I have really enjoyed taking this class this semester. I have always loved the thought of continuing on to Speech Therapy which is definitely something I am still going to pursue, but I also really like the idea of early intervention. Our baby and family that we worked with were INCREDIBLE. They were so willing to work on the activities that we introduced to them and were so excited to have us come over each week. This was because she was open about her desires and goals for her baby, and because of the relationship that we developed with the mom right from the start.
I have learned what Early Intervention looks like and how to work with families. I enjoyed thinking of and researching different activities that mom could do with baby to reach her goals. Sometimes it was difficult to find more resources for her, but the resources that I did find ended up being very helpful and beneficial.
Since mom was so willing to work with her baby and was so invested in helping her develop and grow, N was sitting up the ENTIRE last home visit. The week before she had sat up for a few seconds before falling to the side. Each week before that, her core muscles were just too weak to support her so she would just flop to one side or backwards. However, on the last visit she sat up the entire 30 minutes that we were there. It was so cool to see her progress and how far she had come. I also loved seeing the results of so much time spent on researching activities and writing out a lesson plan. Taking the time to help mom know what to do and then seeing results was so rewarding. N was not quite passing a toy from one hand to the next which was our other goal, but we noticed that she was able to grab things much quicker and firmer than she was when we had our first home visit. At our first visit, she would reach for a toy very slowly and barely grasp it. But now she is much stronger and able to hold things much better.
Overall, this class really taught me how to be an early interventionist and how to work with infants and families. It was so much fun and every assignment was extremely helpful to my learning and taught me a lot.
