A young toddler that I have been supporting through Better Start funds has been making some wonderful progress. The family having succeeded in the application for Better Start Funds embraced the opportunity to get the most out of the funds set aside for the young toddler. Over the last 4-6 months, he has had regular home visits from a physiotherapist, weekly hydrotherapy sessions, and fortnightly home visits on a Saturday from a VI specialist teacher/early childhood/Orientation & Mobility – Eyes and Independence. Recently, a private Speech Pathologist has also joined the team.
Over the time of intense input, this young toddler has started moving so much more from rolling over, to his knees, into commando crawling and just taken off crawling small distances. At first, vision responses were minimal but now, not only have we discovered that he started responding to visual stimuli when looking upside down but encouraging the use of his vision has enabled him to demonstrate to us that he is now noticing a lot more than he did before. He is tracking and following movement of his family members. His babbling is varying in tone and although he is not yet saying much, he is definitely communicating. His interest in mouthing continues but he has extended to playing with his hands and feet and exploring new things.
HE IS MAKING WONDERFUL PROGRESS…BUT… for now, he has exceeded the funds allowed to be spent in a financial year so no more support services can be provided UNTIL...
The NDIS planning has begun as the family lives in an area where NDIS is just coming in. So with fingers crossed, the family are hoping that NDIS funds will very soon be approved and made available to cater for this little man’s ongoing needs in a range of developmental areas, medical needs and future adaptive equipment. He can then continue to MAKE PROGRESS…