Early Start Tools
Help Me Grow (HMG) LA’s Family Partners, all who have experience raising children with special needs, offer information, resources, and connections to free or low-cost programs directly in your community. However, for parents, caregivers, providers or members of the general public who wish to find resources on their own, the list below has been vetted by HMG LA’s Family Partners. Please review carefully to see if they are right for you. Feel free to share with friends, colleagues, and networks.
If you need live assistance from HMG LA, please contact our Family Partners through the client referral form or by phone at (833) 903-3972.
Birth to 5: Watch Me Thrive! includes information customized for various service sectors including ECE Providers, Early intervention service providers, Primary Care Providers, Child Welfare, Home Visitors, Behavioral Health Providers, and Housing and Homeless Shelter Providers.
This simple flier helps unravel Early Start services including eligibility for services at Regional Centers and school.
Easterseals offers a free, comprehensive and confidential online screening tool to help guide and keep track of your child’s growth and development during these first five years through the Easter Seals Make the First Five Count initiative. Families can complete an Ages and Stages Questionnaire (ASQ) and receive scores and more.
The following screening tools currently meet the criteria set forth by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Growth chart that includes developmental milestones alongside height markers and space to add a picture! Available in English and Spanish.
Milestones matter! How your child plays, learns, speaks, acts, and moves offers clues about his or her development. The “Learn the Signs. Act Early.” materials from the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention are free resources for learning about child development and tracking developmental milestones. Download the checklist below based on your child’s age and bring it with you to your next doctor visit and to every well-child visit, to talk about the milestones your child has reached and what to expect next. A milestone tracker app is available on iTunes or Google Play.
Additional Materials
Learn about positive parenting, milestones, and safety information for your child from infancy through the teen years.
Recommended Books
Literacy begins with language. And a baby’s language skills begin to develop at birth, through observing and listening to those around him or her. Speaking, reading and singing to a child from the day he or she is born dramatically improves language skills and vocabulary, which has impacts learning to read and write. You can help your child’s literacy skills grow right from the start.
ZERO TO THREE works to ensure that babies and toddlers benefit from early connections that are critical to their well-being and development. They believe parents are the experts on their children and there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to raising developmental healthy children. Check out their parenting resources by ages and stages.
