The Consultation Project

The Consultation Project has proudly partnered with Sonoma County’s childcare and preschool community since 2001. Through the generous funding of First 5 Sonoma County, the Consultation Project provides FREE and confidential consultation to childcare providers and preschool teachers serving children birth through age 5 who have not yet begun Kindergarten. Our team of consultants include: mental health clinicians, early childhood education specialists, early interventionists, occupational therapists and parent educators. We work collaboratively with childcare providers, preschool teachers and families to address behavioral, developmental, mental health, or family issues. We help facilitate positive relationships with parents and develop collaborative goals and action plans to address the needs of the child, family and program. While we often focus on the needs of a specific child, consultation builds the capacity of teachers and providers to work with all children. 

How We Can Work Together

You are the expert on your program, curriculum, and the children in your care. The consultants bring their experience and credentials to the process and providers and families bring their expertise. Here’s a brief summary of the collaborative process:

Open A Case

Online: Please fill out a Referral Form and someone from ELI will contact you. The Parent Release English  (Permiso del Padre) form must also be printed out and signed. This form must then be received by fax, email, or postal system at the ELI office for the case to be opened.

By phone: Please call ELI at 591-0170 we will take down your information and send you a referral packet: a Family Information (Información de la Familia) flyer for the parent to keep. We can send paperwork via fax, email attachment, or postal mail. When we receive the paperwork back the case is assigned to a consultant. The paperwork can be returned via email, fax, or postal system. Cases are assigned within two business days of receiving the paperwork from you.

Intake

Your consultant will contact you to schedule the intake activities. The intake includes: Consultant observation of the child and program, teacher/ provider intake, parent intake, and a developmental screening using the Ages and Stages Questionnaire. The consultants do their best to be flexible in scheduling to meet the needs of the program and family.

Goal and Action Plan

When enough information is gathered, the consultant will set goals in collaboration with parent and provider to address the child’s needs. Each party (consultant, provider and parent) will have Actions to carry out to meet those Goals. The Actions all parties agreed to are the basis for the Intervention

Intervention

Your consultant will continue to work with your program and the family to implement strategies. Interventions may include developing curriculum with the teachers, coaching teachers in effective teacher-child interactions, arranging an occupational therapy consult, holding a staff in-service, helping the family access resources, and many more. Teacher Child Interaction Therapy and the Center for the Social and Emotional Foundations of Early Learning Pyramid Model are two key sources of classroom interventions. In addition, the TCP can connect families to Triple P (Positive Parenting Program) for one-on-one parenting support.

Referrals

The Project provides consultation, not comprehensive services. When a child or family has intensive needs, we will help connect them with additional resources in the community such as speech and language services, parenting classes, counseling, etc. When a childcare or preschool program has significant needs, we will help with connection to additional resources such as Mini-grants, Mentor programs, SRJC classes, professional organizations and more.

This program is funded by First 5 Sonoma County!