Inclusion in Preschool as a Catalyst to Enhance the Quality of Comprehensive Community-Based Early Childhood Programs

Advances in comprehensive community-based early childhood systems require sophisticated partnerships among numerous constituencies including health, education, human services, and parent groups. Considered here is the potential for early childhood inclusive practices based on a commonly shared developmental framework to facilitate those partnerships. Also discussed is the potential for this developmental framework to generate a process capable of accelerating inclusion by influencing attitudes and beliefs recognizing that, despite the extensive adaptations and adjustments often required, fundamental developmental mechanisms apply to all children. Focusing on preschool age children, a developmentally based organizational structure and collaborative process is presented designed to support family-centered interventions utilizing well-established developmental influences on child development. This process is illustrated with an example to enhance a child’s peer-related social skills and interactions. Based on this framework, a model of personnel development is described. The long-term potential of developmentally-based inclusive practices to serve as a catalyst for enhancing the quality of comprehensive early childhood programs is discussed.