Know

Families of Young Children with Special Needs

Infants and toddlers with special needs are members of our communities, programs, and families, and it is our responsibility to provide high-quality, inclusive support for these children and their families. While these families often experience additional situations and stressors, they have hopes, dreams, and concerns for their children just like other families. You can positively impact families with an infant or toddler with special needs by empowering them with knowledge, empathizing with their feelings, and collaborating with other support professionals in their lives.

Working with Families of Children with Special Needs

与家庭建立有意义的人际关系s is a critical part of your work, and your communication is especially important when working with families with infants and toddlers with special needs. Some infants and toddlers will enter your program with known special needs, and other families will learn that their child has a disability or delay while enrolled in your program. Families with eligible children ages birth to three may receive early intervention services and have an individualized family service plan (IFSP). Others may only receive support from a medical center, and some families will be involved with multiple systems of support. Regardless, families can be overwhelmed by what feels like a constant flow of suggestions and appointments to help their children learn and develop. These families often need more help supporting their children’s development and may turn to you, or others in your program, for assistance with connecting to services or agencies outside your program. It may be helpful to form relationships with community agencies so you, or trainers and administrators in your program, have up-to-date information on how to make a referral and the types of services offered. Positive interactions with families and other professionals can decrease families’ stress and improve their well-being.

Families with infants and toddlers with special needs may go through various evaluation processes and may ask you to complete questionnaires or provide input at the request of a doctor, specialist, or teacher. Other professionals rely on this input, especially when they have limited amounts of time with children compared to program staff who often spend many hours each week caring for, educating, and observing children. This information can be used to determine if a child has a specific condition, support the child outcome summary (COS) process, determine eligibility for specific services, and develop goals for an IFSP or individualized education plan (IEP). An IFSP is a written document that states families’ desired outcomes, the steps needed to achieve those outcomes, and recommended services. You, or a trainer or administrator from your program, may be asked to officially participate in a families’ IFSP review, a time when the team of professionals and the family come together to assess progress, create new outcomes, and determine needed services. Working with professionals from outside agencies helps things run smoothly for families and ensures that all of the professionals and caregivers in a child’s life are communicating. This lessens family stress by reducing the need for primary caregivers to act as the in-between messenger of important information.

Effective Practices

The first step to establish strong relationships with families of infants and toddlers with special needs is to spend time discovering their wishes and concerns for their children and to learn about the meaningful activities they participate in at home. Maintaining this communication throughout a child’s time in your program is essential. Ask questions to learn about strategies that work at home and consider using them when providing care. Through your interactions you can build trust so both you and families feel comfortable sharing children’s strengths and if there are concerns (Sandall, Hemmeter, Smith, & McLean, 2005). Before communicating concerns with families, it may be helpful to discuss with a coach, trainer, or administrator your plan to share this information using family-centered practice. Be prepared for families to react in a variety of ways and know how you can offer support if they choose to take specific steps or access other agencies and resources. For families already receiving support from other professionals, ongoing communication with both families and professionals is critical to maintain consistency between program and home environments. When all the caregivers in a child’s life are consistently using effective strategies to promote development and outcomes, children are more likely to benefit and learn new skills.

In your collaboration with families, acknowledge and respect their strengths and unique background, while realizing their ability to make decisions that are right for them (Hanson & Lynch, 2004). This means that when family wishes and decisions are different from what you would recommend, you will respond to the family’s decisions with respect. Ultimately, meaningful communication and relationship-building will enrich the process for both yourself and families.

Take a look at the following guidelines that reflect family-centered practice. You may remember some of these from Lesson 1. Then, think about which of these you can use in your work with families of children with special needs (Turnbull, Turbiville, & Turnbull, 2000):

• Recognizing the family as a constant in the child’s life; caregivers and service systems may come and go
• Facilitating collaboration between families and professionals
• Honoring and respecting family diversity in all dimensions (cultural, racial, ethnic, linguistic, spiritual, and socioeconomic)
• Recognizing family strengths and the different approaches that families may use to cope
• Sharing unbiased and honest information with family members on an ongoing basis
• Encouraging family-to-family support and networking
• Acknowledging and incorporating the developmental needs of the child and other family members into your practice
• Designing and implementing services that are accessible, culturally and linguistically respectful and responsive, flexible, and based on family-identified needs

See

看下面的视频学习difficult conversations with families. Refer to the content two sections above for more ideas on how to communicate about difficult situations.