Top to Bottom to Top -- Suzanne Milbourne, Chapel Hill, NC, August 2005

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Inclusive Classrooms Top to Bottom Bottom to
Top
Presented at the Fifth National Early Childhood
Inclusion Institute August 3-5, 2005 William and
Ida Friday Center for Continuing Ed Chapel Hill,
NC
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Todays Agenda

• Review principles and definitions of inclusion
• Add to your collection of tools strategies to
  promote childrens participation in child care

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True or False?????????

• Children are included when they are part time in
  child care and part time in a specialized setting
• When children participate in a variety of
  community activities or programs but receive
  their education in a specialized setting, they
  are included.
• A child is considered to be included regardless
  of setting if it is the parents choice
• Children are included if they attend child care
  full time and EI services are provided in the
  home
• When children participate in all activities and
  routines in the same way as other children, they
  are included whether they are attending a
  specialized setting or a child care
  program.

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So what is inclusion??

• When children with special needs (with
  disabilities, developmental delays, or special
  behavioral or emotional needs) participate and
  learn in settings with typical children of their
  own chronological ages and with supports to
  guarantee their successful participation and
  learning.

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Inclusion is not something we do a little of.It
either is or it isnt.Inclusion is the opposite
of exclusion.Inclusion is elegant in its
simplicity and, like love, awesome in its
complexity.
Marsha Forest, 1990
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Setting Child Care Programs

• We know that national studies of child care
  settings (e.g., PA Feine et al. 2002 study) as a
  whole show that a majority of child care settings
  provide average or marginal care

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• Child caregivers, preschool teachers, early
  intervention staff, and parents hold values and
  beliefs about practices for young children,
  generally, and about children with disabilities
  (Lieber et al., 1998)

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What does a quality program look like?
Use Recommended Practices (e.g., accreditation
standards, early learning standards,
environmental rating scale categories)
Establish Expectations Through Participation-Based
Outcomes
Apply a Strength-based Approach
Implement a Child-Centered Viewpoint
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• Focuses on what children can do (not what they
  cannot do)
• Engages children by targeting their capabilities,
  interests, motivation, etc.
• Frames what children need to learn within a
  context of engagement

Apply a Strength-based Approach
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• Target ways of supporting childrens
  participation in activities and routines
• Identify skills needed to participate
  successfully
• Establish accommodations/ adaptations (including
  use of Assistive Technology) teaching-learning
  strategies to ensure childrens success

Establish Expectations Through Participation-Based
Outcomes
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• Macie will participate in snack time by
  interacting with the other children and by
  feeding herself finger food snacks and drinking
  from a cup with as much assistance as needed by
  other children.

EXAMPLE Establish Expectations Through
Participation-Based Outcomes
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What may assist Macie to be successful?

• Sit in a wooden Rifton type chair for snack so
  she is well supported and can use her arms and
  hands for eating (and not to stay upright in the
  chair)
• Ask Macie what she needs (or wants) in order for
  her to use signs
• Facilitate conversation among the children,
  encouraging Macie to participate
• Introduce a Sippie cup with two handles
• Offer medium-sized finger foods easy to grasp
• Guide her with support under her elbow if she
  needs help to get the food to her mouth or cup to
  her lips.
• ALWAYS, ALWAYS praise her for successes.

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• Individualizes for all children by matching
  learning opportunities with childrens strengths,
  developmental competencies, and needs.
• Requires collaboration to identify optimal
  teaching-learning strategies and to account for
  key areas of learning and development

Implement a Child-Centered Viewpoint
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Collaboration Individualization
Early Learning/Child Care Staff
Early Intervention Providers

• Intervene with children by working on skill
  deficits
• Are guided by the IFSP or IEP
• Include multiple disciplines with different types
  of expertise
• Work with children individually (or in small
  groups)

• Teach children by facilitation creating
  learning opportunities
• Are guided by standards curricula
• Include educational staff of varying level of
  training and education
• Work with children in groups

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Making a DifferenceHow can we create meaningful
learning opportunities for ALL children?
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Institute
Planning
Training
Collaboration
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Tools for planning, training and collaboration
Child Portfolios Team Meetings Whats Going
Well? Professional Development Collaboration
Continuum
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PIN Training Programs All About Me Child
Portfolio
Provides opportunities for child care providers
to develop a strength-based perspective about
children with special needs (Campbell, Milbourne,
Silverman, 2000)
Promotes interactions between providers and
families
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Child Team Meetings

• Plan during convenient times e.g., nap time,
  parent availability, when EI providers have a
  regular visit

Vary times to accommodate all members
Keep meetings short 30 minutes AND keep them
focused
Keep minutes so that everyone can be informed
Focus on participation-based outcomes play nice!
Rules for the Road
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Frame Goals and Outcomes As Participation-Based
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Relevance Functionality

• Re-write any goals or objectives that are not
  functional, relevant, meaningful
• Ask If the child cannot do the skill, will an
  adult have to? (If the answer is no, the skill
  is not relevant and functional)
• Ask what immediate purpose (relevance) does
  this skill have for the childs participation in
  child care?
• Ask from the childs perspective, is this
  something that the child is interested in
  learning? Wants to be able to do? Will make a
  difference for the child?

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Have a Conversation with the child care provider

• Identify Activities that
• Go Well
• Dont Go Well

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Identify Routines Activities in the child care
program
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Professional Development Opportunities

• We know that participation in group training
  sessions alone has marginal or no impact on
  program quality (Cassidy et al., 1995)
• Group training plus structured on-site
  consultation can impact program quality (Campbell
  Milbourne, 2005 Kontos et al, 1996)
• Targeted short-term mentoring or on-site
  consultation can improve program quality (Feine,
  2002 Palsha Wesley, 1998)

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Effective Professional Development Approaches

• Targeted on-site consultation and mentoring
• Impact program quality
• Provide specific strategies for an individual
  child

• Group Training plus on-site consultation
• Impact program quality
• General training about children with disabilities

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Opportunities for Professional Development about
children with special needs

• EXAMPLE
• PIN training approach

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Group Training Plus On-Site Consultation PIN
Training Programs

• In field-tests, improved program quality in
  infant-toddler and center-based child care
  settings (Campbell Milbourne, 2005 Campbell et
  al., in press)
• Easily adapted for use in a variety of
  professional development situations

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Targeted On-Site Consultation Mentoring

• Impacts program quality when consultation is
  directed to particular areas of program quality
  (e.g., adult-child interactions learning
  activities)
• Success depends on use of an identified model of
  consultation (e.g., Buysee Wesley, 2005
  Milbourne Campbell, 2005) or of mentoring
  (e.g., Fiene, 2002)

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Collaboration Through On-Site Consultation
Mentoring

• Promotes successful participation of children
  with any number of labels (e.g., with special
  needs developmental delays emotional,
  behavioral, or mental health concerns known
  disabilities)
• Success depends on use of specific strategies
  individualized for the environment child

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Wolery Odom, 2000
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Try a variety of
Specialized Strategies
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Strategies to ensure meeting childrens
individualized needs
Activities Routines Matrix Generic
Instructional Plan Curriculum Skill Webs
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Activities and Routines Matrix Child
__________________ Date _____________
Adapted from Cavallaro and Haney, 1999,
Preschool Inclusion, Paul H. Brooks Publishing
Co.
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Generic Instructional Plan
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Sand play outside put spoons utensils to
use for scooping, pouring
Use spoon help with scooping
Mealtimes Snacks
Finger feeding
Object Play

Introduce fork for stabable foods
Opportunities for Practice Learning About
Eating Motor Skills
Put spoons, cups, utensils in toy box for
manipulation
Try art activities such as finger painting,
painting with sponges for fine motor skill
development
Toys to encourage pouring, scooping
Creative Play
Water Play
Provide dolls model feeding
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• Find out which activities/routines go well for
  the family and the activities/routines with which
  they are not satisfied and/or do not go well

Identify Activities/Routines on Which the
Family Would Like to Focus Find out What is
Happening Now

• Tots-n-Tech Just In Time Resource Guide
• April 2005
• Tots-n-Tech Research Institute
• CFSRP, 5th Floor Edison, 130 S. 9th St.,
  Philadelphia, PA 19107
• http//tnt.asu.edu
• How to Use This Resource Guide
• Identify one or more activities that the family
  participates in
• outside of the home and
• Identify family routines (those that occur at
  home)
• Find out which activities/routines go well for
  the family and

the routines with which they are not satisfied
and/or do not go well

Find out how satisfied the family is with the
childs performance in five functional ability
areas Communicating with children adults
Interacting with adults caregivers
non-caregivers Interacting with children Using
hands and arms Getting around from place to
place
Use Adaptations and AT as an INTERVENTION to
promote participation

Use the Heres the Situation Try This
Adaptation Chart AT Web to Design AT
Adaptations Teaching Strategies
Use the Adaptation Hierarchy to Plan From the Top
Down
Adaptation Hierarchy
Examples
Finding Out About Activities Routines Use the
TNT Family Interview To ------
Find out how satisfied the family is with the
childs performance in five functional ability
areas Communicating with children adults
Interacting with adults caregivers
non-caregivers Interacting with children Using
hands and arms Getting around from place to
place
Activities Routines Examples of Activities
Outside the Home
Examples of Functional Abilities That Occur
Within the Context of Activities Routines

Using Adaptations Assistive Technology to
Promote Childrens Participation Learning
Heres the Situation --- Try this Adaptation
Activity or Routine What is happening now?
      Desired Outcome       Can use the
adaptation/AT without teaching Needs teaching or
practice to use AT Describe


Using Adaptations Assistive Technology to
Promote Childrens Participation
Learning Heres the Situation --- Try this
Adaptation!!
Activity or Routine Reading stories at home
with mom and brother What is happening now? Mom
sits the two boys on the sofa beside her so that
MJ can be propped up to sit and be close to the
book. MJ looses interest in reading because he
is unable to see the book, help turn the pages,
or talk about what is going on in the story.
Desired Outcome MJ will participate in reading
a book with his mom and brother by listening,
talking about the story, helping to turn the
pages. Can use the adaptation/AT without
teaching Needs teaching or practice to use AT
Describe
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Make use of
Assistive Technology
Adaptations
Accommodations
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Assistive Technology
Promote childrens participation in activities
and routines at home, in the community (or
neighborhood), and in child care or other
group-based programs
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Assistive Technology Devices

• Are tools that result in personal change in
  human functions carried out within the context of
  environmental settings demands
• Blackhurst Lahm, 2000.

Existence (eating, etc.) Communication Positioning
Travel and Mobility Environmental
Interactions Education and Transition Recreation
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• The INVERSE principle
• The greater the challenges associated with the
  child,
• the more skill the TEAM working with the child
  has to have

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Use Adaptation As A Primary Intervention Strategy
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Adaptations as Interventions

• Environments, activities routines, have social
  and physical expectations for participation

• Adaptations, including assistive technology allow
  participation in typical routines and activities

Adaptations function as a mediator to make a
bridge between the childs abilities and the
demands or expectations of the environment
By promoting participation, opportunities for
learning are increased
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Facilitating Childrens Participation and
Learning
Environmental Accommodations Adapt Set-Up of
Environment Adapt/Select Equipment
Equipment/Adaptations for Positioning Adapt
Schedule Select or Adapt Activity Adapt Materials
Toys Adapt Requirements or Instructions Have
Another Child Help -- Peer/Sibling
Assistance Have an Individual Child Do Something
Different (within the same activity) Have an
Adult Help a Child Do the Activity Have an
Individual Child Do Something Outside of
the Context (with an Adult)
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Inverse Principle again
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What Skills Do Teams Need to Have?
Ability and motivation to address the issue of
HOW the child may be successfully included (not
IF the child can be included)
Problem-solving and the belief that the TEAM may
solve any problem
Creativity to come up with unconventional but
successful solutions
High reliance on adaptations as intervention
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So, how did we just spend the last 1.5 hours?

• We discussed some principles of inclusion

• We reviewed four components of quality
  programming
• Recommended practices
• Participation-based outcomes
• Strength-based approach
• Child-centered viewpoint

• And, in order for us to contribute to quality
  programming

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We now have New Tools

• Tools for planning, training and collaboration
• Child Portfolios
• Team Meetings
• Whats Going Well?
• Professional Development
• Collaboration Continuum

• Strategies to meet childrens individual needs
• Activities and Routines Matrix
• Instructional Plans
• Curriculum Skill Webs

Make use of Assistive Technology and Adaptations
and Modifications
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Take-Home Plan

• Visit our website for more ideas
• and to download forms
• http//jeffline.jefferson.edu/cfsrp