RESPONDING TO REQUESTS
Requests for psychological services are initiated to answer questions and offer supports related to learning, child development, behaviour, and/or social and emotional difficulties.
Psychology staff may work with individual students, groups of students, as well as parents and teachers. For example, psychology staff may be called upon to help with children or youth when they are:
- Behind in reading or math
- Having difficulty with behaviour or self-control
- Anxious about going to school
- Struggling with organization and study skills
- Worrying about family stresses such as death or divorce
- Making decisions about their future
- Feeling depressed or anxious
When required, psychology staff, as a member of a crisis team, provide crisis intervention, and may work with students who have experienced some form of trauma.
Psychological service providers of the TCDSB strive to use evidence-based practices whether providing assessment services to children, consultation regarding special programs or counselling interventions with students and families.
OUR SERVICES INCLUDE:
PREVENTION
- Implementing classroom based or school-wide programs to promote mental health and resilience, and healthy and safe learning environments (e.g. bullying prevention, conflict resolution, and building resilience)
- In collaboration with other TCDSB departments and community agencies, developing and delivering interventions and programs for students at risk of learning and emotional difficulties
- Sharing psychological knowledge and experience with committees, educators, parents and community-based groups
EARLY IDENTIFICATION/INTERVENTION
- Participating in the early identification of and intervention with children demonstrating learning and/or behaviour difficulties
- Counselling individual students and providing strategies to parents for resolving interpersonal or family difficulties impacting on school performance
- Implementing small group interventions addressing social skills, anxiety management or anger control
- Advising and supporting students, teachers and parents to cope with crises and trauma in the community
CONSULTATION
- Collaborating with school and home to promote an understanding of learning and behaviour in the context of child development and formal assessment findings
- Helping parents and teachers develop solutions for learning and behaviour problems and monitoring the effectiveness of those solutions
- Collaborating with the other members of the interdisciplinary team to help students succeed
- Strengthening communication links among home, school and community agencies
ASSESSMENTS/EVALUATION
- Gathering pertinent information, and consulting with parents, teachers and the special services team
- Observing students and administering standardized tests to understand learning aptitudes, academic skills, socio- emotional development and mental health status of individual students
- Communicating the assessment findings, diagnoses and/or ministry-based identifications, as appropriate, to parents, student and school
- Advising on programming, strategies and learning environments appropriate for the student
PARTNERSHIPS
In addition to working with members of the interdisciplinary team and other departments within the TCDSB, the Psychological Services Department collaborates with community organizations to facilitate the delivery of research-based programs:
