Early Care and Education

Provides resources and a guide to a public awareness campaign that was launched by The Departments of Health and Human Services and Education which is targeted at numerous sectors (e.g. early care and education, medical, primary health care, child welfare, mental health) —highlighting the importance of universal developmental and behavioral screening and support within the context of normative child development.

Addresses important questions on developing awareness and moving to action around comprehensive screenings, follow-up, and early intervention.

Presents research-based screening tools for children under age 5. Practitioners in early care and education, primary health care, child welfare, and mental health can use this reference to learn the cost, administration time, quality level, training required, and age range covered for each screening tool.

Describes how partnerships between health care providers and community organizations could have a significant impact on health and developmental outcomes by assisting with early identification, supporting parents, and coordinating needed services in a timely manner.

Examines the effectiveness of developmental screening on the identification of developmental delays, early intervention (EI) referrals, and EI eligibility. Children who participated in a developmental screening program were more likely to be identified with developmental delays, referred to EI, and eligible for EI services in a timelier fashion than children who received surveillance alone. These results support policies endorsing developmental screening. 

Covers topics such as initiating consultation; getting to know the program; adult relationships; beginning case consultation; gathering information and creating a picture of the child; interpreting behavior and developing hypotheses; and translating hypotheses into responsive action within the child-care setting. Includes case examples of effective programmatic functioning, interstaff and parent-staff relationships, and/or direct child interventions.

Synthesizes the findings from 26 recent studies that addressed the effectiveness of early childhood mental health consultation with respect to staff- and program-level outcomes. Across the reviewed studies, there is some evidence that early childhood mental health consultation helped increase staff self-efficacy/confidence and competence in dealing with troubling or difficult behaviors of young children in their care. In several studies, staff receiving consultation had improved sensitivity and lower job-related stress.

Discusses the challenges to estimating the prevalence of serious emotional/behavioral disorder in early childhood, gives a brief review of literature that provides estimates, and provides recommendations to improving the process of estimation.