Prior to Preschool

Helping Children from Birth to Three Years

The first three years of childhood is a time of amazing physical and developmental change. Intervention for these children becomes important when there are differences between the developmental skills your child would be expected to have and what she is actually doing. Intervention for children who are not yet three years old is different from intervention for preschoolers in three ways. First, the goals of intervention for younger children are often broader than the goals for preschool children. For example, a young child may have a broad goal to improve fine motor skills while a preschooler may have a specific goal to cut with scissors. Second, the intervention strategies used with young children must be adapted from those used with preschool children because of the differences in mental, language, and physical skills between infants and preschool children. An adult would use the techniques for creating teaching opportunities differently and use different forms of help for infants than for preschoolers. For example, instead of using direct verbal help, a parent might use commenting with an infant--describing what the baby is doing or describing what she, the parent is doing. Then she might watch to see if the child will do what she does. Third, you have to be very careful of when you attempt an intervention because it must be matched to the child's physical, mental, and emotional states in order for intervention to be effective. The signs that an infant is alert, attentive, and ready for interaction with an adult are quite different from the signs that a preschooler is alert, attentive, and ready to interact.

Goals for Early Intervention

Generally speaking, early intervention programs for children from birth to three years old have seven goals in common:

An understanding of these goals can be helpful in providing intervention for young children in everyday settings.

Develop a Family Centered Program

The first goal of early intervention is to develop a program that supports the well being of your family and provides a bridge between what happens in your home and in the programs in which your child is enrolled. You and the program staff work together to develop an Individualized Family Service Plan, which focuses on the needs of the entire family in relation to your child. Planning and assessment should be designed to identify the your family's specific concerns and main concerns. Your family should be the central point for the decision making and setting of goals designed to promote the child's development.

Encourage Independence

A second goal of early intervention is to promote your child's development by encouraging engagement and independence. To accomplish this goal it is important to understand the physical environment--how your infant child interacts with materials and how to create meaningful interactions between your child and his environment. This is important because, in order to promote development, your child must be engaged with materials and activities that are interesting and a little bit challenging.

Promote Development

A third goal of early intervention is to promote development in all areas of growth. These areas of growth are typically described as cognitive skills, motor skills, communicative competence, play and social skills, and self help skills. Because all children grow and develop at different paces, it is important to provide activities will allow your child to master these skills at his own pace.

Build Social Competence

A fourth goal of early intervention is to build and support social competence. Your child's development is improved when she can interact appropriately with others. Teaching your child to interact, however, does not automatically mean she will develop friendships.

Promote Skill Generalization

A fifth goal of early intervention is to promote skill generalization. In order for your child to be successful, she must be able to translate the skills that she has learned in one place and with certain people into other situations. By providing intervention in everyday settings and basing teaching opportunities on your child's interest, you can promote skill generalization.

Provide Normalized Experiences

A sixth goal of early intervention is to provide and prepare for normalized life experiences. All families have a different definition of normal and it is important to help your family achieve a lifestyle according to your own beliefs about normal life experiences. An early intervention program should help your family enjoy the lifestyle and experiences you choose by identifying and providing the supports you need so that the things you want and need to do can happen.

Prevent Future Problems

The seventh goal of early intervention is to prevent the development of future problems or disabilities. Through early identification and intervention, many problems that might occur later in a child's life may be minimized. Prevention can be a positive experience that focuses on supporting your child and your family.

Time to Stop and Think

As you study these general goals of early intervention programs, can you identify how they are being met by the programs that are helping you and your infant child?

Go on to Stages of Growth