Assessing Children's Abilities

This week, we have studied the early elementary age group and have been discussing the current trends in testing and evaluating young children.  In the United States, there is much emphasis on the academic skill level of young children.  Teachers in early grades find themselves focusing on teaching the skills and concepts the children will need to know in order to pass the state mandated tests they face each year.  Teachers I know have told me that they feel limited in their creativity, ability to stimulate free thinking, and feel pressured to ensure their children do well in order to secure their own job.  They follow curriculum, but find that the children who learn at a different pace or in a different manner are falling behind early in the year and have difficulty catching up.

So it begs the question...what skills should be measured and how?  In early childhood, we evaluate children on basic skills like literacy, numeracy, gross motor, fine motor, and cognitive abilities like scientific and mathematical thinking.  I believe that these skills can be taught and attained in a play-based environment.  Children learn best through play, right?  When does that change to children learn best through direct instruction in chairs and desks? 



In addition to the skills listed above, I believe that it is important to invest in and assess children's social and emotional intelligence.  If a child is unable or struggles to interact with peers and adults, it will also be difficult to learn some of the key skills needed to pass standardized tests.  For example, if a child cannot regulate his or her emotions in a stressful environment, the child will struggle to attend to the tasks asked of him or her to practice the learning necessary to pass the test.  It seems like a complex example, but it is so common, even in our early childhood environments.

In the Republic of South Africa, children ages 7-15 are required to attend school. When I visited the country in 2000, we spoke with many teachers that told us of stories of children and families that struggled to send their children consistently because the family lived too far from the school or one or both of the parents had passed away from HIV and the child was sent to live with extended family. 

"By 2009, only around 2.5% of children aged 7 to 15 were not in school. Yet

this 2.5% represents around 200 000 children who are not in school when

they should be. There are many reasons why these children are not in

school. Some children live very far from a school. Others are children

who need special education and who get told that the local school cannot

offer them this. Nearly all those children who are not in school are from

poor homes, sometimes with no adults in the home." (Government Gazette, 2010).

According to the South African Government Information website, there is an action plan to improve the performance of students in the education system.  In the plan, one of the goals is to increase the number of learners in Grade 3 who by the end of the3 (Government Gazette, 2010).  They use a standardized test called the "Annual National Assessments", which focus on language and math.

year have mastered the minimum language and numeracy competencies

for Grade

References:

http://www.education.gov.za/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=DV%2bNwF3%2bM1s%3d&tabid=418&mid=1211