Developmental Facilitation: Helping Teams Promote Systems Change. Collaborative Planning Project for Planning Comprehensive Early Childhood Systems.

This document provides information on how internal or external facilitators can support early intervention teams in promoting meaningful change in their communities. The information presented is derived from a federally funded project that provided training and technical assistance to local early intervention interagency teams. The project's purpose was to facilitate the establishment of local collaborative teams to work on challenges associated with putting in place a long-term vision for systems change to achieve inclusive, quality, comprehensive early care and education services to young children birth through 5 (or up to age 8) and their families. The project provided a facilitator to work with local community teams for approximately six sessions, after which, it was hoped, the team would be self-sustaining. The paper begins with an overview of evidence-based change and team development theories. It then provides a description of a model for facilitation through five developmental stages of change: (1) current context; (2) change initiation; (3) growing competence, confidence, and commitment to change; (4) full change implementation; and (5) desired change now current context. In the descriptions of these five developmental levels, reference is made to various activities that the facilitator can use with the team. (Contains 10 references.) (CR)