The Ultimate Resource Guide for Early Intervention Professionals
Are you just starting in Early Intervention or a seasoned therapist seeking resources to enhance your EI practice? Whether you're an Occupational Therapist, Physical Therapist, Speech Therapist, or other Early Intervention professional, this post is a treasure trove of Early Intervention resources designed to keep you informed about evidence-based practices and empower the families you work with.
Do you find yourself constantly searching for valuable Early Intervention resources?
Well, you're not alone!
As a pediatric Occupational Therapist, I’ve even heard other OTPs refer to it as “informational hoarding” 🤪.
But hey, we solemnly pledge in OT school to be lifelong learners so I guess it’s to be expected.
The quest for evidence-based and practice-enhancing resources can often feel like a second full-time job. Balancing our various roles as busy Early Intervention professionals can be a juggling act in itself.
Today, I'm sharing a curated list of the most exceptional Early Intervention resources. Whether you're a seasoned Early Interventionist or just beginning your EI journey, this compilation has something to offer you.
My mission is to help you enjoy your OT practice while better serving the needs of young children and their families (but also save you time so you can focus on all your other important occupations!).
So, let's dive in and explore some Early Intervention resources!
Affiliate links included below. See disclaimer for full details.
Early Intervention Books
The Early Intervention Coaching Handbook, 2nd Edition by Dathan Rush and M’Lisa Shelden
This book walks you step‐by‐step through the five characteristics of successful coaching practices: observation, action, reflection, feedback, and joint planning. You'll learn about the essential qualities of effective coaches and discover how to adjust your coaching techniques to meet the specific needs of early childhood educators, parents, and caregivers. This book includes updated research, the latest evidence‐based practices, and almost 80 pages of sample scripts and scenarios that help you support families of children with a wider variety of diagnoses. With this practical guide to proven coaching techniques, you'll be ready to help both professionals and families support the learning and development of all young children.
Early Intervention Every Day!: Embedding Activities in Daily Routines for Young Children and Their Families By Merle Crawford and Barbara Weber
The practical sourcebook is packed with research-based strategies for helping parents and caregivers take a consistent, active role in supporting young children’s development. Targeting 80 skills in 6 key developmental domains for children birth to three, this reader-friendly guide gives professionals dozens of ready-to-use ideas for helping families and caregivers embed learning opportunities in their everyday routines. Early interventionists will turn to this book again and again for strategies that enhance child development, strengthen attachment, and help children with developmental delays participate fully in family life.
Pause and Reflect by Dana Childress
This one‐of‐a‐kind workbook is designed to help you reflect on what you do, why you do it, and how you can continue to grow your skills to ensure the best outcomes for the families you serve. Dana Childress, a seasoned practitioner and trainer, gives you a systematic, organized, and efficient way to pause and reflect on your practices, so you can be confident that you're translating the best, most current knowledge into real‐world action every day. Engaging, interactive exercises will help every professional—at any level of experience—examine and enhance their work with young children and families. You'll get reflection prompts, realistic examples, self‐assessments, knowledge checks, action plan templates, and reflective journal pages.
Routines-Based Early Intervention: Supporting Young Children and Their Families By R. A. McWilliam
A proven model for family-centered intervention in natural environments, routines-based intervention is the approach thousands of professionals trust to improve the lives of young children and families. This definitive guide is from the leading authority on routines-based intervention. Putting the wisdom and strategies from his popular workshops into book form, Robin McWilliam gives professionals a detailed framework for early intervention that addresses families' individual needs and helps children participate in daily routines. With this step-by-step guidance on each part of the routines-based intervention model, professionals in Part C programs will reach their key goals during visits to homes and childcare settings.
The Whole Brain Child by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson
Written by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson, The Whole-Brain Child is a revolutionary approach to child rearing with twelve key strategies that foster healthy brain development, leading to calmer, happier children. While not specifically focused only on the Early Intervention population, this book gives all parents and providers a good understanding of the child’s developing brain with age specific strategies for dealing with day-to-day struggles.
No Drama Discipline by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson
The pioneering experts behind the bestselling The Whole-Brain Child - Tina Payne Bryson and Daniel J. Siegel, the New York Times bestselling author of Brainstorm - now explore the ultimate child-raising challenge: discipline. Highlighting the fascinating link between a child’s neurological development and the way a parent reacts to misbehavior, No-Drama Discipline provides an effective, compassionate road map for dealing with tantrums, tensions, and tears - without causing a scene.
Early Intervention Websites
Family Guided Routines-Based Intervention
Family Guided Routines Based Intervention, or FGRBI, is an approach to early intervention services and supports that integrates family-centered practice, adult learning, coaching, and feedback with evidence-based intervention on functional and meaningful outcomes in everyday routines and activities. This website contains lots of articles and handouts for both providers and parents.
Virginia Early Intervention Professional Development Center
The Virginia Early Intervention Professional Development (VEIPD)Center team provides coordination and oversight of Virginia'sComprehensive System of Personnel Development (CSPD) for early interventionists who provide support and services for infants and toddlers with developmental delays and disabilities and their families under Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA). They Produce resources (webinars, trainings, videos, blog, modules, etc) to support ongoing early intervention professional development and certification.
The family infant and preschool program (FIPP)
FIPP provides direct support to children and their families in Alexander, Burke, Caldwell, Catawba, and McDowell counties in western North Carolina. We serve children birth to five years of age, families, and women who are pregnant. They offer a variety of learning opportunities for professionals interested in learning about evidence-based practices.
Evidenced-Based International Early Intervention Office
The EIEIO is the academic and administrative home of the Routines-Based Model (RBM) of Early Intervention for children birth to 5 years with disabilities and their families. The RBM was developed by Robin McWilliam. The EIEIO combines the efforts of researchers, trainers, and practitioners to conduct research and provide technical assistance to programs, states, and national programs.
EI Excellence
A website of collaborative effort of EI professionals in the Charlotte and Mecklenburg County area of North Carolina.
ECTA
The ECTA Center supports state IDEA Part C and Part B, Section 619 programs in developing more equitable, effective, and sustainable state and local systems, that support access and full participation for each and every young child with a disability, and their family. They are a consortium of national experts from across multiple organizations.
Center on the Developing Child
The mission of the Center on the Developing Child is to drive science-based innovation that achieves breakthrough outcomes for children facing adversity.
Pathways.org
A non-profit organization providing resources to help understand, track, and encourage baby's milestones for the best possible outcomes. A great way to review development. A huge library of parent-friendly short videos and an app too!
CDC milestone charts
Spanish and English versions of milestone tracker checklists. There’s also an app for parents.
STAR Institute
The STAR Institute was formed in 2016 from two merged organizations SPD Foundation and STAR Center. STAR Institute for SPD provides premier treatment, education, and research for children, adolescents, and adults with SPD. Their mission is to impact quality of life by developing and promoting best practices for sensory health and wellness through treatment, education, and research.
Center on the Social and Emotional Foundations for Early Learning
The CSEFEL is a national resource center funded by the Office of Head Start and Child Care Bureau for disseminating research and evidence-based practices to early childhood programs across the country. It’s focused on promoting the social-emotional development and school readiness of young children birth to age 5.
Growing Little Brains Early Intervention Blog Posts
Early Intervention Continuing Education
Continuing Education: Parent Coaching
RBI training
Live and onsite training as well as certification in utilizing the Routines-Based Model of Early Intervention designed by Robin McWilliams.
GLB: Getting Started in EI
This is a 1-hour FREE online self-paced course for Early Intervention Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, or Occupational Therapy students who are new or transitioning to the field of Early Intervention. It will discuss the role of the OT in Early Intervention, the key principles of Early Intervention, and the benefits of utilizing a parent coaching model of intervention.
Getting Started with Parent Coaching
This is a 5.5 hour AOTA-approved online self-paced course for Early Intervention Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, OT students, Physical Therapists, Speech-Language Pathologists, or other Early Intervention professionals who want to utilize a parent coaching model of intervention with their clients. A detailed description of each step of the coaching model as defined by Rush and Shelden will be discussed. Pre-recorded videos from Early Intervention treatment sessions will be shared to model each step of the coaching model. In addition, numerous parent handouts and therapist resources are provided to deepen the understanding of this model.
Continuing Education: Autism
The National Professional Development Center on Autism Spectrum Disorder
The National Professional Development Center on Autism Spectrum Disorder (NPDC) was funded by the Office of Special Education Programs in the US Department of Education from 2007-2014. The NPDC developed free professional resources for teachers, therapists, and technical assistance providers who work with individuals with ASD. Resources include detailed information on how to plan, implement, and monitor specific evidence-based practices.
PLAY project
The P.L.A.Y. (Play and Language for Autistic Youngsters) Project® is a parent-implemented, intensive early intervention program for young children with autism that is evidenced-based. They offer a series of trainings, workshops, and certifications for both parents and professionals.
DIR Floortime
The International Council on Development and Learning (ICDL) is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to promoting each person's development to its fullest potential. Through the genius and leadership of Dr. Stanley Greenspan, ICDL was formed 33 years ago and became the official home of DIR® and DIRFloortime®. DIRFloortime® is used to help children, young adults, and even adults with a wide range of emotional, sensory, regulatory, motor, learning, and developmental challenges. DIRFloortime® is recognized as a leading evidence-based approach to helping individuals on the autism spectrum and others with neurodevelopmental differences flourish. ICDL provides training courses for parents and professionals through the DIRFloortime® Training Program.
Autism Navigator
Autism Navigator is a unique collection of web-based tools and courses using extensive video footage to bring science to communities. There are FREE webinars and resources for both families and professionals.
Learn Play Thrive approach to autism
This neuro-diversity-affirming approach seeks to teach therapists how to interpret behavior and generate interventions built on deepening a provider's understanding of autism learning styles. Therapists are trained to create effective interventions based on the strengths and learning styles of autistic children.
Continuing Education: Feeding
SOS feeding
The Sequential Oral Sensory (SOS) feeding approach was developed by Dr. Kay Toomey and integrates motor, oral, behavioral/learning, medical, sensory and nutritional factors and approaches in order to comprehensively evaluate and manage children with feeding/growth concerns. It is evidenced-based and many workshops and a certification program are offered for professionals. There are also many parent-friendly resources on this website.
SOFFI
Taught by Dr. Erin Ross, PhD, CCC-SLP brings over 30 years of experience working within the neonatal intensive care unit and with infants after discharge. During this time, she has brought her experience in developmentally supportive care practices and feeding development and intervention services together to create SOFFI®: Supporting Oral Feeding in Fragile Infants. SOFFI® is an integrated approach to supporting oral feeding in preterm and in infants who have complex medical issues, both in the NICU and in the Early Intervention setting. SOFFI® is offered both in an online video format and virtually “live” via ZOOM.
Melanie Potock
Melanie Potock is a pediatric SLP and feeding expert. She has many courses, books & articles focused on raising kids to be healthy, happy eaters. From babies to toddlers to teens. She also produces lots of helpful content for parents and professionals on IG.
Beckman Oral Motor
The protocol developed by Debra Beckman uses mechanical muscle responses, which are not mediated cognitively, to baseline the response to pressure and movement, range of movement, variety of movement, strength of movement, and control of movement for the lips, cheeks, jaw, and tongue.
The Lactation OT
Lactation-specific continuing education for OT, SLP, PT, IBCLC, and healthcare professionals.
Get Permission Approach
Taught by Marsha Dunn Klein, OTR/L, M.Ed. FAOTA, The Get Permission Approach is a responsive, sensitive, and evidence-based approach to supporting children with feeding challenges. There are other courses on this website too and a membership community just for feeding therapists.
AEIOU
This course teaches a step-by-step approach for helping children learn to explore food, enjoy eating, and participate independently in social mealtimes. The AEIOU approach (acceptance, exposure, independence, observation, and understanding) offers a new and highly successful method for integrated treatment of infants and young children with challenging feeding disorders using sensory, oral motor, biomedical, and environmental strategies.
Catherine Shaker
Catherine S Shaker, MS/CCC-SLP, BCS-S offers feeding and swallowing seminars for neonates, medically fragile infants, and children through school age.
Early Intervention Community/Mentorship
There are way more continuing education opportunities now than when I first started my Occupational Therapy career 23 years ago. However, obtaining knowledge is only one part of the equation. When you are just getting started in Early Intervention (and heck, even when you have years of experience), it’s more important to have a support system and others to collaborate and brainstorm with. This is how the application of knowledge and growth occurs. The following list are programs I wish I had known about and had early on in my career.
Growing Little Brains 6-week group mentorship
This 6-week group mentorship program was designed by Melanie Batista, OTR/L to help new-to-the-field Early Intervention OTPs transform into confident practitioners ready to step into clients' lives knowing where and how to start making an impact. It focuses on teaching a parent coaching model of intervention and gives practical tips, resources, handouts, and video examples of EI sessions to fast-track success and lessen the overwhelm. There are also weekly group Zoom calls to deepen understanding, master the application of new learning, and troubleshoot each participant’s questions and caseloads.
The Therapy Village
A yearly membership program led by Melanie Batista, OTR/L providing EI-focused CEUs, discussions, time-saving resources, parent handouts, and a community for Early Intervention professionals to share knowledge and provide support to one another.
Coach2Coach with Stacey Landberg, MS, CCC-SLP
A community of EI professionals led by Stacey Landberg focused on learning and honing the application of parent coaching strategies.
Division for Early Childhood-Early Intervention Community of Practice
The Early Intervention CoP is a place where your voice can be heard and where you can gain new insights about working with families of infants and toddlers (birth to age 3) with developmental delays or disabilities. This is the place to pose questions, share ideas, problem-solve, and discuss any early intervention topics of interest to you. You can also find resources specific to your interests and enhance your work in early intervention.
Want to receive a FREE copy of this resource list in a PDF version?
Your dedication to serving young children and their families through Occupational Therapy is truly inspiring.
But, I want you to remember that you don’t have to have all the knowledge today! (and btw…you’ll never possess all the knowledge).
Your desire to help, ability to listen to your clients, establish rapport, and collaborate with your families will always be your strongest asset as an EI therapist.
The pursuit of excellence in our practice is an ongoing adventure, and I’m here to support you every step of the way.
So, take these resources, explore, learn, and grow.
And then I’d love to hear your feedback. Are there any other resources you’d like to see added to the list?
