Children's Center provides workshop for special needs children

HATTIESBURG, Miss. - The Children's Center is having a workshop at Parkway Heights United Methodist Church to educate parents, caregivers, and speech pathologists with techniques that will help better care for children with special needs.

Children’s Center director, Sarah Case-Price said, "Our staff are learning how to train daycare workers and other service providers that work with young children with disabilities. So not only will the children that are enrolled at the center be impacted, but those that they interact with will also have that opportunity to learn from the information that we're having brought in."

The workshop was called “Learning Language and Loving It," which will certify these people to implement this program to other professionals who work with children.

"This program will be very beneficial for the children because we are giving the knowledge to their caregivers on how to present it in a way that could be best for the children verses just telling them to do one thing with each different child," said Adrienne Whittington, Merit Health Wesley speech pathologist.

The workshop also implemented a strategy called "Observe, Wait, and Listen."

"I think observing, waiting, and listening to what the child needs verses what you want them to hear or learn is probably one of the biggest take-home strategies from this program," said Whittington.

The Children's Center will continue workshops through Friday.