Finding out what works best for children and families is not easy. There is a lot of evidence available, but it can be hard to know how reliable it is. This means it can be difficult to decide on the right kind of support for children and families.
The Guidebook aims to change this. It is free and easy to access. It gives clear information to help you choose which interventions to put in place locally, and makes it easier to use reliable evidence in the design and delivery of support for children and families.
The Foundations Guidebook is a new, updated version of the Early Intervention Foundation’s (EIF) Guidebook.
It contains information on existing research on over 130 interventions with at least preliminary evidence of improving children and families’ outcomes.
The Guidebook provides reliable evidence to support decision-making across the spectrum of early intervention, services for children and families, and children’s social care.
What’s new about the Guidebook
The new Guidebook is now more accessible and easier to use, and we have improved the search function so you can quickly get details about individual interventions.
Most Guidebook entries are the same as they were on the previous EIF Guidebook. They have evidence and cost ratings, studies that underpin the evidence rating, and implementation information. We have added new or improved features including:
- A full evidence description in a downloadable PDF with more detail about the studies underpinning the evidence rating
- Information on the ethnicity and race of children and families in the underpinning studies
- More consistent reporting of parent outcomes that are in the underpinning studies that contribute to the evidence rating
- More accessible and consistent language across the interventions about evidenced outcomes
- A new, more transparent format for the theory of change for each intervention.
Finding out what works to support children and families
The Guidebook includes evidence on interventions that have been rated for their impact on children and families’ outcomes. Ratings are based on studies on the difference that the intervention has made for children and their families when they have been used before. For each intervention, the Guidebook can tell you:
- What the intervention does and who it is designed for
- How effective the intervention has been found to be (its impact)
- How confident you can be in the impact (evidence rating), as well as indicative costs.
The Guidebook also includes information about how to deliver interventions and summaries of the studies underpinning each intervention. More detail on the supporting studies is available in the Full Evidence Description.
Who the Guidebook is for
The Guidebook is designed to help local leaders, commissioners and practitioners, and researchers and policy makers, to use evidence when they make decisions about how best to support children and families. The Guidebook can help if you are:
- Planning or designing a new service
- Updating or improving an existing programme
- Applying for funding
- Commissioning or conducting research.
Combined with your knowledge and expertise, the Guidebook can help you decide which interventions are the best fit for the families and children you work with, in your local setting.
The Foundations Toolkit
Together, the new Guidebook and the Practice Guides series (commissioned by the Department of Education and produced by Foundations) make up our free, online Toolkit for local decision makers and practitioners, and national policy makers and researchers.
The Toolkit offers a complementary set of tools: the Guidebook has information about interventions that make a difference to children and families’ outcomes, and the Practice Guides have recommendations about how to put evidence-based support into action.
As we continue to find out more about what works for children and families, and what information you need, we will update the Guidebook.
