Direct Service Versus Consultation Approach
Direct Service Versus Consultation Approach
What is the best way for Itinerant ECSE teachers to spend their time Ensuring appropriate levels of intervention or the intensity of instruction is a difficult and complex task. Little is presently known about how much is enough and researchers such as McWilliam, Wolery, and Odom (2001) emphasize the need for the field to develop a consistent definition of instructional intensity, a definition that addressed not only the density of instruction(p. 521), but the duration and comprehensiveness as well. One of the issues that is difficult to determine when answering the question how much is enough is the degree to which IEP-based instruction occurs in the absence of the Itinerant ECSE teacher (McWilliam et al., 2001).
While it is evident that high quality early childhood programs provide enormous general benefits to childrens education and development, the degree to which they explicitly address childrens IEP objectives is less clear. In fact, research on this topic suggests that IEP-based instruction, in general education classrooms, is limited (Walker et al., 2002), but increases once high quality ongoing consultation services are provided (Mortenson & Witt, 1998; Peck, Killen, & Baumgart, 1989; Venn & Wolery, 1992). Many argue that a consultative approach to itinerant service delivery is the preferred method because, if implemented correctly, it can increase the knowledge and skills of childrens daily caregivers needed to provide intervention of sufficient intensity (Buysse, Schulte, Pierce & Terry, 1994; McWilliam et al., 2001; Odom et al., 1999).