Pre-IFSP
Team Assessment
Once
eligibility for early intervention services is determined
by the MDT and an early intervention IFSP team is established,
the team should begin collection of needed information
for development of a useful IFSP. The evaluation
information collected by the MDT for determining eligibility
seldom provides the type of information needed for development
of the IFSP.
Specifically,
the IFSP team should pursue understanding of :
- Child's
abilities across all domains (beyond test scores and
developmental levels)
- Understanding
of child and family's daily routines
- Child's
active role in these daily routines
- Family's
and care provider's challenges in caring for the child
- Child's
natural environments for family and community activities
(i.e., park, church, backyard, Gymboree class, etc.)
- Learning
opportunities within each environment (crawling on
grass, sitting in sandbox, sorting food boxes, talking
with peers, selecting songs/videos/toys, shaking musical
instruments, eating with utensils, etc.)
- Strategies
that may be useful for stated concerns/needs
- Family/child
strengths and resources related to stated concerns
(i.e., what has helped? what could be tried?)
- Family's informal and formal support systems
- Family
needs related to specific prioritized concerns
- Family
members' prioritized concerns/need
This
information can be collected by observation, interviews,
and review of available reports. The IFSP team should
respect the value of parent report /observation, input
from routine care providers, and observation of trial
& error use of possible intervention strategies in different
settings, activities and on different days.
This
information can not effectively be collected by one
person in one setting. Each potential team member
should focus on collecting needed information that might
be useful in developing a plan to address the concerns/needs
in their area of expertise.
Care
must be taken, however, not to duplicate efforts in
this assessment process. Information collected from
families must be shared across team members efficiently.
All this information must be collected in time for an
IFSP meeting to be held within 45 days of the referral.
An
IFSP Assessment Report may be useful for the team
to integrate their findings with family concerns prior
to the initial IFSP meeting. Such a report is not required
but if written should:
- Be
a single, family-centered report
- involve
the input of family members and care providers
- be
written in first person (I, we)
- be
written in people-first language ("child has",
NOT "cerebral palsied child")
- refer
to parents by name (NOT "mother", "grandpa")
- be
positive and solution-focused
- contain
specific examples to illustrate points
- avoid
narrative repeat of MDT findings
- avoid
use of jargon and acronyms (i.e., OT, ROM, pre-linguistic
skills)
- be
written in clear simple language that families and
referral agents and team members can easily understand
(i.e., "has" vs "presents with"
or "uses" vs "utilizes")
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