The National Quality Standard (NQS) Assessment and Rating Instrument is an important tool for supporting reliability and validity in the assessment and rating process for Australian early childhood education and care services. The Instrument provides a guide for authorised officers and practitioners, by describing each element of the NQS at each of the three most frequently applied quality levels: Working Towards NQS, Meeting NQS and Exceeding NQS. This minor research project involved detailed content analysis of the Instrument, to identify the constructs used to differentiate between the three quality levels and the frequency with which each construct occurred. The analysis found that intentionality, frequency, extent and inclusivity are the four constructs most commonly used for differentiating between NQS quality levels. (author abstract)