The Family Focused Intervention Scale was completed by a sample of 503 mothers of birth to 6-year-old handicapped children who were enrolled in intervention programs throughout the United States. This study was conducted to identify the types of family intervention services mothers were currently receiving and the types of services that they would like to obtain. The results indicated that the most common services were providing parents information about their child and helping parents and families become involved in the early intervention system. Resource assistance and personal-family assistance were the least common services provided Family-focused services were reported more by mothers of children birth to 3 than 3- to 6-year-olds. In addition, programs with home-based components and programs with Individualized Family Service Plans tended to have a greater family-focused orientation. Generally, the need for family services was greater than that currently being received. However, the more family intervention services mothers received, the more they perceived their intervention programs as benefitting their families and their children.
This study examined the relationship between extra-year programs and later school achievement. Ninety-five children were identified as being either retained in kindergarten, placed in a transition classroom, recommended for an extra-year program but went into first grade, or as being in a control group of children who went from kindergarten to first grade without reservation. Results indicated that children retained in kindergarten performed significantly lower on a standardized achievement test than did children in the other three groups. Despite an extra year of schooling, children placed in transition classrooms did not differ significantly in their performance from children who were recommended for an extra year but went onto first grade and children in the control group.
A questionnaire was constructed, consisting of 45 items, that assessed the degree to which mothers received a number of family intervention services. The questionnaire was completed by a national sample of 503 mothers who had children with handicaps in early intervention programs. A factor analysis of questionnaire responses indicated that the items assessed five independent components of family-focused intervention, including systems engagement, child information, family instructional activities, personal-family assistance, and resource assistance. Results from the factor analysis were used to construct the Family-Focused Intervention Scale (FFIS), consisting of 40 items and five subscales. Cronbach's alpha indicated that each of the subscales was reliable. Comparisons among groups of mothers suggested that the FFIS was sensitive to variations in the level of family intervention services.Early intervention services for children with handicaps evolved from medical science and learning theory models of etiology and treatment. Children's handicapping conditions were conceptualized and diagnosed both in terms of their medical and physical complications and in terms of their developmental and social-adaptive functioning. For the most part, treatment entailed providing direct services that were designed to compensate for the children's medical or physical complications, and/or providing them with directed learning
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