Early Intervention

According to the Department of Education’s Early Intervention Paper (2010 “Early intervention means intervening as soon as possible to tackle problems that have already emerged for children and young people”. Schools use a variety of different professionals who come into the school to assist in how a child’s additional needs can be met.

Social Services

Social Workers – they become involved in monitoring the child usually when the parents have asked for help or there is an ongoing concern in regards to the child’s home environment (in which case they may have been contacted by the school directly). They also work with ‘looked after’ children – those who are in care. They provide practical help and advice about a variety of things – home, help,

They provide relevant information and help people understand their rights and entitlements. They also fulfil a practical role such as letter writing and making phone calls on the persons behalf.

Health Services

Health Visitor/nurse – generally work with children from birth to about 5yrs old. They do observations and check-ups as needed, come into schools and advice and speak to staff members, the child’s parent will usually be present. They support and educate on immunization, good childhood nutrition, minor illness and behavioural issues. They can also advise on parental issues such as identifying post-natal depression.

Positive outcomes include improved health and life outcome for the child through good education, thus allowing them to achieve their developmental milestones.

Physiotherapist – This type of intervention is connected with gross motor skills development, giving out advice and setting targets through exercise. They help rehabilitate children who are experiencing problems as a result of injuries, illness or other medical reason to increase their physical movement and improve

As some children can be born with physical problems that affect communication, such as feeding and swallowing problems, the speech and language therapist also deal with issues relating to the throat and mouth as these will affect a child’s speech. They are sometimes based in schools and give diagnosis of any communication delays or disorders. Children will receive certain interventions to assist in their progress and these will need to monitored and reviewed by teachers and sometimes utilise specific techniques to aid in the intervention.

Positive outcomes include – improved language skills, the child will be able to communicate with others, improved education outcome, the child may meet their individual development needs.

Psychologist – They may become involved in a child’s intervention in connection or following on from a speech and language therapist or teaching staff, usually if the child is not showing any signs of progress. They offer advice and counselling to both child and parent over a range of social and emotional problems as well as learning difficulties.

Positive outcomes include – enhance the child’s learning and make practitioners more aware of any social factors affecting he child’s learning thus leading to an improved educational