Cheong Nur Faidisha Qistina was a timid 3-year-old when she first enrolled at the Building Bridges EIPIC Centre in Jurong in August 2012. Suspected as having cerebral palsy, Qistina needed assistance when balancing and even while sitting on a chair.
When she first started having therapy sessions at the Centre, Qistina would cry and had difficulties socialising with both her teachers and peers.
Five months into the programme, with five hours of intervention every week, Qistina is now more spontaneous when socialising in a group. She is also more confident sitting and balancing on her own!
Qistina is also showing marked improvement in her social-communication skills, and has started using two- to three-word phrases to express herself. A typical day at Building Bridges EIPIC Centre for Qistina includes the daily sing-a-long…
play time at the gym…
frolic in the ball pool…
and engaging in fun activities as speech therapy
EIPIC in a nutshell
The Early Intervention Programme for Infants and Children (EIPIC) is a centre-based programme catering to children with developmental needs. It provides educational and therapy services for children aged 6 and below diagnosed with special needs that will affect their development. A trans-disciplinary team of allied professionals (occupational therapist, speech and language therapist, social worker, psychologist, etc) provides therapy, consultation and family support according to the needs of each child and his/her family. The team also supports small group teaching conducted by early childhood and early intervention trained teachers in class.
EIPIC aims to facilitate development and improvement in –
- Gross motor and fine motor skills
- Cognitive skills
- Speech, language and communication skills
- Social skills
- Self-help skills
SPD was appointed by the then Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS) and the National Council of Social Service (NCSS) to set up two EIPIC centres. The Building Bridges EIPIC Centres are located in Tiong Bahru and Jurong East.
Please e-mail us to find out more about the EIPIC programme.