FARMINGTON — The Franklin County Children’s Task Force has received an $8,000 grant from the Maine Children’s Trust. The funds are earmarked for the “Baby Think it Over” program.

This program is shown to increase the awareness of middle and high school students regarding the care needed for a newborn.

BTIO covers multiple aspects of parenting, including infant care, time requirements, comforting and child abuse prevention. Students learn interactively following the “experiential learning” theory to acquire realistic knowledge of the demands of parenting.

The infant simulators are programmed using 15 different 24-hour schedules. The schedules are based on the needs of real infants.

Cycles of care include feeding, burping, rocking and diaper changing while sensors placed within the infant simulator will detect rough handling, abuses or mistreatment. The sensors will also detect the timeliness of the care or whether it was missed all together.

The simulated child’s experiences are recorded within the software, producing a log which is used as a guide to measure competency. Students are then graded based on the level of care they provided.

This program is available to all schools in Franklin County as well as Livermore Falls.

Anyone interested in the availability of this program is welcome to contact the Children’s Task Force directly at 778-6960 to learn more about how the community can prevent unintended pregnancy.

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