Program Goals

The goals of Mom Power®: A Strong Roots™ Curriculum are:

For Mother:

• Reduce maternal depression and posttraumatic stress symptoms
• Reduce parenting stress
• Increase sense of parenting competence
• Enhance coping skills
• Strengthen parenting factors associated with secure and healthy child attachment, including parent reflectivity and attachment representations
• Reduce social isolation and loneliness
• Increase access to culturally relevant community resources, including those that address behavioral health and tangible needs

For Child:

• Increase likelihood of secure and healthy attachment to mother
• Increase support of social-emotional and behavioral development
• Increase access to developmental or behavioral health services

Logic Model

View the Logic Model for Mom Power®.

Essential Components

The essential components of Mom Power®: A Strong Roots™ Curriculum include:

• Parenting intervention that is:
• Attachment-based
• Multigenerational
• Psychoeducational
• Delivered through 13 sessions, consisting of:
• 10 Group Sessions (typically once per week for 10 consecutive weeks) to deliver a manualized intervention program for mothers and their children
• Duration: 2-2.5 hours each (or 90 minutes Virtual)
• Group Size: 10-12 mothers per group with their children
• Location: Physical space with two rooms (or Virtual platform)
• Format:
• Closed group: Mothers must attend first 2 sessions to continue; must attend 7 sessions to complete program 
• Each group session consists of:
• A shared group meal
• Parent-child separation
• Two simultaneous classes:
• Mom Group for mothers
• Child Group for children
• Parent-child reunion and Circle Time which includes a shared group activity with mothers and children
• 3 Individual Sessions
• Occurring:
• Pre-Group
• Mid-Group
• Post-Group
• Address the unique needs of families
• Collaborate with parents to identify needs and provide individualized referrals to community resources with warm hand-offs when possible
• Duration: 60 minutes each
• Weekly Phone Calls during 10-weeks of Group Sessions to check-in, assess resource and safety needs, provide additional support or referrals
• Core fundamental therapeutic components include:
• Utilizes the Strong Roots Concepts, a framework for understanding and strengthening early relationships that is grounded in the metaphor of the Tree and utilizes nature-based concepts and imagery
• Follows the 5 pillars of Mom Power, the fundamental therapeutic elements of the intervention, which are aligned with the Center for the Study of Social Policy’s Strengthening Families Protective Factors, and reflect the outcome areas that the intervention intends to impact:
• Attachment-based parenting psychoeducation
• Supported parent-child interactions
• Connecting to culturally relevant resources
• Enhanced social supports
• Self-Care Skills: Stress reduction/Mind-body exercises
• Promotes peer support through the group format, including facilitated topics during shared mealtimes
• Directly addresses barriers to participation, such as transportation, meals, childcare
• Provides a safe, trusting, and nurturing environment for families to connect, grow and learn new skills; and serves as a safe–soft entry to any additional services (engagement)
• Requires group Reflective Supervision for service providers (pre-group, weekly during 10-weeks, post-group) to offer curriculum and clinical support for providers in a parallel process, and to monitor fidelity to the model
• Child Group:
• Promotes secure parent-child attachment and child social-emotional development by:
• Creating an emotionally and physically safe environment
• Providing attuned and responsive caregiving
• Supporting separations and reunions
• Nurturing a child’s capacity to give clear cues regarding emotional and behavioral needs
• Child Group staff and children engage in play that is guided by a weekly curriculum that emphasizes child-led play and offers suggestions for age-specific activities

Program Delivery

Child/Adolescent Services

Mom Power® directly provides services to children/adolescents and addresses the following:

• Problems with, or challenges in, the child-parent attachment relationship
• Disruptions in social, emotional, and/or behavioral regulation
• Lack of connection to relevant and responsive community-based services and resources

Parent/Caregiver Services

Mom Power® directly provides services to parents/caregivers and addresses the following:

• Depression
• Anxiety
• Traumatic stress (from childhood or experienced as an adult)
• Posttraumatic Stress
• Parenting Stress
• Disruptions in capacity for parental Reflective Functioning
• Disruptions in, or problems affecting, the security of the parent-child relationship
• Disruptions in responsive caregiving behavior
• Parent of a child with challenging emotional and/or behavioral needs
• Isolation/lack of social support
• Lack of connection to resources

Services Involve Family/Support Structures:

This program involves the family or other support systems in the individual's treatment: Participants can invite a family member, co-parenting partner, friend, or other support person to group session 8, “Guest Week.” This is an opportunity to enhance participant social supports and for participants to share what they have learned with their support person.

Recommended Intensity:

Group sessions - 1 time per week, 10 sessions (90-150 minutes each); Individual sessions - 3 in total: before the group session series begin, in the middle of the group session series, after the group session series end (60 minutes each)

Recommended Duration:

10 weeks

Delivery Settings

This program is typically conducted in a(n):

• Community Daily Living Setting
• Foster / Kinship Care
• Hospital
• Outpatient Clinic
• Community-based Agency / Organization / Provider
• Group or Residential Care
• School Setting (Including: Day Care, Day Treatment Programs, etc.)
• Virtual (Online, Telephone, Video, Zoom, etc.)

Homework

Mom Power® includes a homework component:

Homework is framed as “Practice” to aid participants in building a sense of confidence and competence in applying the material learned to everyday life. Practice is linked with the content learned in group and often includes instruction to practice self-care skills, notice behaviors in themselves and their children, and/or complete sunshine time (i.e., child interactions).

Languages

Mom Power® has materials available in languages other than English:

Arabic, Spanish

For information on which materials are available in these languages, please check on the program's website or contact the program representative (contact information is listed at the bottom of this page).

Resources Needed to Run Program

The typical resources for implementing the program are:

Staffing Requirements (and weekly time commitment for 12 weeks):

• 2 Mom Group Facilitators (6-8 hours)
• Program coordinator (4 hours)
• 1 Child Group Leader (6-8 hours)
• Child Group Staff Members (4-6 hours)
• Sufficient staffing for a 1 Child Group Staff Member to 4 children (1:4) ratio is recommended, however there are options to modify this structure based on available agency resources
• Reflective Supervisor (2 hours)

Space and Equipment needs:

• In-person Groups:
• Space with 2 rooms in close proximity:
• 1 that can accommodate 10-15 people for Mom Group
• 1 that can accommodate 30-40 adults and children for mealtime, Child Group, and circle time
• Computer/projector/DVD player/TV (a modality for playing videos)
• Up-to-date paper copies of curriculum and supplemental materials for facilitators and participants
• Virtual Groups:
• HIPAA-compliant virtual meeting platform (e.g., Zoom)
• Technology for group participants (e.g., tablets, hot spots, headphones)
• Up-to-date digital copies of curriculum and supplemental materials for facilitators and participants

Manuals and Training

Prerequisite/Minimum Provider Qualifications

A mental-health-related master’s level credential is necessary for one of the two Mom Group Leaders and the reflective consultant. Additionally, it is recommended that reflective consultants have experience providing reflective supervision.

Manual Information

There is a manual that describes how to deliver this program.

Program Manual(s)

Manual Information:

• Muzik, M., Rosenblum, K., & Schuster, M. (2021). Mom Power®: A Strong Roots Curricula: 10-week in-person curriculum. Unpublished manual. University of Michigan.
• Muzik, M., Rosenblum, K., & Schuster, M. (2021). Mom Power®: A Strong Roots Curricula: 10-week virtual curriculum. Unpublished manual. University of Michigan.
• Muzik, M., Rosenblum, K., Ribaudo, J., & Schuster, M. (2021). Mom Power®: Child team curriculum for child team leaders. Unpublished manual. University of Michigan.

For more information, please contact the training listed contact below

Training Information

There is training available for this program.

Training Contact:

• Diana Saum
  zerotothrive.org/strong-roots/mom-power-core-training
  strongroots@umich.edu
  phone: (734) 232-5747

Training Type/Location:

Training is provided virtually or in person approximately 3 times a year. Additionally, organizations can request to host an onsite training.

Number of days/hours:

Training consists of: 5-10 hours of asynchronous pretraining learning 3 days (in person) or 5 half days (virtual) day synchronous live training

Implementation Information

Pre-Implementation Materials

There are pre-implementation materials to measure organizational or provider readiness for Mom Power® as listed below:

Organizations interested in the program can complete the following questionnaire, and then speak with a Strong Roots representative to determine organizational readiness: https://zerotothrive.org/strong-roots-inquiry-form/

Additionally, there is a Readiness Checklist available for site self-assessment. For a copy of the Readiness Checklist, please contact the training contact above.

Formal Support for Implementation

There is formal support available for implementation of Mom Power® as listed below:

Technical Assistance: 5 hours of technical assistance are included in the cost of training and are provided via phone, virtual meeting platform, or in-person meeting. This service is intended to support sites with general trouble shooting around implementation of group.

Reflective Consultation: Reflective consultation for group facilitators is an essential component of the intervention. Sessions occur pre-group, weekly during 10-weeks, post-group, and are intended to offer curriculum and clinical support for providers in a parallel process. Sites are required to receive reflective consultation from Zero to Thrive® for the first two Mom Power® groups that they implement to ensure fidelity to the model. After the first two groups, reflective consultation is still required, but sites can choose to contract with an external reflective consultant or provide this service internally.

Fidelity Measures

There are fidelity measures for Mom Power® as listed below:

Practitioner self-report assessments are completed by facilitators to measure content and process fidelity. Video recordings of sessions can also be submitted to the developer for review upon request. Providers/facilitators are trained on how model fidelity is measured and the requirements for monitoring and reporting fidelity measures during the training.

Fidelity Measure Requirements:

Fidelity measures are required to be used as part of program implementation.

Established Psychometrics:

Rosenblum, K., Muzik, M., Morelen, D. M., Alfafara, E. A., Miller, N. M., Waddell, R. M., Schuster, M. M., & Ribaudo, J. (2017). A community-based randomized controlled trial of Mom Power parenting intervention for mothers with interpersonal trauma histories and their young children. Archives of Women’s Mental Health, 20, 673–686. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00737-017-0734-9P

Implementation Guides or Manuals

There are implementation guides or manuals for Mom Power® as listed below:

The administrative manual outlines considerations for organizational-level factors that support implementation of the program. This includes reaching sustainability, collaboration, training staff, leadership involvement, and implementation issues. Materials are available after receiving the Mom Power® training.

Implementation Cost

There are no studies of the costs of Mom Power®.

Research on How to Implement the Program

Research has been conducted on how to implement Mom Power® as listed below:

Gray, S. A. O., Moberg, S. A., Obus, E. A., Parker, V., Rosenblum, K. L., Muzik, M., Zeanah, C. H., & Drury, S. S. (2022). Harnessing Virtual Mom Power: Process and outcomes of a pilot telehealth adaptation of a multifamily, attachment-based intervention. Journal of Infant, Child, and Adolescent Psychotherapy, 21(1), 6–18. http://doi.org/10.1080/15289168.2022.2045464

Relevant Published, Peer-Reviewed Research

Child Welfare Outcome: Child/Family Well-Being

Additional References