EvidenceBased FamilySchool Partnerships for Early Childhood

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Evidence-Based Family-School Partnerships for
Early Childhood
The Future of School Psychology Task Force on
Family-School Partnerships Jon Lasser and
Kathryn Woods
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Efforts to provide early childhood programs,
collaborations, and resources to children,
families, and schools are a critical component of
a proactive, prevention oriented, comprehensive
plan for positive child outcomesSee FSP
Handout 1 for More Information
Overview
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Rationale for a Multi-Tiered Approach to
Family-School Partnerships

• Family-school partnerships provide a context for
  families and educators to collaboratively
  identify and prioritize concerns across a
  continuum of opportunities and intensities
• Prevention and intervention efforts and supports
  are delivered toward a universal and targeted
  audience
• A multi-tiered approach enables families and
  educators to provide services based on a
  students responsiveness to previous preventions,
  interventions, and supports
• See FSP Handout 2 for More Information

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Explanation for a Multi-Tiered Approach to
Family-School Partnerships

• Provides various levels of family-school supports
  based on a students identified need and
  responsiveness to previous efforts
• Universal Family-school collaboration provided
  to support all students and families (e.g., 4 As,
  Parent-School Collaboration, Parent Involvement,
  Parent Education).
• Targeted Family-school collaboration provided
  to support identified students and families
  unresponsive to previous universal efforts (e.g.,
  Parent Education and Intervention, Parent
  Consultation).
• Intensive Family-school collaboration provided
  to students and families unresponsive to previous
  targeted efforts (e.g., Parent Consultation
  conjoint behavioral consultation and Parent
  Intervention).

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The Multi-Tiered Approach to Family-School
Partnerships
Tier 3 Intensive, Individual Interventions Indivi
dualized supports for families and students
unresponsive to the first two tiers (e.g., Parent
Consultation conjoint behavioral consultation
and Family Intervention)
Tier 3 1-7
Tier 2 Targeted Group Interventions Specific
preventions and remedial interventions for
targeted groups of families and students
identified as at risk and unresponsive to the
first tier (e.g., Parent Training and
Intervention, Parent Consultation)
Tier 2 5-15
Tier 1 Universal Interventions Engaging all
families as collaborative partners (e.g., 4 As,
Family-School Collaboration, Parent Involvement,
Parent Education)
Tier 1 80-90
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Evidence-Based Interventions in this Module

• Dialogic Reading
• Parents and teachers learn how to build emergent
  literacy and language skills by encouraging young
  children to become active participants through
  interactive and shared picture book reading
  practices
• Incredible Years
• Parent and teacher training programs designed to
  promote social adjustment of preschool and
  elementary school children through positive
  discipline and involvement
• Parent-Child Interaction Therapy
• An intervention designed to restructure
  parent-child interaction patterns to facilitate a
  more positive relationship, often used to treat
  children with disruptive behavior disorders

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Early Intervention

• The goal of early intervention is to prevent or
  reduce the effects of academic, social,
  emotional, and behavioral difficulties for
  children who are at risk due to physical, mental,
  or environmental conditions (Bates, 2005)
• These services may prevent developmental delays
  from worsening and ameliorate later disabilities
  that require special education services (Jacob
  Hartshorne, 2003)
• Federal mandates such as IDEA outline the
  importance of early intervention and family
  involvement
• Part B mandates services for children ages 3 to 5
• Part C mandates services for infants and toddlers
  as well as family involvement in intervention
  programs

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Importance of Working with Families

• Parents have enormous influence over their
  childrens behavioral, emotional, and social
  development
• At no time is this influence more important than
  during a childs preschool years
• Many of the behavioral problems that young
  children exhibit are established through their
  earliest interactions with their parents
• Even in cases where the childs problems may
  originate due to biological or developmental
  characteristics, many problem behaviors may
  worsen due to the interaction patterns between
  parents and children

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Early Childhood Education

• Early childhood learning experiences are more
  important for children today than ever before
• Many children enter school unprepared to learn
  and many lack basic knowledge regarding letters,
  vocabulary, sentence structure and numbers
  crucial to school success
• Parents and teachers must work together to
  optimize learning environments and prepare
  children for school success

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Emergent Literacy Skills

• Emergent literacy skills include the knowledge
  and attitudes that are presumed to be
  developmental precursors to conventional forms of
  reading and writing, as well as the environments
  that support these precursors
• As children develop their emergent literacy
  skills, they will be better prepared to learn
  essential school skills related to reading and
  writing
• Children will also be more likely to maintain
  these skills throughout their early learning
  years
• (Whitehurst Lonigan, 1998)

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Early Literacy Experiences

• Childrens preschool experiences with books also
  plays an important role in academic performance
  in later years
• Wells (1985) found that the frequency of
  listening to stories between 1 and 3 years of age
  was associated to teacher ratings of oral
  language skills at 5 years of age and reading
  comprehension at 7 years of age

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Early Literacy Experiences cont.

• Providing children with early literacy
  experiences is particularly important for
  children living in low income environments
• These children may experience a limited amount of
  time exposed to books due to lack of availability
  and limited time available for parents to read
  with their children (Whitehurst et al., 1994)

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Social Skills Development

• Children develop appropriate social skills across
  home and school settings when parents and
  teachers model positive problem-solving and
  manage misbehavior effectively (Patterson, 1982
  Webster-Stratton, 2000)
• Because children with conduct problems often
  experience academic failures, prevention and
  intervention efforts should target all facets of
  problem situations
• Early intervention may prevent more serious,
  chronic difficulties

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References

• Bates, S.L. (2005). Evidence-based family-school
  interventions. School Psychology Quarterly, 20,
  352-370.
• Jacob, S., Hartshorne, T. (2003). Ethics and
  law for school psychologists (4th ed.). New
  York John Wiley Sons, Inc.
• Patterson, G.R. (1982). Coercive Family Process.
  Eugene, OR Castalia.
• Webster-Stratton, C. (June, 2000). The
  Incredible Years Training Series. Juvenile
  Justice Bulletin. US Department of Justice.
• Wells, G. (1985). Language development in the
  preschool years. Cambridge Cambridge University
  Press.
• Whitehurst, G. J., Arnold, D. S., Epstein, J. N.,
  Angell, A. L., Smith, M., Fischel, J. E.
  (1994). A picture book reading intervention in
  daycare and home for children from low-income
  families. Developmental Psychology, 30, 679689.
• Whitehurst, G. J. Lonigan, C. J. (1998). Child
  development and emergent literacy. Child
  Development, 69, 848-872.