As babies, toddlers, and preschoolers spend more and more time in child care programs, those programs have an increasingly significant effect on their healthy social and emotional development. The impact and quality of caregivers' relationships with children contribute to the quality of young children's mental health. A mental health consultant who understands the development of young children, the experiences of parents, and the world of child care can help strengthen or, if need be, repair relationships in a child-care setting. Because the quality of caregiver-child relationships is affected by the adult's history and capacity for relationships, the mental health consultant considers and attends to the needs of adults as often as to the needs of children. Services range from case consultation, which addresses the needs of individual children, to program consultation, which explores a range of circumstances in the child-care setting. In this comprehensive guidebook, the authors review current theory and offer practical suggestions for improving relationships among mental health consultants, program directors, staff, parents, and children to help identify and remove obstacles to quality care. Topics covered include: initiating consultation; getting to know the program; adult relationships; beginning case consultation; gathering information and creating a picture of the child; interpreting behavior and developing hypotheses; and translating hypotheses into responsive action within the child-care setting. Each chapter includes case examples of effective programmatic functioning, interstaff and parent-staff relationships, and/or direct child interventions. Consultants, mental health professionals at all levels, early childhood educators and trainers, and policymakers will find this book to be a useful guide to using mental health consultation to make positive changes in the child-care environment.