Preparing Practitioners To Work with Infants, Toddlers and Their Families: Issues and Recommendations for Policymakers.

Issues are discussed and recommendations are offered to policymakers on the preparation of practitioners to work with infants, toddlers, and their families. Section I examines eforts to define "competence" for practitioners and programs. Section II describes in detail four key elements of training for infant/family practitioners, illustrating how they can be incorporated into different educational models and settings. Section III provides examples of promising approaches to enhancing competence through training in preservice, inservice, and continuing education, profiling 10 programs, such as the Interdisciplinary Specialization in Infancy Program of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; the Clinical Supervision Seminar, Erickson Institute (Chicago); Support Network of North Carolina; San Francisco General Hospital's Infant-Parent Program; and the Chronic Illness Teaching Program at Michigan State University. Section IV suggests priorities for collaborative action among policymakers, parents, educators, and professionals to improve training of infant/family practitioners. Appendix A outlines a set of core concepts in non-technical language that can form a knowledge base common to parents, policymakers, educators and trainers, and other professionals across disciplines. Apendix B lists resources for further information. (RH)