Library Thursdays: Moira Pieterse

Moira Pieterse has contributed much to the Down syndrome community in Sydney as well as NSW and the world. She established and ran the Down Syndrome Program at Macquarie University beginning in 1975. She co-wrote the well known program for early intervention--Small Steps: an early intervention program for children with developmental delays, (Moira Pieterse and Robin Treloar with Sue Cairns, Diana Uther and Erica Brar) which included communication, gross motor, fine motor, social skills and developmental checklists and is still relevant today. She helped develop The Macquarie Reading Program and researched literacy in children with Down syndrome. She spent time in Russia, the Netherlands, England, Slovenia and other countries helping parents with children with Down syndrome. She was involved in the beginning of integration in mainstream classrooms.
In addition to all of that, Moira dedicatedly promoted amongst health professionals and others in the community the rights and potential of people with Down syndrome.

Last week Moira presented the DS NSW library with many interesting pieces of her work. They include translations of Small Steps in Dutch, German, Turkish and Slovenian, photos from the Macquarie Down Syndrome Program, many of her research papers and others' works from the same period.

We are very grateful to Moira for all she has done for so many as well as providing access through our library to her works. If you are interested in any of them, come and have a look. A complete list of what's available with be posted when they are catalogued.


To borrow anything from the library, just call 9841 4410 or email.