The provision of child care and development programs that meet the specific needs of infants and toddlers is a major issue among professional caregivers. This monograph provides a quick guide to program planning that focuses specifically on the needs of very young children in group settings. The monograph explains and discusses the planning process using a needs-based curriculum model philosophy. The planning process consists of eight specific steps. Step 1 highlights development of a program philosophy. Step 2 addresses the identification of needs of the children, and step 3 addresses the development of program goals related to what the program aims to achieve. Step 4 focuses on developing a curriculum framework for infants and toddlers. Step 5 examines the concept of observation of the needs and interests of individual children. Step 6 addresses development of program plans for individual children, while step 7 focuses on development of the group plan. The final step addresses evaluation of each of the previously discussed steps. Contains 38 references. (SD)