Dr. Johnson is Emeritus Professor in Child and Family Studies at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota, where she retired from providing professional development education in early childhood education, early intervention, and early childhood special education. She completed her undergraduate degree in special education and elementary education at the University of Idaho and her master’s and doctoral degrees in early intervention at the University of Oregon under the advisement of Dr. Diane Bricker.
Dr. Johnson has worked at University Centers for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities in Louisiana, Oregon, and Nevada as Program Coordinator, Teacher, Service Coordinator, Grant and Contract Administrator, Director, Principal Investigator, and Instructor. She served as Director of the Research and Educational Planning Center and the Nevada University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities from 2001 to 2008, where she developed and administered lifespan programs, services, and supports for individuals with disabilities and their families.
Her professional experiences encompass all service settings for young children, including neonatal intensive care units, pediatric intensive care units, well-baby clinics, home- and center-based programs for infants and young children (including Head Start and Early Head Start), nursing homes, supported employment, transition programs, special education schools, and university lab school programs. Much of her professional career has focused on developing and refining assessment and curriculum systems to support the provision of services, interventions, and teaching for young children with disabilities, birth to age 6, and their families. Dr. Johnson is author, developer, and trainer of An Activity-Based Approach to Early Intervention, Fourth Edition (with N. Rahn & D. Bricker; Brookes Publishing Co., 2015), and the Assessment, Evaluation, and Programming System for Infants and Children (AEPS; Brookes Publishing Co., 2002, 2022) and has been involved with the system since her days as a graduate student at the University of Oregon. In her spare time, Dr. Johnson likes to read, work on home projects, observe and interact with young children, and support human and animal rights.
Dr. Rahn is Assistant Professor of Special Education at University of Wisconsin– Whitewater. She completed her undergraduate degree in communicative disorders at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, her master’s degree in early intervention at the University of Oregon, and her doctoral degree in special education at the University of Minnesota under the advisement of Dr. Scott McConnell. She has worked as a preschool special education teacher with children having a range of needs, including children with significant disabilities, and as an early interventionist providing services to infants and toddlers with special needs and their families.
Dr. Rahn is author of An Activity-Based Approach to Early Intervention, Fourth Edition (with J. Johnson & D. Bricker; Brookes Publishing Co., 2015). While at the University of Oregon, she provided training on AEPS and earlier editions of An Activity-Based Approach to Early Intervention to programs around the country as part of an outreach training grant. Her areas of interest include naturalistic intervention strategies, early language and literacy interventions, response to intervention, and personnel preparation. Dr. Rahn’s research focuses on embedded vocabulary and language interventions for young children with disabilities and at risk for disabilities.
Dr. Bricker served as Director of the Early Intervention Program at the Center on Human Development, University of Oregon, from 1978 to 2004. She was a professor of special education, focusing on the fields of early intervention and social-communication.
Her professional interests have addressed three major areas: early intervention service delivery approaches, curricula-based assessment and evaluation, and developmental-behavioral screening. Dr. Bricker's work in early intervention approaches has been summarized in two volumes: An Activity-Based Approach to Early Intervention, Fourth Edition (with J. Johnson & N. Rahn; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2015) and An Activity-Based Approach to Developing Young Children’s Social Emotional Competence (with J. Squires; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2007). Her work in curricula-based assessment/evaluation has focused on the development of the Assessment, Evaluation, and Programming System for Infants and Children, Second Edition (AEPS®; with B. Capt, K. Pretti- Frontczak, J. Johnson, K. Slentz, E. Straka, & M Waddell; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2004). This measure and curricula provides intervention personnel with a system for the comprehensive assessment of young children with results that link directly to curricular content and subsequent evaluation of child progress.
Dr. Bricker has been a primary author of the Ages & Stages Questionnaires® (ASQ®; with J. Squires; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 1995, 1999, 2009) and directed research activities on the ASQ system starting in 1980. Developmental Screening in Your Community: An Integrated Approach for Connecting Children with Services (Bricker, Macy, Squires, & Marks; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2013) offers a comprehensive system for creating and operating community-wide developmental-behavioral screening programs for young children.
Dr. Bricker's distinctions include the Division of Early Childhood, Council for Exceptional Children Service to the Field Award, December 1992, and the Peabody College Distinguished Alumna Award, May 1995.
