ECE 240

Vanessa Longoria
Reflection Paper on
Assessments

Research shows that assessing young children is beneficial in several ways. For instance,
it helps the teacher measure their strengths and support areas. This leads to planning for the
classroom and helping them grow and progress. Assessments are also a source of documentation
that keeps valuable data and childs information. Moreover, these can be utilized as prove of the
childs progress to show parents and the state. They are also very useful to help educators
observe children for red flags in any developmental delay, speech, behaviors and strengths.
Every person has a different style, therefore there are several formats one can use or create to
better meet their needs.

Some ways that early childhood educators can practice responsible assessment with
young children are by having pre-selected forms available and being familiar with them. They
can be formal or informal. It is essential for the educators to know how to use the assessments
and have the appropriate purpose for each child. For example, to always find a way to support
the child. They can also use these assessments during parent-teacher conferences to set goals,
check the progress, find out the reason for a behavior and create strategies for the child at home.

On the contrarily, early childhood educators can be influenced by biased opinions,

criticism, labeling, not feeling well, tiredness, upset or sick. Any of these factors or all of them
together can affect the way an observer feels and perspective. If the observer does not maintain a
neutral attitude, his/her observations can omit or add valuable data of the observation. Lack of
such things will make the observation useless or not valuable.

Some legal or ethic issues relating assessments can be presented. It is a delicate situation
because the observer is responsible for providing evidence of the observation and of maintaining
the notes to facts. Parents can be upset or not in agreement with the educators observations,
concerns or suggestions. Videotaping is one of the most easy to perform but can lead to
problems. Another assessment can also be when screening for a delay or disability. Therefore,
early childhood educators should have tactic in presenting the observations and discussing them
with anyone.

Although there are many benefits in assessing young children, there are also many
controversies in making them at such a young age. Parents, colleagues, relatives, specialist or
professionals can disagree with this because of their personal, cultural, or religious beliefs. Other
controversies are that the data of the observations can be omitted, not accurate, not neutral, or not
true. That is why it is important to collect evidence and detailed information of any observation.

It is interesting that regardless of the diversity of children in the classroom, early

childhood educators can effectively practice such assessments. If they maintain raw data, details,
evidence, and facts, the assessment results will be extremely beneficial to the teachers, child and
families. In conclusion, as an early childhood educator, I practice and perform a variety of
assessment tools in the classroom to have support in identifying speech, behavior, delays and
strengths. I highly recommend anyone to search for the best assessment tool that meets their
needs.