Assessing Young Children: Should We and Why?

As much as I love my job teaching Kindergarten, and enjoy seeing my students develop in all developmental areas; I hate assessing them. I'm often frustrated with the lack of developmentally appropriate questioning or format of the test.  Assessing children in public school is completely different from assessing in a daycare environment. When I work as a preschool teacher, I enjoyed assessing my children through collecting artifacts of children works and observations. I was able to get a glimpse of the whole child and understand how their development translated to their everyday experiences. It was easy to modify the environment, adjust lessons, and bring in new materials all based on their current developmental needs. Children were less frustrated when being assessed, never developing anxiety over taking a test, or feeling the need to cheat because they just wanted to do well. The question now is what so different between that type of assessing I was able to conduct in preschool and the type of assessment I'm mandated to due through the school system? How are children from other parts of the world assessed; like Canada? These are just a few questions that wonder in my mind when I think about the practice of assessing young children.

According to, Assessing the Development and Learning of Young Children a position statement written by the Southern Early Childhood Association (SECA), "The purpose of assessment of young children is to collect information necessary to make important decisions about their developmental and educational needs. Assessment must always serve in ways that enhance opportunities for optimal growth, development, and learning. The process of determining individual developmental and educational needs informs early childhood education practices and provides a template for setting individual and program goals."  There are many different ways in which to collect this data such as formal and informal assessment, observations, work samples, projects, and work samples. 

Understanding the purpose of assessing young children is not the problem most early childhood professionals understand that assessing children development is essential to providing quality stimulating care. It how you asses that make the difference in the quality, purpose, and effectiveness of the data collected. Such laws as the "No Child Left Behind Act" has directly linked standardized test to overall school success.  The SECA stated in their position statement that test are not adequate tools for deciding important decisions like merit pay, the development for a school improvement plan, or comparison of students. So if assessment are not used for any of the things listed above what should they be used for?

Appropriate Uses for Assessment  

• Emphasizes emerging development in all developmental domains: physical/motor, psychosocial, cognitive, language, and literacy development
• Focuses on individual strengths and uniqueness
• Is based on sound principles of child growth and development
• Emanates from authentic (logical, meaningful, relevant, and applicable) curricula
• Is intertwined with instruction
• Is performance, process, and product based
• Is ongoing and occurs in many contexts
• Recognizes and supports different intelligences and learning styles
• Minimizes or alleviates child stress to ensure best (or most successful) outcomes
• Is reflective and analytic, honest and accurate, instructive and useful
• Is collaborative with learners, parents, teachers, and professional specialists as needed 
***Supplied from SECA***

Appropriate Styles of  Assessment  

• Work Samples
• Teacher Observations
• Checklist and Inventories
• Parent Conferences
• Teacher Constructed Test or Projects
• Referral Decisions 

Issues in Assessing Young Children in Canada  

After watching the video, Provincial Assessment Program, which is about a assessment program that is used in Canada to assess young children in elementary school to prepare them for a national test that compares their academic gains to other peers around the world. In viewing the video, although it was well recorded, the children were all setting nicely and working, and the teachers showed passion; it made me sad. I was sad because I know that the assessment was not truly for the benefit of the child but for the glorification to gloat about the academic status of a country. Student can make the same academic gains from working to together collaborating, using trial and error to self discover answers, presenting their finding and using supported resources to support their position. One test does not dictate future success for a child, a educational program, or a teacher. Why can't we assess children in the most natural way, using real life experiences, with topic that can relate too, and integrate in with all subject areas?  

    

Resources

Southern Early Childhood Association. Assessing Development and Learning in Young Children: A Position Statement of the Southern Early Childhood Association. Little Rock, AR

Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuEpgTqgLDo