The Trustwork Series

A trauma-informed healing system for children, teens, and caregivers navigating foster and kinship care.

The Trustwork Series is a trauma-informed, developmentally aligned three-book curriculum designed to support healing in foster care and kinship systems. Authored by Aaron B. Kershaw and published by BuildingBlocs Literacy, the series gives voice, language, and tools to children, youth, and caregivers ,restoring emotional safety in homes that often feel disconnected by design.

Each book is crafted for a unique audience: Say It Small for children (ages 6–10), Say It Anyway for youth (ages 10–18), and Steady in the Storm for caregivers and system-connected adults. Aligned chapter by chapter, this curriculum allows families and professionals to walk through the same healing themes, together, even when reading separately.

What sets this series apart is its emotional infrastructure: simple metaphors like “cups,” “spills,” “maps,” and “repair scripts” make deep concepts accessible across ages. Whether you’re in a foster home, group setting, church ministry, or agency program, the Trustwork Series equips you with a synchronized system of healing, not just advice.

This is not therapy. It’s something sacred: a shared language for rebuilding trust, navigating grief, and becoming steady, even in the storm.

• Audience: Foster children (ages 6–10), foster youth (10–18), and caregivers
•  Core Focus: Trauma-informed emotional healing, identity repair, relationship scaffolding
• Format: 3-book series (one per age group) + facilitator guide for 8-week delivery
• Tools Include: Emotion maps, nervous system resets, “fix-it” scripts, co-regulation tools, voice-claiming prompts
• Settings: Foster and kinship homes, shelters, schools, churches, agency programs
• Spiritual Lens: Values-based, optional for ministry use, clinically safe for secular spaces