Toolkit for Storytllers

Foster Care and Adoption

This page contains articles, videos & podcasts and additional resources to help storytellers accurately portray the experiences of adolescents who have been a part of the foster care system and/or an adoption process.

Blog
Storyteller Insights: Differing Perceptions of Foster Care Portrayals
Storyteller Insights: Differing Perceptions of Foster Care Portrayals
Foster Youth Storytelling: Less Vulnerability, More Resiliency
Foster Youth Storytelling: Less Vulnerability, More Resiliency

Both news and popular media are used to portraying foster youth as permanently damaged, either by the circumstances that led them to foster care and/or by the broken system that failed them.

Adopt: A New Perspective
Adopt: A New Perspective
Foster or Otherwise, Parenting is Parenting: Love, care, and try your best
Foster or Otherwise, Parenting is Parenting: Love, care, and try your best
Tragic is Magic: Reclaiming My Story
Tragic is Magic: Reclaiming My Story
Let Love Define Family: Portraying a Modern Generation of Foster Parents
Let Love Define Family: Portraying a Modern Generation of Foster Parents
There’s More to the Picture: What the adults of Foster Care want content creators to know
There’s More to the Picture: What the adults of Foster Care want content creators to know
“We’re Not Broken”: What two former foster youth want content creators to know
“We’re Not Broken”: What two former foster youth want content creators to know

Additional Resources

Reframing Transition Age Foster Youth Toolkit

Click here to go to the toolkit from The FrameWorks Institute

FosterMore Foster Care Factsheet

FosterMore Foster Care Factsheet

This factsheet from FosterMore includes overrepresented stories and harmful stereotypes to avoid when portraying foster care in entertainment media, helpful facts about the foster care system, and a glossary of relevant terms. Click here to download the factsheet.

Think Tank for Inclusion & Equity Foster Care & Adoption Factsheet

This fact sheet from the Think Tank for Inclusion & Equity includes examples of overrepresented stories and harmful stereotypes to avoid when portraying foster care in the media, appropriate language to use when speaking about foster care, and a glossary of relevant terms. Click here to download the factsheet.