Young children learn at very different rates which makes it difficult for parents to identify whether their child may have longer term difficulties or whether he/ she just needs a little more time to develop. For this reason, I offer a different service for children who are in nurseries (or perhaps still at home), one that focuses on identifying areas of possible need mainly through carrying out a developmental assessment and careful observation.

Knowing how your child learns best, identifying supportive strategies and discovering what types of environment maximise his/her potential can be also helpful to you as you think about the future school choices for your child.

Pre-school work tends to unfold depending on individual circumstances and thus, the scope of the work will be discussed when we meet together. You may find additional meetings with yourselves helpful as there are often many questions and topics that parents find useful to explore at this time or you may wish me to support the nursery on a half-termly or termly basis.

1. Information Gathering

At the core of the service is my contact with you to gather a full history, to complete a developmental profile and to clarify your concerns.  You may have information from other professionals that would be helpful to share with me, for example reports from your health visitor, Paediatrician and/ or Nursery.

2. Assessment

Assessing a young child is best done using both developmental assessments (play based and standardised) and observational methods. Observing your child at home and in the nursery will help me to see how he/ she understands and makes sense of the environments in addition to showing me what skills and challenges your child has.

3. Feedback and Planning Meeting

With the information gathered, I will then hold a feedback and planning meeting with you (and nursery staff if appropriate) in order to discuss strategies that might help your child’s development over time; an Individual Education Plan can then be written which can then be reviewed on a regular basis. If requested, I can be involved in the IEP reviews and have ongoing involvement as appropriate. A summary report is issued following this feedback and planning meeting.