Assessment Of The Kindergarten Classroom An Empirical...

Assessment in the Kindergarten Classroom For many years, educators have been challenged in their efforts to assess kindergarten children using a variety of strategies. Tests and other types of assessments designed for kindergarten children are not the same as those intended for children in later grades in elementary school. Today, kindergarten teachers face the challenge of balancing traditional developmental programming with the academically oriented curriculum that is currently required. The essence of this challenge is to use assessments to measure and communicate student learning in relation to their curricular stance. The first article that I examined to investigate the issue was â€Å"Assessment in the Kindergarten Classroom: An†¦show more content†¦At the kindergarten level, this movement has been met with significant debate as teachers negotiate the balance between traditional developmental programming and the current academically-driven curriculum. Central to this debate is teachers’ uses of assessments to measure and communicate student learning in relation to these curricular orientations. In practice, in every school kindergarten, teachers face the challenge of finding assessment strategies that serve multiple purposes across curriculum orientations. Compounding this challenge is a dearth of empirical research into classroom-based, kindergarten assessment. The three research questions guiding the investigation in the first article were: (a) How do teachers describe and demonstrate their curricular stance in relation to developmental and academic orientations to kindergarten education? (b) What assessment strategies do kindergarten teachers integrate into their kindergarten programs? and (c) How do teachers’ approaches to assessment align with their curricular stances? Through interviews and classroom observations, the findings of the study contributed to the development of profiles delineating approaches to kindergarten assessment. As we all know, contemporary kindergarten is loaded with standardized expectations that emphasize the mastery of academic skills. These expectations have a