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State-funded prek policies on external classroom observations: Issues and status

Description:
Given the variety of publicly funded early education programs relying on observation score data, as well as the continued pressure on these programs to contain or cut operating budgets, this larger context is particularly salient as the field expands its discussion regarding best classroom observation practices. To help highlight some of the prospective agenda items for that discussion, this report summarizes the emerging--and often less-than-definitive--literature base on the potential validity and reliability issues related to policies on classroom observation protocols, observer capacity, and frequency of observation data collection. As the reader will notice, while some of this literature arises from early education-focused research, the majority of existing research on these topics is situated in middle and high school classrooms. In addition, in light of President Obama's proposal to expand 4-year-olds' access to high-quality, publicly funded preschool, the report also examines the variety of state-funded PreK program policies on classroom observations as a means for illustrating why these validity and reliability issues should be considered as part of the best practices discussion agenda. To set the stage for this dual inquiry, the report begins with an overview of state-funded PreK in the United States. This is followed by a brief description of the typical classroom observation process and two widely-used, preschool-focused classroom quality measures. After describing the current research base on the reliability and validity issues related to choice of observation protocol, ensuring observers have the capacity to generate reliable scores, and determining how frequently score data will be collected, the report turns to the status of PreK observation policies. The report concludes with some general perspectives on potential agenda items for future best practices discussions. (author abstract)
Resource Type:
Reports & Papers
Author(s):
Country:
United States
State(s)/Territories/Tribal Nation(s):
Alabama; Alaska; Arkansas; California; Connecticut; District of Columbia; Georgia; Illinois; Iowa; Kentucky; Louisiana; Massachusetts; Michigan; Nebraska; Nevada; New Jersey; New Mexico; North Carolina; Ohio; Oregon; Pennsylvania; Rhode Island; Vermont; West Virginia

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