Reference no: EM13835409

Capstone Final: Federal Education Proposal: Early Childhood Education
Introduction
In the United States of America the demand for early childhood education and care programs continue to increase due to two reasons; high demand for out of home care for child and due to recognition that educational experience is very important during the early ages of development in a child (Blenkin, 2012). Research has indicated that high quality and appropriate early childhood set of programs lead to both short and long term positive impact on the child's social and cognitive development. But with this understanding in mind, we see a program that is ill informed and with policies that are insufficient being imparted into the lives of the children. The programs that are existent in most cases have relied upon approaches that fragmented, and piecemeal to the complex matters that face children and their families at this early stage in their lives. Effective policies have not been frequently been funded at the most appropriate level in order to provide support to the families and the children (Gullo, 2014).

It is my belief that currently United States is at crossroads, and it is important that we must be able to come up with an integrated system of early childhood care and education which is made up of comprehensive approaches which directly brings together families and communities in the design, evaluation and implementation. It is important to invest in a child at an early age and be able to rip benefits that involve cost saving in the future. If we fail to make this investment on early child education, it means that we will be facing an uncertain future as America that will be at risk of increased delinquency, lowered levels of productivity, lower adults ready to be productive and less economic development (Blenkin, 2012).

Background of this paper
After suggesting above that the early education system in the United States might be lacking in one or two areas, one area in which I find the system to have a big problem is in formative assessment. It is important that we should understand that there is a relationship which exists between assessment in early childhood education and teaching and learning (Gullo, 2014).

i. Purpose

This is a paper that is created to make a review of issues in early childhood education and make proposal when it comes to formative assessment. The findings of this paper is intended to better the early childhood education in United States since it will be used in support of the development framework for the early education and learning (Gullo, 2014). This is a paper that is created in order to answer questions that are related to formative assessment in early childhood education.

ii. Curriculum relation to assessment

Features of curriculum such as degree of formality and informality cannot be separated from how we assess the learning and development of children. The relationship between the curriculum and assessment can be said to be sophisticated and complex and the interplay between the two is very important in ensuring effectiveness of either of the two. It is important that a curriculum framework is developed for children from birth up to the age of six. It should be a curriculum that which embraces a certain view of the children in terms of learning and how learning may be celebrated. In early Childhood education, learning can be provided in four themes that are complementary and broad and includes; well being, thinking and exploring, communicating and identity.

The framework created should be able to rely upon certain principles such as communicating and language, play and experience at first hand, active learning, well created indoor and outdoor learning environment and lastly holistic learning associated with development. It is important that we should have a curriculum that has assessment which recognizes the uniqueness of early education in the development of the child. It is important that the federal government should be able to learn from countries that have longer and established history of appraisal of assessment practices than that which is existent in the United States. It is important to develop an assessment that relies on set principles that are used in guiding practice and policy on the child assessment.

Through the following ways, the proposed assessment will help the child better achieve their goal in education. This assessment will be specifically created for a certain specific purpose and it should be fair and reliable. It is an assessment that will be age appropriate, and parents will be utilized as a very important source of information and audience for the results of the assessment. This is an assessment system that is linguistically appropriate, and recognizes that it appropriately measures language

How the changes will work

Analysis of the legislative context

In most countries we have witnessed long history of informal assessment of children who are undergoing early learning. With the changing times most countries have found it necessary to document early childhood education in ways that were not being utilized before. The legislative requirement and desire by practitioners has been important in advising the process of documenting data in helping better understand the process of learning at the early stages. It is important to understand the contents of education act which is related to Early Childhood Education.

It is a provision of this act that teachers must be able to evaluate children and report the outcome of their evaluation to their parents from period to period. The implication of the law means that the schools and the teachers must be able to come up with an assessment procedure which can be able to offer accurate information on the progress of the children and their achievement. The teachers must be able to create and maintain the records of progress shown by the children during their time attending school. At the end of the process they must be able to provide the parents with the outcome of their assessment. It is important to understand that currently the assessment process that is being used in school does not ensure compliance with the Equal Status Act due to the fact that it was not created in line with the curriculum in order to make it all inclusive.

The child care regulations provide the adequate requirement and regulation when it comes to all aspects of operations in a preschool set up. This formative assessment model must be able to ensure that the whole content it holds is part of the law through this regulations and requirement. In order for this to be possible the stakeholders must be able to engage when it comes to making judgments that are deemed to very important in terms of the development and learning. It therefore shows that assessment must be able to take place within a framework that is in line with the legislation of the country.

Importance of the model in learning and development

This model of assessment can have a number of functions in early childhood education and this can be inclusive of being summative, evaluative, and informative and ipsative. This assessment in early childhood education has great potential to support development and learning. Studies which have been done in most countries have indicated that assessment is important in meeting the needs of children and support of the cognitive process in children. The main and ultimate purpose of the assessment in early child education is to make the process of learning more enjoyable and a success among the children (Persky, 2011). Assessment must be able to work for children; it is through this assessment that we can be able to enrich the curriculum, provisions and interactions as a whole. The assessment will be able to guide in terms of what the child will learn next in order to extend and support that form of learning.

a. Nature of Early Childhood Learning

It is important for stakeholders to determine the characteristic of early childhood learning and determine the main theoretical constructs which will aid in assessment and learning among the children. The theoretical consideration can be important in development of this proposal on approaches that can be used in assessment (Persky, 2011). In early childhood education, children learn in various dimensions that include motor, linguistic, emotional and physical development. This is very variable means of learning in most dimensions. This kind of learning occurs in rapid measures and is very susceptible to certain changes in environment. It is such nature of early childhood education that makes the whole process of curriculum development and assessment highly challenging.

b. Complexity in early learning

There is evidence to suggest that early education is extensive and complex. Early childhood educators in United States have always attempted to convey the fact that early education is complex, and through this they have shown that children learning can be made better if only it can be approached in the right way (New, 2007).Children display different proficiency levels when it comes to learning at different context. Children's mind supports a certain schema at a certain period of time and therefore means that any assessment that is created must be able to contain all the schemas through which the child can be able to learn. The levels of complexity shows that we can only rely on important elements to come up with a means of assessment and not a general daily observation of the children with no periodical timeline.

Theoretical Considerations of this policy proposal

In current years especially in Western Europe, the government and policy makers over there have undergone a process of rethinking the construction process of the child. The rethinking is being done and in mind they have several development and learning theories such as psychology, philosophy, and sociology. The post modern perspective looks at the child from the sense of their start of life, and then the construction of own life. This assessment theory that I have proposed tries to borrow a lot from the perspective that was used by Malaguzzi in the development of Reggio Emilia preschools that are based in Italy (New, 2007). This was a rich theory as it did make use of the understanding that the child needs to be equipped all from the start in order to engage actively while they grow in the world. This proposal will look at assessment from the different perspectives which include ecological and socio-cultural.

i. Ecological Perspective

In most explanations of learning in early childhood development socio-cultural and ecological theories have dominated in current days.

The biological and ecological models have been utilized heavily when it comes to understanding development and learning and the associated processes of assessment (New, 2007). The models are able to emphasize the role that the ecology plays in human development and the different environmental processes. There are several papers which have been written and which have stressed the importance of education and care in facilitating the overall development of the child. Looking at it from this perspective it can be seen that human development is taking place as a result of a complex and progressive interactions which are also highly reciprocal between the adults, young people and objects that are found in the environment. The interactions take place in a very regular basis over a long and extended period of time. The forms of interactions that are enduring are taken as being key to the learning and development process and this must be studied for a long time alongside with observation of changes overtime.

ii. Socio-Cultural Perspective

Two decades ago socio cultural perspectives which highlight the social and cultural nature of education and learning are being used to give explanation of the ways that learning and development takes place in early childhood and development. Socio-cultural learning theories show that the learning process is so much of a social construction as it is also an individual one. The transformation of a child takes place in a number of levels of development which must be considered by the federal government when developing assessment of the early childhood education. The assessment must consider that the child changes with the level of involvement, role that they play in the entire learning process and the ability to show and demonstrate flexibility.

Conclusion

Research has shown that high quality early childhood education can be able to offer short term and long term positive effects on the children and the society. Proper early childhood education is important when it comes to social and cognitive development. Children who go through a stable and complex play can be able to turn out being important adults in future. The academic success of a child can be predicted through a high quality early childhood education. In order to make the early education to be effective, the federal government of United States should be able to create a policy system through which a defined assessment model can be created. If the early childhood education can be able to come up with a well planned and documented assessment process, then the problems that have been witnessed in the past when it comes to compliance with the law and the developmental needs of the child will be eliminated. This proposal is very important and therefore needs to be taken into consideration by the education stakeholders in the country in order to better early childhood education.