Developmental assessment in

children
 Outline
• What is a developmental assessment?
• Why Developmental assessment is important?
• Domains of developmental assessment
• Assessment methods
Developmental assessments
 What is developmental
assessment of the child?

• The process of gathering information about a child.

• Reviewing the information.

• Assessment is a critical part of the high quality, early

childhood program.

• Educators and health care providers do child assessment to

get information about what he knows and what he can do.
• Observing and documenting a child’s behavior and performance
over a period of time is important for :

• Educators
• Health care providers
• Parents

• They can begin to plan appropriate and effective individualized

instruction for each child.

• parents so can follow their child’s progress at daily life activities and
at school, understand their child’s strengths and challenges.
 Why is assessment
important?
• Assessment can Provide a record of growth in all developmental
areas:
Cognitive
Physical
Motor
social-emotional.
Language and approaches to learning

• Assessment can help in :

• Monitoring progress

• Screening: ‘red flags’

• Diagnosis
– Identify special need(s)
 Why is assessment
important?
• Identify children who may need additional support and determine if
there is a need for intervention or support services.

• Help to plan individualized instruction for a child or for a group of

children that are at the same stage of development.

• Identify the strengths and weaknesses of the provided care and

help in evaluating how well the program meets the goals and needs
of the children.

• Provide a common ground between health care providers’

educators and parents or families to use in collaborating on a
strategy to support their child.
Why is it necessary?
• Reassure if normal development pattern
• Discuss issues around good parenting
• Spot regression
• If any genetic disorder?
• Identify those with specific areas of impairment
or global concerns
– Allows early support or interventions eg. hearing aids,
physiotherapy, ?To ensure child reaches their
potential
– Give Parents time to adjust
 Developmental Domains
• Most developmental screening instruments have items that are clustered
within five domains:
• These domains will help in mapping a child’s performance compared with
children of a similar age from similar population

Personal- Adaptive
Social Domain Motor Communicati
Domain Domain on Domain Cognitive
Domain
 What are different child assessment methods?

• Methods of child assessment can be

• Informal (conducting natural observations, collecting data
and children’s work for portfolios, using educator and
teacher ratings)
• Formal (using assessment tools such as questionnaires
and standardized testing). Both methods are effective and
can help inform nurses, educators and parents about a
child’s progress.
Assignment one :Each student should search about one
developmental assessment tool and try to examine a child and
present it at class in 19/3/2022 then submit the assignment. Do
not forgot to record the age of the child
 Assessment can be
done through
• Observations can be made with minimal or no intrusion into
children’s activities. Observe all facets of development, including
intellectual, linguistic, social-emotional, and physical
development, on a regular basis.
• Portfolios are a record of data that is collected through the
work children have produced over a period of time. The
collection clearly shows the progress of a child’s development.
Portfolios can be an important tool in helping facilitate a
partnership between teachers and parents.
• Educator Ratings are useful in assessing children’s cognitive and
language abilities as well as their social-emotional development.
These ratings can be linked to other methods of assessment,
such as standardized testing or other assessment tools.
 Assessment can be
done through
• Parent Ratings integrate parents into the assessment
process. Parents who are encouraged to observe and
listen to their child can help detect and target
important milestones and behaviors in their child’s
development.

• Standardized Tests are tests created to fit a set of

testing standards. These tests are administered and
scored in a standard manner and are often used to
assess the performance of children
Important issues to consider in Child
assessment

• Believe the parents if concerned

• Full antenatal, perinatal and postnatal
history
• Consanguinity or learning problems
in
family - ?recessive or metabolic
problem
• Observation of age-appropriate play
with
toys in clinic
Important issues to consider in Child
assessment
•Culture influences:
• Language • Childbearing age
• Religion • Pregnancy diet
• Economics • Childrearing practices
• Dress • Normality standards
• Social Relationships • Early achievement
• Gender Roles • Construct of self
• Technology • Mother-infant relation
• Everything! • Everything!
 Important issues in Child
assessment
• Assessor knows the child. The adult conducting the assessment should have a pre-
existing relationship with the child. Ideally, the assessor is the health care provider or
the educator.

• Assessment is “authentic. (In reality/ real situations)” Assessment should take place
in a child’s normal setting. The assessment should reflect everyday relationships and
experiences. It should be conducted in familiar contexts and settings (such as the
classroom).

• Observations are ongoing and diverse. For a comprehensive assessment, observations

should be made at a variety of children’s activities and be ongoing in order to fully see
the progress of a child.

• Assessment is a cycle. Although specific methods for assessment tools vary, the
process is cyclical, to better serve children
The cycle is as follows:

• Instruct.

• Observe. Observe children in various situations.

• Document, Reflect. Record while observing or as soon as possible.

• Analyze, Evaluate. Study the data with assessment tools. The assessment
comes from the combination of documentation and evaluation.

• Summarize, Plan, and Communicate. This informs a child’s specific needs

and plan.

• Instruct. (The cycle repeats.)

 Instruct

Communicate Observe
children

Assessment cycle

Summarize& Plan Document&

reflect

Analyze & Evaluate

 Assessment Approaches
• Norm-referenced assessment
– Compare individual child to other children

• Criterion-reference assessment
– Compare child as he/she is now to how he/she
was at some earlier time
– ‘Milestone scales’

• Functional assessment
– Observation of the child’s ‘performance’ of
everyday tasks in a natural setting
 Approaches
• structured, formal assessment:

• Start with relationship building

• Be open to listening & learning rather than telling

• Fully explain the purpose(s) (before) and the result(s)

(after) of the assessment

• Include parents and family in all stages of the assessment

process
•Suggested opportunistic screening questions

•Do you have any concerns about the way your child is
behaving, learning, or developing?
•Do you have any concerns about the way he or she
moves or uses his or her arms or legs?
•Do you have any concerns about how your child talks
and understands what you say?
•Does your child enjoy playing with toys? Describe what
he or she does while playing
•Has your child ever stopped doing something he or she
could previously do?
•Does your child get along with others?
•Do you have any concerns about how your child is
learning to do things for himself or herself?
Concerns of Health care providers for Assessing Young Children

Many early childhood professionals have multiple concerns about :

- The assessment of preschool children including what is being measured,
- The quality of the measurement tools,
- The conditions under which children are being assessed,
- How the assessment results are being used.
 The assessment process should never focus exclusively on a
test score or number.

Tests are a standard for evaluating the extent to which children have
learned the basic cognitive, academic, and social skills necessary for
functioning successfully in our culture.

It is important to remember that a test score represents a sample of

behavior in a structured testing situation and should not be viewed as the
sole determinant of a child=s current competencies or future achievement.
( Do not Judge the child)
The assessment process should never focus exclusively on a
test score or number.

Preschool children's development is rapid and uneven,

and their development is greatly impacted by
environmental factors such as the care they have received
and the learning environments they have experienced.

Test results should always be interpreted in light of a

child's cultural background, primary language, and any
handicapping conditions.
 Formal testing settings may not capture the full scope and depth
of knowledge of what children know and can do.

Assessment of preschool children differs from testing older children because the
standardized paper-and-pencil tests used in later grades are not appropriate for young
children.
Test scores and other performance measures may be adversely affected by temporary
states of fatigue, anxiety, or stress.
Additionally, test scores depend on a child's cooperation and motivation.
 Building and maintaining rapport with children is a continuous process
that must be interwoven throughout the testing process.

Testing young children is challenging because an examiner must

successfully carry out a multitude of tasks during the testing situation
such as establishing rapport, administering the items according to
instructions, keeping the materials ready, responding appropriately to
the child, precisely recording the child's responses, keeping the child
engaged, and scoring the child's responses.

The content and procedures of young children’s assessments must

be different than that used with older children. Just as all children, do
not learn in the same ways, some children do not perform well on
standardized tests.
 The purpose of developmental screening is to identify children who should be referred for further
assessment.

Many preschool and kindergarten programs have mandated formal

developmental screenings for all children they serve in order to identify
children with developmental delays at an early age.
Screening instruments are designed to identify children who should be
referred for further assessment to determine the need for special services or
supports.
Because they are designed for administration to large numbers of children as
the first stage in a program of assessment, they contain a limited number of
items and can be administered quickly.
These few items do not measure the entire range of achievement, and thus
these instruments are of limited usefulness in measuring child progress over
time.