TRI's Serra Acar, Ph.D., Patricia Blasco, Ph.D., and Sybille Guy, Ph.D., presented at the Conference on Research Innovations in Early Intervention (CRIEI) 2016. They participated in three sessions during the two-day conference located in San Diego, California, February 11-13, 2016.

Working Together to Enhance the Quality of Inclusive Early Care and Education

TRI's Patricia Blasco joined Laurie Dinnebeil (University of Toledo), Chih-ing Lim and Camille Catlett (both from Frank Porter Graham, Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) on a panel: Working Together to Enhance the Quality of Inclusive Early Care and Education.

The purpose of this presentation was to disseminate the results of a collaborative effort across OSEP-funded projects focused on enhancing the degree to which community colleges prepare preservice teachers to work with young children who have disabilities and their families. 

Patricia Blasco - Project PEPI (Preparing Early Childhood Professionals for Inclusion)

Camille Catlett and Chih-ing Lim - Script-NC

Laurie Dinnebeil - The Partner Project

Using common evaluation instruments, they were able to significantly increase the sample sizes of faculty members who work at community colleges and the students with whom they work. This enabled them to conduct more sophisticated analyses, including Rasch analyses of faculty members’ and students’ knowledge and competencies on topics related to early childhood inclusion.

Translation of Developmental Screening Tools: A perspective of cultural and linguistic appropriateness

Serra Acar and Patricia Blasco presented Translation of Developmental Screening Tools: A perspective of cultural and linguistic appropriateness.

The purpose of this poster session was twofold: (a) to examine linguistic, functional, cultural, and metric equivalence of the screening tools that are translated into other language(s) and (b) to provide guidelines for future translation studies.

Poster - Translation of Developmental Screening Tools: A perspective of cultural and linguistic appropriateness.

Project EF: Executive Function in Infants and Toddlers Born Low Birth Weight (LBW) and Preterm

Patricia Blasco, Sybille Guy, and Serra Acar presented Project EF: Executive Function in Infants and Toddlers Born Low Birth Weight (LBW) and Preterm

This poster session covered Project EF, a research collaboration between TRI and the Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). The purpose of this federally funded project is to examine whether components of Executive Function found in traditional measures of infant/toddler development can discern early indicators of EF in children born LBW/preterm and a control group.

The primary goal in Years 1 and 2 is to assess a sample of 100 children born LBW and preterm and 50 children who were full term by administering a battery of standardized measures of infant and toddler development involving both caregiver report and individual assessment.  In Year 3, the children will be assessed on these measures and a measure of executive function.

Poster - Project EF: Executive Function in Infants and Toddlers Born Low Birth Weight (LBW) and Preterm

About CRIEI

CRIEI is a biannual, multidisciplinary conference created by researchers, specifically for researchers in early intervention (birth-8). It is a unique 2½-day meeting focusing on methodological advances, research in progress, innovative approaches to combining methodologies, issues in conducting research, and controversial topics related to interventions with young children with disabilities or those at risk for developmental delays and their families. All attendees present their own research during the conference, which typically includes about 150 participants from across the country. CRIEI also provides a unique opportunity for graduate students to present work in progress and receive guidance and suggestions from those who have firmly established themselves in the field of research.

For more information about the conference, click here.