- VOLUME
- ABSTRACT FILE
- TITLE
- High-stakes testing with preschool children: Violation of professional standards for evidence-based practice in early childhood intervention
- KEYWORDS
- high‐stakes testing, authentic assessment, early childhood intervention, professional standards, evidence‐base
The accountability movement in education has been a controversial set of policies and practices. Without doubt, measurement of children’s progress in learning and school success is a critical part of instruction, educational policy, and reform. However, nowhere are the high‐stakes testing movement and its dubious practices more contentious than in the emerging implementation within early childhood education or pre‐kindergarten. Authentic assessment and program/progress evaluation has been embraced by the early childhood fields as meeting the unique needs of all young children. This article reviews the features and advantages of authentic assessment by describing the where, what, how, who, when, and why of appropriate measurement for early childhood intervention and outlining its accumulating evidence‐base.