Assessment Task: Case Study
Sara is a five-year-old girl who joined your preschool class halfway through Term 3, having moved to Melbourne from a small rural town in Barcelona, Spain. Sara lives with her mother and father, as well as her paternal grandparents. Sara is an only child, and her parents are expecting their second child a few months. Sara's parents (Marc and Ana) are practising optometrists, owning a small local Dental Clinic. Sara's grandparents are retired, and have always cared for Sara while her parents worked, so she never attended out of home care, such as Long day Care settings. Sara is always dropped off and collected by her grandparents, and you can see she has a very strong bond with them both. Sara's grandparents and parents speak limited English, with Spanish being the the main language spoken at home. Sara speaks both English and Spanish, although both to a limited extent, preferring to use gestures and body language to communicate. You have only heard her communicate verbally a few times since she started at your preschool -- a 'yes' or 'no' response to questions. Sara was very quiet and shy when she first started your preschool, which you expected due to moving to a new country, starting a new preschool and being immersed in a new culture. However, after several months of attending preschool, you notice that she is still very quiet, is not communicating verbally with her peers and has not formed any friendships. You often see her watching the other children engaged in dramatic play, and occasionally she will walk towards other children and attempt to join, without success. She also has a tendency to withdraw from the group, and occasionally will push other children when they enter her personal space. Sara seems happiest at preschool when engaged in solo sensory activities - play dough, sand, water, slime etc. Sara also loves listening to and playing music, and she is a very good dancer. She is able to concentrate on one activity for extended periods of time, in particular when she is at the puzzle table, often completing all the puzzles available on the shelf. With only a few months until the end of the year, you start to write the children's preschool to primary school transition reports. As you begin to write Sara's transition report, you realise you have some concerns that you need to articulate to her parents, and some teaching areas to focus on in order to support Sara's development.
For this assignment you are required to develop an in-depth focus report of a child of your choice aged between birth to12 years of age. You will be required to:
a) Provide a description of the child, outlining the family background and context of the child, and the developmental delay/cause for concern that you have identified, including some of the characteristics that lead you to this conclusion.
b) Explore the possible factors that may be influencing the child's development;
c) Point out the strengths and interest of the child; and
d) Outline ways, using appropriate pedagogy and modifications to the environment, which would support the child's development
e) Discuss factors of the parent-teacher and home/school partnerships can be used to support the child's development
It is important that you support your statements with at least 6 relevant and scholarly sources of literatures to justify the influences on development, as well as the pedagogy and environmental modifications you propose.
SECTION ONE: Background of the child and Developmental Delay/cause for Concern (400 words)
Introduction to the child and area of concern (suggested headings)
- Introduction to the child
- Background & context of the child
- Identify the developmental delay/cause for concern by identifying the concerning characteristics
In this section you need to provide a description of the child's background and context and then continue on to identify the developmental delay/cause for concern which could cause you concern if you were this child's teacher i.e. language delays; poor concentration skills; lack of appropriate social skills (such as turn taking or sharing etc). You need to clearly identify the characteristics that suggest a developmental delay/cause for concern.
It is important that you change the actual child's name and any names of centres or staff or parents so that the child, centre or family cannot be identified. Please consider the ethical implications carefully.
SECTION 2: Factors that may be influencing development (400 words)
Discussion of at least 2 possible factors that you believe may be influencing the child's development (suggested headings)
In this section you make professional judgments drawing on the readings that you have been undertaking for this unit about what factors may have attributed to the issues that concern you, and how these factors are known to influence development. You must use literature to support your argument here, writing this in an essay style. By weaving in the literature you are supporting the claims you made about possible influences on the child's development that could be reasons for the concerning characteristics.
SECTION THREE: Strengths and interests of the child (400 words)
Strengths and interest of the child (suggested headings)
In this section you point out at least one of the child's strengths and interest areas, giving practical examples/observations to support your statements (these should be discussed only briefly in your work, and then referred to and included in your Appendix list). You will also need to discuss how you can use these strengths and interest to support the child's development, using literature to support your ideas.
SECTION FOUR: Plan - pedagogical approach and environmental modifications (400 words)
Planning individualized pedagogical and environmental modifications to support the child (suggested headings)
Developmental delay/cause for concern:
- Characteristic 1
- Characteristic 2
- Environmental modification
- Pedagogical approach
In this section you need to explain how you will build on the child's strengths (identified in Section 3) to address the concerning characteristics (identified in Section 1). This section ties the report together showing ways of modifying the program both pedagogically and environmentally to better cater for the child.
Try to focus on incorporating the child's interests and working through the child's strength to overcome the delay/concern. You will need to draw on scholarly readings / information from relevant, up-to-date information on the area of diversity concerning this child. You may like to include specific information sheets etc. as an Appendix (at the end of your assignment).
SECTION FIVE: Home-School Partnerships (400 words)
Home-school and parent-teacher partnerships (suggested headings)
- Home-School
- Parent-Teacher
Finally, describe how you will use the parent-teacher relationships to work with parents to support the child in the classroom environment, with consideration to the child's home life.