Family Support Volunteer

Home-Start Lambeth volunteers provide support, friendship and practical help to local families with young children. Our volunteers make sure that a child’s early years count. By volunteering with us, you will be helping transform the lives of families and children across Lambeth. 

Home-Visiting support is primarily offered through visits to families’ homes and/or meetings in local parks/cafes or other public spaces, as most families prefer to be supported in person. 

How does this volunteer role make a difference?

All kinds of families can find it hard to cope, for many different reasons. Maybe they need support because of the illness or disability of a child, or because of a parent’s post-natal illness, bereavement or loneliness. 

Home-Start volunteers offer these families non-judgemental, confidential support, tailored to suit the needs of the family. This includes:

• Providing tips on practical parenting skills
• Building a supportive relationship with the family in which the challenges of family life can be discussed, and positive strategies encouraged.
• Encouraging parents’ strengths and emotional well-being so they can best support their children.
• Encouraging families to widen their network of relationships and to make use of support and services available in the community.

What is the time commitment?

We ask all our volunteers to:

• Provide support to at least 1 family for a minimum of 2 hours per week (this includes 2 hours with the family + your commute time to the family’s home and back + around 10 minutes to fill out an online form on how the visit went).
• Attend regular support/supervision with a Coordinator (every 6-8 weeks)
• Commit to volunteering for a minimum of six months or more
• Provide regular, timely updates of support delivered to families through the completion of an online form

What support will I get?

Home-Visiting volunteers will need to complete an e-learning course, once this is completed, they will be invited to a 1-day face to face training where they will meet most of our HSL staff, this face-to-face training will go over some of the topics already seen in the e-learning, but will also include Domestic Violence and Mental Health. Completing this allows volunteers to support families face-to-face.

E-learning covers topics like:

• An Introduction to Home-Start 
• The role of a Home-Start volunteer 
• Values & attitudes 
• Listening & communication 
• Supporting parents 
• Meeting the needs of children 
• Protecting & safeguarding children & vulnerable adults 
• Confidentiality

Our family coordinators also provide regular supervision, checking in on how your volunteering is going, offering support and answering any queries you have.

We also offer volunteers regular (optional) training opportunities – past trainings have been on Perinatal Mental Health, Domestic Abuse, Autism, Financial Wellbeing, and the Housing System in Lambeth.

What skills & experience do I need?

We are looking for volunteers who:

• Have parenting or childcare experience and skills which may benefit families
• Are able to maintain confidentiality but recognise that there may be occasions when disclosure is essential to the welfare of a child
• Understand the importance of reliability and punctuality when supporting families
• Have good listening and communication skills and demonstrate a caring and sensitive attitude towards others
• Are prepared to keep online records of support as requested
• Value diversity and inclusion
• Attend support, supervision and training as required

All volunteers are required to understand and follow Home Start Lambeth’s policies on Confidentiality, Equal Opportunities, Safeguarding and Health and Safety. 

All volunteer roles are subject to an enhanced DBS check. 

This role is advertised as part of TPP's Free Giving Back Services. This volunteer advertisement copy has been supplied to TPP and applicants apply direct to the organisation. Please contact the organisation directly if you have any questions about this volunteer role.