ABSTRACT
Moves toward integrating child and family services in the early years, underpinned by a holistic view of child development, have led to greater overlap between the roles of providers. Health services are expanding into the domain of early learning particularly in the areas of language, literacy, and social skills. The handbook The Hygiene of the School Child is an early example of an argument about schooling that framed its purpose as ‘health first, then education’. The concept of school readiness is being reframed from within the health discourse to a ‘set of interdependent health and developmental trajectories’. A Child-Centered Literacy Orientation (CCLO) instrument has been developed by pediatric health researchers to be used in conjunction with literacy interventions such as Reach Out and Read (ROR). Getting to Know Your Baby (GTKYB) classes are the latest iteration of an older model of provision in which community nurses set up walk-in clinic sessions in community centers.
