Multifaceted Assessment for Early Childhood Education

Robert J. Wright

• Publisher: SAGE Publications, Inc
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781483317168
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Evaluation & Assessment in Education

An engaging examination of current issues and practices involved in assessing young children A highly readable integration of the latest assessment practices and policies, this text includes valuable information regarding young children with special needs and English language learners—topics that are insufficiently addressed in other assessment texts. Focusing on practical applications of key concepts, Multifaceted Assessment for Early Childhood Education provides a knowledge base of what every early childhood teacher should know about assessing young children. Key Features

• Comprehensive coverage examines the full range of assessments, including formative, summative, authentic, and standardized.
• Cases in Point provide practical implications and examples from real life.
• Objectives for Learning alert students as to central concepts and provide guidance for reading and studying.
• Discussion Questions encourage analysis and class discussions, promoting higher order thinking on the topics.

Ancillaries
Password-protected instructor resources, available at www.sagepub.com/wrightinstr, feature PowerPoint slides, a test bank, Internet resources, and additional activities.

Part I
Background, Current Issues, and Interpretation of Assessments in Early Childhood

The first section describes the major authors of the 19th century who have developed the instructional approaches, content, and skills that should be taught to preschool youngsters. There is a description of the nature of kindergartens as envisioned by Froebel and the Children’s Houses created by Maria Montessori. In America, the growth of urban settlement houses and the efforts of President Franklin D. Roosevelt to provide nursery schools is described and placed in the context of the era. Of special interest is the creation of Head Start and its impact. The relation of assessment to policy initiatives for early childhood education begun during the 1960s is also examined.

Another focus of the book’s first section is the No Child Left Behind law and its impact on the education of children enrolled in preschools and primary school grades. Ethics and testing policies of major professional associations are presented and described. Also included is a discussion of the problem of assessing children who are not proficient in the English language. A model for an assessment program for children enrolled in preschool, kindergarten, and primary grades in public schools is also presented in this section.

All educational assessments and measures are not exactly indicative of what children can do or know. They are estimates. As estimates, there is a degree of error in each score. The amount of error in a set of test scores is an indicator of the reliability, consistency, or stability of the measure. Proper uses of test scores and selection of appropriate measures are associated with the validity of assessment procedures or tests.

1
History and Framework of Early Education and the Assessment of Young Children

There is no other outward offence that in the sight of God so heavily burdens the world, and deserves such heavy chastisement, as the neglect to educate children.

—Martin Luther

Introduction and Themes

Long lost, the concept of childhood was reborn during the Renaissance; however, it was not until the 19th century that contemporary ideas about the education of children under the age of 5 years were developed in Germany. In America, early childhood education and education for children with disabilities was marginalized until the 20th century.

Principles of social science were used by American researchers to establish a measurement-based understanding of child development and learning. This approach was built on a belief that genetics is the primary factor determining each child’s lot in life. Racism and discrimination against children with disabilities were by-products of this concept of human development.

The collection of child development data at university-based clinics led to developmental assessments and screening tools. However, the application of the principles of educational measurement for the evaluation of early childhood programs, and for the assessment of the special needs of young children with disabilities, was not mandated until after 1965.

Federal and state laws and regulations now require children be screened for potential learning or developmental problems. Children found to potentially be at risk for problems must be provided a thorough assessment. An assessment includes a number of approaches used to collect information about the performance abilities and limitations of a child. These can include test data, performance data, and observational records.

The model for program accreditation of the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), first developed in 1929, was updated in 2008, but only one early childhood program in seven seeks that accreditation. Since the 1990s, state education departments have been providing leadership in developing early childhood program evaluations and licensing standards.

Learning Objectives

By reading and studying this chapter, you should acquire the competency to:

• Describe the first modern early childhood education programs.

• Discuss problems involved in assessing bilingual prekindergarten children.

• Explain educational rights of children with disabilities.

• Present arguments for and against the work by Lewis M. Terman with mentally gifted children.

• Describe research findings from early childhood education impact studies.

• Discuss reasons behind the growth of state-sponsored child care and preschool programs.

• Explain reasons behind the rapid growth of private tutoring companies focused on cramming for preschool children.

First Early Childhood Programs

Europe in the 19th century gave birth to a modern approach to early childhood education. Educators had always assumed that before the age of 7 children were too immature to focus on academic learning. The notion of education with children as young as age 3 was unheard of. This 19th century development resulted in an early childhood program that would be familiar to today’s teachers. Early childhood education was first proposed by a Swiss educator, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, and later by his student Friedrich Froebel (or Fröbel) from Thuringia, Germany (Froebel, 1948; Pestalozzi, 1973/1894).

Pestalozzi’s program was built around the concept that children learn first through the senses and experience, then through language-dominated cognitive channels. His teaching methods were aligned with the natural needs and instincts of children. Pestalozzi used the word “anschauung” from Emanuel Kant to describe how children reach this level of knowing. Anschauung can only occur through actively exploring the environment and through play. Pestalozzi believed the child needed to actually use objects before he/she could learn the words describing them and their uses.

Froebel, an architect turned schoolmaster, came to realize that children needed a school experience prior to age 6. The child’s garden or kindergarten was introduced by Froebel as a necessary step in the educational ladder prior to first grade. In kindergarten, children find the balance between learning new skills and behaviors expected by society. It is a safe place where young children have the freedom to grow following natural (inborn) patterns. Froebel posited that play should be central in the kindergarten day.

Froebel’s Kindergarten

Central to Froebel’s kindergarten curricula was an emphasis on the child learning from nature. Young children were taught to observe patterns and the natural geometry and symmetry of nature. The creative use of play, supported by a series of “gifts” (educational toys) and “occupations” (material for practice in skill development), was central in the curriculum. The gifts were designed to teach colors, shapes, numbers, extent, symmetry, lines, rings, points, and proportion. Occupations included teaching materials for helping children learn solids, surfaces, lines (weaving, embroidery, etc.), points (stringing beads), and reconstruction. Froebel’s kindergarten curriculum developed analytical thinking through teaching the child to observe patterns and geometric forms of individual aspects of nature but equally to evaluate them as “a whole both in its organic unity and in its component parts” (Froebel, 1948, p. 553). Toy blocks made of maple were used to construct and reconstruct the world of things. Froebel’s goal was to have children learn through their own actions, and arrive at the concept that there is an inner coherence to all things (McCarter, 1999).

Today, the use of standardized tests in American kindergartens has been described as a violation of the original rubric for a “child’s garden” given to education by Froebel (Jeynes, 2006). Froebel’s curriculum was highly symbolic, providing children with materials (gifts) that helped youngsters cope with their world through play. The imposition of tests and high-stakes assessments into this idealistic children’s garden can metaphorically be compared to the serpent in Eden. The impact of Froebel’s “gifts” to children far exceeds that produced by standardized educational tests. See Case in Point 1.1 for an example.

Case in Point 1.1

Impact of Froebel’s Gift of Wooden Blocks

In 1876, a New England teacher and her 9-year-old son traveled to Philadelphia to visit the Centennial Exposition of the United States. That young mother, Anna Lloyd Wright, with her young son, Frank, paid their $.50 admission fee and visited all 37 of the national exposition halls during their week in Philadelphia.¹ Froebel’s fo...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Brief Contents
• Detailed Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Part I Background, Current Issues, and Interpretation of Assessments in Early Childhood
• Part II Formative and Summative Assessments and Tests
• Part III Individual Screening Measures and Full Assessments
• Part IV Parent Communication and Special Needs Children
• Part V Evaluation of Early Childhood Programs and Schools
• Glossary
• References
• Index
• About the Author