The percent of ASQ screens developmentally on target among children at pyramid model sites increased to 60% in 2023-2024, up from 44% the year prior.  

Contributing factors:

• Site leadershi

Limiting factors:

• Staff turnover

The most critical time to nurture a healthy, productive, successful future are the years between birth and age five. Nearly 90% of brain growth takes place during the first five years of life, with more than 1 million new neural connections formed every second. These are the connections that build brain architecture – the foundation upon which all later learning, behavior and health depend.  

Science shows that starting early can have major short- and long-term effects on cognitive and social-emotional development. Early learning has been linked to progress in school, increased earnings, and reductions in antisocial behavior, welfare participation, and trouble with the law.

“Healthy development in the early years (particularly birth to three) provides the building blocks for educational achievement, economic productivity, responsible citizenship, lifelong health, strong communities, and successful parenting of the next generation.” - Harvard Center for the Developing Child 

Science shows that positive early childhood experiences can have major short- and long-term effects on cognitive and social-emotional development. Money spent on high-quality early care and education (ECE) is an investment. One dollar spent on high-quality early care and education yields an average return of $4 over time. In circumstances where children are extremely vulnerable, the return can be as high as $13.

• Birth to Three

• Early Care & Education (AKA Childcare)

• Head Start

• Libraries

• Nonprofits

• Parents, Caregivers, Families

• Pre-K/Elementary Education

• Shine Early Learning (Youngstar)

• University of Wisconsin Extension- Dodge County 

• Watertown Family Connections 

• Wisconsin Alliance for Infant Mental Health (WI AIMH)

• Wisconsin Early Childhood Association (WECA)

• Wisconsin Latino Chamber of Commerce- FUTURO Program

Our community recognizes the need for collaboration and connecting support to all those who are working with and caring for infants, toddlers, and young children in Dodge and Jefferson counties. The Pyramid Model provides a framework for intentional implementation of practices that support social and emotional learning and address the distress that infants, toddlers and young children- and the adults who care about and for them-experience when there is challenging behavior. The primary reason young children are suspended and expelled from early care and education is the presence of challenging behavior. Limiting suspension and expulsion relies on increasing the capacity of adults, at the program and community level, to work to understand the meaning of a child’s behavior, to reframe their thinking, and respond in ways that guide and support social and emotional learning. 

Program–wide implementation of the Pyramid Model Framework consists of

• Systemwide commitment to training and coaching and implementation of programmatic and classroom practices

• Practices and goals are guided by a leadership team- (state, community, and program) and driven by data

• Early care professionals are supported by internal and external coaches that work with the adults to apply skills and strategies that ensure equitable outcomes for infants, young children and their families

Objective:  Promote developmental screening (ASQ) practices with Pyramid Model Implementing Sites.

Action Steps:  

• ASQ will be included on each Pyramid Model partners MOU
• Offer one ASQ-3 and ASQ-SE training opportunity for partners per contracted trainers 

Child counts and sites listed below:

2019-2020 = 101 screens (Furutre All-Stars Acadamy, Lake Mills School District, Mary Lindsmier School, Watertown Unified School District, Willows). 

2020-2021 = 26 screens (Community Care, Future All-Statrs Acadamy, Dodgeland, Watertown Unified, Willows).

2021-2022 = 55 screens (Community Care, Future All-Statrs Acadamy, Dodgeland, Watertown Unified, Willows). 

2022-2023 = 43 screens (Community Care, Future All-Statrs Acadamy, Dodgeland, Watertown Unified). 

2023-2024 = 83 Screens (Community Care, Future All-Statrs Acadamy, Dodgeland, Watertown Unified).