Developmental Screening in Your Community: An Integrated Approach for Connecting Children with Services

As a professional who works with young children, you know how early detection of delays and disabilities can change the course of a child's whole life. But in today's communities, many programs and providers still struggle to coordinate their screening efforts so children who need services don't slip through the cracks. Integrated, community-wide screening and early detection/child find systems are the answer—and this is the first book with the systematic, big-picture guidance and specific information you need to develop your own system or strengthen and refine your existing system.

Developed by early childhood, medical, and social service experts in screening and assessment, this groundbreaking book helps your community establish an effective early detection system that's comprehensive and low-cost; encourages close collaboration among health, social service, and educational agencies; and meets each child's whole continuum of needs, from universal screening to community services. You'll get detailed guidance on 6 key components of successful community-wide early detection:

1. Program goals
2. Community public awareness
3. Centralized contact and referral
4. Developmental-behavioral screening system
5. Follow-up
6. Ongoing program evaluation

You'll also discover the critical foundations and procedures for:

• connecting everyone who screens children across settings into a single unified system
• ensuring that all parts of the system align and work seamlessly together
• selecting and using the best developmental and behavioral screening measures
• monitoring your system so that all parts keep functioning smoothly and children get the services they need
• improving screening and referrals across diverse settings: early childhood education, social service, and medical home settings
• implementing a successful statewide early detection system (includes specific examples from 10 key states)

With this adaptable, integrated plan for early detection/child find, your community will ensure that delays are caught quickly and all young children and their families get the services and supports they need to thrive.

A featured book in our Successful Screening and Assessment Kit!

See how this product helps strengthen Head Start program quality and school readiness.

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.

Marisa Macy, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Education at Lycoming College in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Dr. Squires is Professor of Special Education, focusing on the field of early intervention/early childhood special education. She oversees research and outreach projects in the areas of developmental screening, implementation of screening systems, early identification of developmental delays, and the involvement of parents in monitoring their young children’s development.

She is lead author of the Ages & Stages Questionnaires®, Third Edition (ASQ®-3; with D. Bricker; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2009), Ages & Stages Questionnaires®: Social-Emotional, Second Edition (ASQ®:SE-2; with D. Bricker and E. Twombly; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2015), and the Social-Emotional Assessment/Evaluation Measure (SEAM™), Research Edition (with D. Bricker, M. Waddell, K. Funk, J. Clifford, & R. Hoselton; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2014).

She has authored or coauthored more than 90 books, chapters, assessments, videotapes, and articles on developmental screening and early childhood disabilities. In 2013, she coauthored the book Developmental Screening in Your Community: An Integrated Approach for Connecting Children with Services (Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2013). Dr. Squires currently teaches doctoral-level courses in early intervention/special education and conducts research on comprehensive early identification and referral systems for preschool children.

Kevin Marks, M.D., is a Pediatrician and Pediatric Hospitalist at PeaceHealth Medical Group, and Clinical Assistant Professor in the School of Medicine, Department of Pediatrics at Oregon Health & Science University.