Assessments Tools Used in Day Care Centers

Day care assessments ensure children receive safe and appropriate services.

For parents, leaving a child in a day care center can be anxiety-producing. The worry about whether their child is in good hands and kept safe throughout the day is a natural response. However, some parents may feel more at ease knowing that particular early child care centers are accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children, which has specific requirements for assessing day care centers and their staff.

General Assessments

General assessments serve to evaluate the day care center as a whole, ranging from areas such as safety to the appropriateness of staff training and education. The Program for Infant/Toddler Caregivers developed an assessment tool that measures the quality of care young children receive. The assessment tool is known as the Program Assessment Rating Scale, or PARS. Five factors are taken into consideration when the assessment is implemented at a day care center, including the quality of caregivers' interaction with infants, family partnerships, cultural responsiveness, and inclusion of children with disabilities, the level of relationship-based care, routines and the physical environment. Each component has its own set of identifiers that observers respond to during the live assessment. For instance, the physical environment component may have several questions regarding safety and whether there are age-appropriate toys for children to play with. Day care workers receive feedback and information on training for improvement after the scores are released.

Wellness Assessments

Wellness assessments are used to measure how good a day care center is at providing a healthy atmosphere for young children. These tools look at the types of food that are served, how much physical activity children get in a day and whether or not they are being educated on health and wellness. The Yale University Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity devised an assessment guide that aims to capture information on the quality of nutrition, wellness and physical activities policies written into early childhood development center handbooks. This tool is strictly appropriate for children ages 3 to 5, and is not intended for infants or older children. The assessment tool collects data about whether or not the day care center participates in health awareness and education not only for the children, but also for their parents. It also serves to make sure that snacks and beverages offered at the day care center meet health standards.

Environmental Assessments

Environmental assessments look specifically at the environment of the day care center, and evaluate it for safety and other environmental factors. An example is the Infant/Toddler Environment Rating Scales. This assessment tool examines the day care center space and furnishings, personal care routines and what safety practices are in place, among other identifiers. This environmental rating scale is used to make improvements to day care centers so they offer young children safe and appropriate learning environments.

Self Assessments

Rather than relying on outside observers to implement assessments, day care centers can create their own assessments. Such assessments should be based on their state's licensing division and the rules for operating a legal day care center. According to the State of California Department of Social Services, some things a day care center should include in a self-assessment is whether or not there is a written disaster plan, whether or not the day care center tracks incident reports, how the center goes about notifying parents of an ill child and whether the staff-to-child ratio is met at all times. Day care centers can use their state's guidelines as a basis and then expand on them to create a comprehensive evaluation tool they perform quarterly or annually for quality management purposes.

References

• National Association for the Education of Young Children; Update; Fall 2009
• WestEd: A New Yardstick for Assessing Early Childhood Care; 2006
• The Yale University Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity; Wellness Child Care Assessment Tool
• FPG Child Development Institute: Environment Rating Scales; Infant/Toddler Environment Rating Scales (ITERS-R)
• California Department of Social Services; Child Care Centers Self Assessment Guide