By doing the test you will get the following benefits:
The Child Friendly Divorce Self Assessment is for non-violence divorces.
It includes 19 non-mandatory questions. Please rate them according the answer that corresponds the most to your situation.
The scores that you can obtain for each question are:
After having answered all the questions, you will be presented your average score as well as feedback on your answers.
Experience with divorced parents and children of divorce points out that many parents care a lot about their children. During the divorce and right after it, the parents think about what to do for the children very seriously. They take many of the actions they intended to do.
Some of the intended actions remain on the "To Do List". Some important actions, the "Should Do's", are not on the list at all. Despite all good intentions, after a while the focus moves away from the children to the ordinary day-to-day challenges. These circumstances might lead to not being as friendly for your children of divorce as you can be.
The test includes 19 questions. Each question has 5 possible answers.
We realize that this is quite some text to go through. Children and Divorce is a complex subject. We want to give you something of real value, instead of a quick and dirty popular checklist. Something that can bring you real benefits.
To make your work easier, we made not all the questions optional. You are not required to answer them all. Thus, if you do not want to answer a question because you do not know, because the question does not apply to you or because you just do not like the question, you can skip it and go on with the next question.
On the "Thank You" page that appears after you finish the Child Friendliness Self Assessment Test, you will have the possibility to comment on the test. Your feedback will be visible to all visitors of www.Children-and-Divorce.com? It is valuable for us. With your feedback we will improve the Self Assessment
For each question and possible answer the test gives you extended background information on every issue. We hope that you enjoy this Child Friendly Divorce Self Assessment Test and that you get real benefits from it.
This is why we developed this Child Friendliness Self Assessment Test for you. Enjoy it.
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For each question, you can find an explanation and background to each questions of the Child Friendly Divorce Self Assessment. Learn more about the important issues and how you can improve.
Question 1. Did you try to save your marriage before you divorced?
Do you know why saving your marriage is often better than a divorce? Read the article Save your Marriage.
Question 2. Do you and your ex partner blame each other?
Read why divorced parents should stop blaming each other and focus on the well being of their children instead: Parenting after Divorce.
Question 3.Do you keep your children away from your ex partner?
Do you know why you should not keep your children away from your ex partner? Parenting after Divorce explains.
Question 4.Do you accept your new situation?
Do you know why it is important to accept your new situation? Do you know what you can do to accept your new situation if that is not the case yet? Read the article "Focussing on Yourself".
Question 5.Do you talk with your child(ren) one-to-one about their emotions on a regular basis?
Read why you should talk one-to-one with your children about their emotions regularly in Parenting after Divorce.
Question 6.Do your children do better or worse at school after the divorce?
Read what to do to improve the school results of your children in Parenting Education.
Question 7.Do your children see both their parents often enough?
To understand why your children should see both their parents frequently, read this article about Custody of Children Visitation.
Question 8.What are your beliefs about divorce?
Dealing with your new reality and with negative feelings, supporting and non-supporting beliefs, and the power of positive words will help you on the right path. Read on.
Question 9.Are your friends and family really supportive or do they keep talking negatively about your ex and the divorce?Find somebody you can trust and get the support you need from your friends and family relationships.
Question 10.Did you explicitly tell your children the divorce was not their fault?
Children at a certain age blame themselves for the divorce. This hurts them. You can avoid this by telling children about divorce correctly.
Question 11.Do you revise and update the parenting plan regularly?
Your children get older, things might work out different than what you expected, you changed from job, your ex partner moved to another place, your child does worse at school. These and more are all reasons to have regular parenting plan meetings.
Question 12.How is the relationship with your ex?
Why and how you should build a new relationship with your ex partner is explained in Parenting Advice
Question 13.How do you spend your time with your children?
Do you being a divorced parent spend enough parenting time with your children? What is enough time? How can you spend time with your children? Big adventures like a skying holiday are fine, but most of the time can be found in daily life. Please read more about parenting time.
Question 14.Do you stimulate your children to experiment, to interact with others and to discover?
Find out why what happens if you do just that in Parenting Advice - Activities.
Question 15.Is there a structure in the day of your children?
The daily structure defines the boundaries for your children to experiment, to learn and to grow.
Question 16.Do you protect your children well?
Your children of divorce should feel safe and secure. Only then they can develop socially and emotionally in a healty way. In this article, we discuss the ideal environment, schools, bullying, the neighbourhood, domestic violence, watching tv and alcohol. Divorce Protecting Children explains.
Question 17.What is the physical distance between their divorced parents?
The shorter the distance, the better for the children because they can switch from home easier. When their parents live far away from each other, long distance parenting issues should be tackled.
Question 18.How is the financial situation for your children?
Next to the children, divorce and money are the next important subject for divorcing parents. First of all you have to divide your properties and then you have to find a formula for how to support the ex spouse and the children financially.
Question 19.What is the quality of the education your children get?
Parenting Education gives you tips and ideas on how you can contribute to the school results of your children of divorce.
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We hope that this Child Friendly Divorce Self Assessment helps you to your life and the life of your children on the rail again. If you have any comment or suggestion on the Child Friendly Divorce Self Assessment, please let us know.