Question:
My husband and I are taking in a foster child, a 7 year old boy. He has been through a lot, both his parents abused him, and his father sold and was addicted to drugs. Finally he was taken away from the creeps and put into foster care when he was 5. According to the program we signed up with, he is a very “problematic” child, and would probably need a lot of help adjusting.
I explained to my kids how lucky they were to have the life they do, and how the boy that was coming to stay with us might not be very nice at first because he had been through a lot. I was very open about his childhood, I wanted them to fully understand his situation. The boy(his name is Carson) will be coming to live with us soon, and I have a few questions for anyone who has been or are currently foster parents:
First of all, we need some advice as far as discipline goes. We spank occasionally, only after many warnings and on the clothed bottom. Do you think this would be alright if done carefully? We are a fairly strict family and plan on starting him out with time outs, we don’t want to scare him before he adjusts.
Also, does anyone have any tips as far as helping him feel like he is part of the family? He will have his own room, we even decorated it and bought a few toys he can have for himself.
Like I said, he would be a very… ornery boy. He was known to be violent because of frustration and lack of communication skills (he is only 7, so this only consists of kicking, hitting, biting, etc, he isn’t going to be pulling knives on us). I have 3 other children, aged 10, 8, and 5. How can I tell them to handle a situation where he does something mean to them? I told my 10 year old to watch over his sisters a little bit, and to stop him however he can if Carson is hurting them.
Last question, I promise 
My family and I go to church every Sunday, and he has never had an experience like that, been explained religion, or had to sit quietly for too long. We were going to have him go to Bible School with my 8 year old’s group, and I was wondering how we should explain to him about how things work at our church.
Thank you SO much for your help in advance, and for reading my questions. I’m going to be honest, I’m pretty nervous about the whole experience, even though I’m excited. I’m confident in my parenting skills, but I really really want Carson to be happy in his time with us.
I also forgot to mention we did do a training class to help us. They didn’t mention that spanking was bad if it was only a small smack, which is really all we do
And also, when I said that my 10 year old was watching over his sisters, I of course meant when my husband and I were not there. Just clearing that up
