Title

How to Use the Early Childhood Indicators of Progress

Intro

The Early Childhood Indicators of Progress (ECIPs) are the basis for the method and practice of teaching, curriculum development, child assessment, teacher preparation, and evaluation in Minnesota.

Sections

How to read the ECIPs

The organization of the domains is designed to be easy to understand and aid in planning for individuals and small groups of children. The ECIPs are displayed as an approximate age-range continuum, reflecting the understanding that individual children’s skills emerge at different times. Included within each domain are the following elements:

Domains are major areas of development.
Components are specific areas of learning within each domain.
Subcomponents are consistent strands within a component across the full age-range continuum.
Indicators are expectations for observable outcomes for the child at specific ages. For quick reference, indicators are numbered within the domain and subcomponent.
Indicator numbers identify the location of an indicator within the domain, component, and subcomponent.

Indicators within each column by age-range continuum (e.g., 1-2 years) are listed in approximate developmental order. For example, the skill described in the first indicator typically emerges at the beginning of the age-range continuum and progresses as the child develops.

Note: When supported by research, there may be times when additional age ranges are identified. For instance, within Physical and Movement Development: Dexterity (P6), the research designates what can be expected of a child 0-6 months old that is different from what can be expected of a child 6-12 months old.

What the ECIPs are and are not

The ECIPs demonstrate a continuum of increasingly complex learning for children from birth to kindergarten entrance. They are intended to address the development and learning of ALL children, including children who:

Are typically developing
Are dual language learners
Are from diverse cultures
Have disabilities

They are not an all-inclusive resource about children’s development. The standards reflect a selection of important, evidence-based developmental expectations that highlight the learning and skills children need to be equipped for future learning and continue as life-long learners.

There are appropriate and inappropriate uses of the ECIPs. They are not intended to be used as a curriculum, assessment, or diagnostic tool. The ECIPs should never be used to determine children’s eligibility for various programs or services or to deny children access to programs or services.

This tool can be used to inform instructional decisions and how best to support children’s learning. For early childhood professionals, the information shared within the ECIPs should relate specifically to a program’s authentic assessment procedures and content.

How different groups can use the standards

The primary audience of the ECIPs is professionals in early childhood care and education programs who work with children from birth to kindergarten entrance. The settings for these programs may include school districts, child care (home or center-based), community preschools, and Head Start programs.

Administrators, directors, principals, educational leaders, policy makers, community members, and other stakeholders will use the ECIPs when planning for or assessing the effectiveness of current policies and resources related to the optimal development of young children.

The ECIPs are also intended to support caregivers of young children. Communication with families and caregivers should include discussions of the ECIPs, so they have the information they need to support children’s learning and development.

Caregivers and families

Family engagement is an essential component of the successful implementation of early learning standards.

Families and caregivers of young children in Minnesota are better able to understand children’s development and communicate more fully when early childhood professionals share this framework with them. The standards create a common vocabulary for families, caregivers, and professionals so that communication is effective. Collaboration between caregivers and professionals is the best way to provide consistent, high-quality support to every child in their care.

Early childhood professionals

The ECIPs should be used frequently as a tool to assist in meeting the individual needs of all children. Early childhood professionals may use the ECIPs in three primary ways:

To guide planning for learning experiences and effective caregiving and teaching strategies
To provide direction for authentic assessment of young children
To support the engagement of families and caregivers

In addition, early childhood professionals will be impacted by the ways that the ECIPs influence program standards and evaluation. Plans for staff training and development sessions and higher education coursework in Minnesota will integrate the ECIPs into all areas of best practices for those working with young children.

Curriculum planning

When planning for curricular approaches for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, early childhood professionals can turn to the ECIPs to identify the concepts, knowledge, and skills appropriate for children at different ages. These professionals can use the broad developmental trajectories identified in the ECIPs to plan for individual children and determine the best ways to support each child’s continued growth.

In addition, by collaborating with families and considering diverse cultural backgrounds, early childhood professionals ensure that instructional approaches are culturally inclusive as they plan activities and experiences.

Using common vocabulary from the ECIPs supports strong communication among all professionals within and across early childhood programs. It is important for professionals to understand that meeting a child where they are developmentally may include working on an earlier skill rather than moving towards a more developmentally appropriate skill.

Authentic assessment

The ECIPs should not be used as an assessment.

The ECIPs provide direction for early childhood professionals when using authentic assessment procedures to monitor young children’s progress. Authentic assessment tools should be selected to ensure standards (such as the ECIPs), curricula, assessments, and teaching strategies create a coherent experience for children and enable professionals to understand and accurately support individual children’s learning and growth.

Early childhood professionals can engage in criterion-referenced, observational assessment that is authentic, meaning that it is grounded in the everyday practices of observation, documentation of what is observed, and collection of work samples; completed by those who know the child well; and conducted in the child’s natural environment.17, 18

Authentic assessment is a strengths-based approach to understanding where children are in their development. Authentic assessment should:

Celebrate the multiple ways of learning and representing knowledge children have, understanding that expectations about what a child can and should be able to do are mediated by cultural, family, and community values and practices
Value and build on the knowledge that both caregivers and children bring to their learning

Staff training and development

Higher education coursework and ongoing staff training and development are important ways to strengthen the competencies of professionals in early childhood education programs. The ECIPs will be integrated into these learning experiences for early childhood professionals, offering a framework of child development expectations and developmentally appropriate practices. Higher education coursework and staff development sessions increase familiarity with the ECIPs and address how standards inform curriculum and assessment.

Alignment with state-approved assessments

These alignment crosswalks demonstrate the overlap between the updated Early Childhood Indicators of Progress, the Minnesota Kindergarten Academic Standards and the four state-approved assessments. The crosswalks help to answer the questions of "What does a child know or do?" and "Where is a child in their learning progression?” in relation to Minnesota’s early learning and kindergarten standards. Answering these questions can help guide decisions around instruction and programs, resources, and services.

Program standards and program evaluation

The ECIPs are a framework that supports high-quality programming for young children within any set of program standards.

Programs may be accountable to the Head Start Program Performance Standards or to accreditation processes such as those established by NAEYC and the National Association of Family Child Care (NAFCC). In fact, these program standards create the conditions for successful implementation of the ECIPs by creating quality learning environments for young children.