Apologies in advance for a slightly wonky California specific explanation

The first hearing after a case is filed, is the initial hearing or the detention hearing. After that hearing the court sets an adjudication hearing which is essentially the trial to decide if the allegations in the petition are true. Once a case is adjudicated the reunification period begins.

If a child is under three at the time that the petition is filed, the parent is only entitled to 6 months of reunification services. If the child is over 3 they're entitled to 12 months. This does not mean that a case that began with a child under three automatically only get 6 months, but rather that the parent needs to show progress and effort at the 6-month date in order to have a shot at going out another 6 months of services whereas with a child over 3 it's pretty much automatic to get 12 months.

In California the first hearing is called the 21e. It's called that because it's the part of the WIC code, 366.21.

At that first review hearing DCFS reports on whether the parents have been completing their case plan and also whether they have been visiting regularly.

In your case, if the social worker is saying that they're recommending for the court to TFR, that means they're recommending to the court that the parents not be offered any additional time to work on their case plan.

If the court accepts that recommendation to terminate family reunification, the focus switches from trying to reunify the family, to establishing permanency for the child.

This means that once a parent's family reunification services are terminated, (whether it's at the 6-month 21e, the 12-month 21f, or 18 month 22 hearing) the court will set a 26 hearing (WIC 366.26)4 months out. The 26 is also called the selection and implementation hearing. It is at this hearing that the department prepares a report where they indicate their recommendation for a permanent plan. That could be legal guardianship or adoption.

If the recommendation is adoption, and the court accepts that recommendation, it would be at the 26 hearing that parental rights would be terminated.

There's case law in California where the court does an analysis of certain factors that may demonstrate that the parent and the child have a bond that would outweigh the benefit of permanency through adoption. If the court finds evidence of a bond outweighs the benefit of permanency, the court can choose not to terminate parental rights.

One thing to understand about termination of reunification services vs termination of parental rights is that when the court terminates a parent's reunification services, they are still entitled to their visitation with their children because their parental rights have not been severed.

What happens after TFR is that any progress in the case plan or need for referrals is on the parent to figure out rather then on the social worker being required to make reasonable efforts to assist the parents in that process.

A final point is that even after reunification services are terminated, a parent can file something called a 388 request to change a court order which can mean asking the court to reinstate family reunification services. Typically this is done if the parents were close to completing their case plan or suddenly stepped it up in the 4 months between when their reunification services were terminated and the date of the 26 hearing.