All About Screening.pdf

ALL ABOUT

Developmental screening is a short, easy-to-complete formal test of young children’s developmental skills, such as motor, cognitive, language, and social-emotional skills.
A developmental screener reliably distinguishes children who should be referred for further, more comprehensive assessment from those who don’t need to be referred.
Doctors, nurses, and other early childhood professionals use developmental screening to tell if children are on track with developing basic skills, or if they might have delays.
A developmental screening tool, such as ASQ®-3, is a research-based instrument that asks questions about a child’s development and gathers information.
All children should receive developmental screenings.

Before the age of 18, about one in seven children in the United States will experience a developmental disability or a disabling behavioral problem.
Before the age of five, as many as one in four U.S. children are at risk for developmental delays or disabilities.
Fewer than 50% of these children are identified before starting school.
Identifying delays early and providing help before age five produces effects that significantly exceed those of services provided to school-age children.

Surveillance: The monitoring or tracking of children’s developmental progress over time
Referral: The action taken by screening personnel to connect families with the appropriate service for their child
Developmental milestones: A set of functional skills and behaviors that are key markers of child development

1 Bricker, Macy, Squires & Marks. (2013). Developmental Screening in Your Community. Baltimore: Brookes Publishing.
2 Center for Disease Control. Developmental Screening Fact Sheet. http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/actearly/pdf/parents_pdfs/developmentalscreening.pdf
3 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of Education. (2014). Birth to Five! Watch Me Thrive: An Early Care and Education Provider’s Guide for Developmental and Behavioral Screening. https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/ecd/ece_providers_guide_march2014.pdf
4 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of Education. Birth to Five! Watch Me Thrive. http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/ecd/ watch-me-thrive
5 ZERO TO THREE (2012). Achieving the Promise of a Bright Future. http://www.zerotothree.org/public-policy/policy-toolkit/devscreensingmar5.pd