Sample Adoption Family Tree

According to the U.S. Census, 1 in 25 households with children has at least one adopted child.

And yet, many adoptive parents find themselves frustrated when their child is faced with uncomfortable questions about adoption on the playground or at school. (Read Kristen Howerton’s Huffington Post article, for example.)

National Adoption Month can be a great time to take adoption to your children’s library or school through books, education and conversations with your child’s teachers or peers:

  • Ask your local library to set up an adoption books display. You could even offer to host a children’s story time with an adoption book.
  • Consider donating adoption books to your local library or your child’s school or daycare.
  • Ask your child’s teacher if you and your child can do a special show-and-tell to talk about your family’s adoption story and adoption in general.
  • Even a simple conversation with your child’s teacher or daycare provider could help him or her realize that they could use better adoption language. Revisit our post on Positive Adoption Language for pointers.
  • Rethink tricky school assignments like family trees so that your child won’t feel left out. We developed our own American Adoptions Family Tree worksheets for children who were adopted or conceived with assisted reproduction. Feel free to print and share the worksheet with others! You’ll find the links below.

Additional Resources:

  • AdoptiveFamilies.com – This website has tons of resources for talking to kids and teachers about adoption and about how to adapt the conversation for different age groups.