Life Course Development Plan

Table of Contents

Introduction3

Assessment Model4

Factors that influence child development5

Child Development6

Safeguarding children from abuse9

Risk and risk assessment11

Solihull Approach Model12

Conclusion12

References13

Life Course Development Plan

Introduction

In accordance with the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) (2008), all names involved have been changed in order to maintain confidentiality. Tracy is a single mother with two children, Ben is 18 months old and his brother Tom is 4 years old. Tracy has been in a relationship with the father (Steve) of both Tom and Ben for approximately 5 years. It has been identified that both Ben and Tom have speech and language development problems. For the purpose of this assignment, I will focus specifically on Tom and the implications his family circumstances may have on his life course development.

Tom's speech and language development is severely impaired, but this has only been identified following a core contact to his brother. The family have a known history of domestic violence and from information received from the police they have attended domestic violence incidences at the family home on a number of occasions. Their contact with health visiting services has been sporadic and prior to the implementation of Universal contacts Tom appears to have been missed.

It was identified that Tom's attendance at nursery has been very sporadic and whilst the nursery had concerns about some aspect of Tom's development they had not discussed this with other agencies. When Tom did attend nursery he isolated himself from his peers and on the occasions when he did play with others his interactions became very aggressive and were sometimes violent in their nature. Further investigation found that Tom was still wearing nappies.

Assessment Model

Following discussion with my Clinical Practice Teacher (CPT), it was agreed that I should assess the family using the Child and Families Assessment Framework (CAF) (Department of Health, 2000) (see appendix 1). The CAF is a recommended tool that provides a framework which provides the assessor with a common language that underpins universal practice with children and their families. It can enable practitioners to work within a criterion that can identify whether their environment is conducive to successful development of children. An advantage of using the CAF is that it will increase the likelihood of parents and children experiencing consistency between themselves and professionals. It is child focused and if the child is able to communicate taken from the child's perspective.

With Tom there is concern about his development, by using the CAF further interventions can be based on a clear assessment of developmental progress and any possible difficulties he may experience in achieving planned outcomes which are timely and appropriate in a child's developmental needs. The benefits of using the CAF is that it builds on strengths as well as difficulties, it is a continuous process which is grounded in evidence (Dept of Health, 2000). Although as future health visitors we should heed Munro's (2010) warning criticizing the framework calling it inefficient and suggest that it does not easily facilitate professional judgment about ...