EI Assessment

I prepped and prepped and prepped Camden's for today's developmental assessment. "Remember Miss Jane?" I asked him repeatedly. "She's coming to your house today. And she's bringing a friend. They're going to play toys with you!"

I'm telling you-- if you have a shy kid like mine, this prepatory stuff really helps. Camden knew what to expect. He waited anxiously at the window for his "friends" to arrive. Of course, he was still initially shy when they came in the house, hiding on my shoulder and peeking up at them occasionally. Today, we had the EI Coordinator, the developmental therapist, and a pediatrician doing her residency at Duke at our house (the pediatrician was there for training purposes).

I can't speak highly enough about the therapist. An older woman with a soft voice and kind eyes, it was immediately obvious that she had years of experience with children. She sat across the room from Camden, so she wouldn't be intruding on his personal space. She slowly took toys out of a suitcase and slid them across the floor to Camden so she could let him make the first move. Perfect for handling a slow-to-warm-up temperament.

She had Camden perform several tasks and activities: coloring with crayons, stacking blocks, playing with a toy train, putting small objects into a narrow container, pretending to drink from a plastic cup, playing with a bowl and spoon, pointing to pictures in a book, and many more. She also asked me a series of questions about his overall development ("Can he run?", "Can he walk backwards?", "Does he walk up stairs?", "Does he point when you ask him where something is?", "Does he throw tantrums?", "Does he follow simple instructions?"). She also carefully observed Camden and took notes.

Camden was a bit reserved, but complied with almost all of her requests (one exception? He had zero interest in feeding the baby doll a bottle. I told the therapist I'm sure this is because he's never been around an infant and he has no clue what a bottle is). He did prefer some tasks over others (he loved the bowl, spoon, book, and block activities) but mostly, she was able to keep him interested and engaged.

She then tallied up Camden's assessment and read the scores to me. I'm a little unclear how many areas of assessment there were (maybe 5?) but I know she listed the following categories: Communication, Social/Emotional Development, Cognitive Development, Adaptability, and Motor Skills. I might be missing a category or two, and it's possible that some of the above categories were lumped together. But you get the point. To qualify for EI services, a child has to have a significant delay in one major area, or a delay in 2 or more areas of development.  A score from 90-100 is considered normal and on-target for a particular child's age. Camden scored a 78 in communication. And those 78 points he scored? All receptive language skills (ability to understand people, shake his head no in response to questions, follow instructions, etc.). So, my gut instinct was right and Camden's communication is a bit below average for his age (he scored normally in every other area).

However, Camden's collective score in all areas of development was too high to qualify for EI Services and his delay in communication was not significant enough to qualify by itself. It was a strange mixture of disappointment and relief when I heard that news. But then the therapist surprised me by saying that even though Camden didn't technically qualify for services based on his scores, she was willing to make a clinician's recommendation that he have a speech evaluation with a speech pathologist through EI. Great news.

So, our next step is to wait to hear from the speech pathologist who will then come out to our house to do a more in-depth speech evaluation (instead of a total developmental assessment like today). She will then either recommend speech therapy through EI or, if she feels he's too young for that, she might give us some tasks that we can focus on at home with him.

I kept putting off calling EI for various reasons over the past few months and let me just say this: I am so glad I finally did it. I was impressed with the experience and professionalism of the therapist today and it was validating that my concerns about Camden's speech were finally taken seriously instead of dismissed. An added bonus: Camden got what he thought was a fun playdate out of the deal. So if you're out there worrying about your child in one way or another and are debating a phone call to EI, I say pick up that phone. I have nothing but positive things to say about our experience thus far.

I'll keep everyone posted on the upcoming speech evaluation.