training were interviewed to find out about its impact in their setting. The research showed statistically significant improvements in the children s communication. Practitioners reportedpositive benefits to their own and children 's skill development.

This reflective discussion draws on data from a collaborative enquiryinto kinship or family and friends practice. It introduces perspectivesfrom complexity and chaos theory as a way of re-examining thechallenges of kinship practice.The discussion highlights the enduringchallenges for practitioners, not least, managing anxiety and uncer-tainty, sustaining continuity and containment, becoming experiencedand taking account of the complex developmental needs of the chil-dren and their families. The discussion particularly raises questionsabout appropriate settings for practitioners to undertake such ademanding area of child and family social wor

This chapter describes integrated family center practice that offers protection, nurturance, and avenues for development for parents and their children. The focus is the integrated family center (or family resource center) as a community-based single-site system of care, which arguably has an important role in the development of safe communities and new visions for children's services. As an alternative to existing child welfare services, they address fragmentation, defensive practice, and the disconnection from community that are serious problems in protective services. As stable community-based programs, integrated family centers provide a therapeutic milieu with a complex array of services to meet child welfare's primary goal: child well-being and family support. These integrated centers have the advantage of being a community, a place to belong to that grows with the family.

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