Parent Coaching: tips and strategies specific to your family

Kristin Ward is the manager of the Parent Coaching team and enjoys working with tricky dynamics in families. She loves supporting parents to see how they can be on the same team as their kids, no matter what challenging behaviour they are facing. Passionate about seeing whānau thrive, Kristin strongly believes there is lots parents can do to build close and warm relationships with their children. Kristin is a therapeutic social worker with additional training in child and adolescent mental health. Kristin and her husband have two teenagers and a primary aged child, and as a whānau they are involved in respite foster care. In her spare time Kristin dreams of building her own yurt. The number of times she has Googled ‘how to build a yurt’ is quite surprising.

Jenny has been on the team at Parenting Place for over 24 years. (She is setting a record!) Once upon a time, Jenny was a teacher and an educator for Parents As First Teachers. Her lifelong passion is working with families and helping them find solutions to the tricky everyday challenges that come hand-in-hand with parenting. Author of the recently released Kind, Firm, Calm: Simple Strategies to Transform Your Parenting, Jenny enjoys writing as well as travelling around the country speaking in preschools, schools, churches and community organisations. Jenny has been married to Stuart for 45 years and adores being a grandma to their four grandkids. Addicted to buying books for her grandchildren, she’d love to write her own children’s books one day, as well as raise free-range chickens and perhaps even take up horse riding again.

Sheridan Eketone is warm, engaging and highly relatable, and ready to help when parents are feeling like they’ve tried it all. As a mother-of-four, Sheridan combines her first-hand parenting insights with the latest evidence-informed information, offering strategies that help parents build connection with their children, manage big feelings and create a positive family atmosphere. She has extensive experience in group facilitation programmes such as Toolbox, Building Awesome Whānau, Tuning into Kids and Circle of Security. Sheridan regularly delivers presentations on parenting and speaks to NZ media on family-related topics. With over 20 years on the 'front-line' raising her own busy whānau, Sheridan understands the daily demands of life with kids. She has loads of practical support to offer, as well as highly contagious levels of enthusiasm, passion and patience.

Sanna Finch is our Parent Coach specialising in the teenage years. She loves walking alongside parents, especially as they navigate the turbulent waters of raising teens. With over 21 years of experience parenting her own three kids (young people she still enjoys hanging out with!), Sanna is calm, empathetic and reassuring. She knows first-hand the highs and lows of family life and feels strongly that teenagers need their parents just as much as younger children do. Sanna is passionate about supporting parents to enhance connection and communication with their teens and to continue having positive and fun interactions with them throughout this period of significant change. Sanna also practices as a Social Worker in a healthcare setting, primarily supporting parents going through significant stress and trauma. In her spare time Sanna enjoys exploring New Zealand’s tramping tracks and cuddles with her dog.