Adapting assessments of child engagement to develop an early childhood consultation model

Designing a virtual mental health consultation program to support and strengthen childcare centers impacted by COVID-19: A randomized controlled trial protocol

BACKGROUND

The COVID-19 pandemic has had negative psychosocial impacts on young children; teachers in childcare centers continue to be overwhelmed by how to address the downstream psychological effects children are experiencing. This randomized controlled trial will study the role of a community-based, childcare center-support system in improving resilience and mitigating the long-term impacts of COVID-19 on children's development.

METHODS

This study will be modeled on a successful Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (ECMHC) intervention which utilizes mental health consultants to deliver a Jump Start+: COVID 19 Support (JS + CS) virtual toolkit to childcare centers in Miami-Dade County via a Kubi robot. The toolkit comprises four strength-based strategies likely to be effective in improving resiliency following disasters: Safety Planning, Effective Communication, Adult Self-Care, and Trauma-Informed Behavior Support. Our first aim will utilize a cluster randomized trial to examine the effectiveness of JS + CS on improving the psychosocial functioning of young children, as compared to an obesity prevention intervention control group. Children will be followed at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months. The second aim will examine the mechanisms that contribute to effective uptake by teachers of the JS + CS support strategies on child outcomes. The third aim will explore implementation barriers/facilitators as well as potential societal contextual factors (e.g., vaccine uptake) to help centers serving disproportionately affected minority communities recover from and prepare for future crises.

CONCLUSION

This design will inform the refinement and scaling of JS + CS and generalize impacts to other childcare center interventions in the context of disasters.

Development and initial validation of the Spanish form of the adjustment scales for preschool intervention (ASPI)

The purpose of the study was to develop and validate a Spanish language form of the Adjustment Scales for Preschool Intervention (ASPI) for use by early childhood teachers. A multi-step, mixed method adaptation and translation process of the English form was used to increase the cultural relevance, linguistic comparability, and metric equivalence of the measure in its Spanish language form. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses in a diverse sample of preschool children from low-income families (N = 4077) revealed two higher order behavioral dimensions of Overactivity and Underactivity. ASPI dimension scores across Spanish and English language forms were horizontally equated through IRT. Criterion-related validity using multilevel models was established through concurrent associations with social, emotional, behavioral, and academic readiness skills. Policy and practice applications, and future directions for the use of scale scores are discussed.