Session Information
04 SES 07 A, Early Childhood and Family
Paper Session
Contribution
Early identification of children at risk of learning difficulties, starting in the last year of kindergarten, is a major issue for any School System. Drawing on a research project carried out over the last three years in Italian kindergartens in the Province of Bolzano on children at risk of reading and writing difficulties or developmental dyslexia, this paper focuses on the role of the didactic evaluation process done by teachers during early identification initiatives.
Our study underlines the importance of planning early identification processes as common initiatives between School System and Health Service. A huge difference exists between early identification initiatives in kindergarten and screening processes, since the former gives to teachers a fundamental role.
During our projects we developed a complex plan of action-research based on four elements: teachers’ training; didactic labs for the whole class group before and after testing children, scientific early identification test through two different tools (traditional and software), twice a year; meetings between teachers and Health Service experts after testing the children.
The combination of these four elements produced a complex research path, developed in nine phases during the whole school year. During seven of those phases teachers and children were directly involved as main characters of the experimentation.
In our research, the training and testing process enables teachers to enrich their skills on evaluating and planning, and to adopt didactic strategies, specific tools and resources to enhance the inclusive development of didactic activities and to facilitate the learning process for the whole class group.
As a matter of fact, we stress that early identification initiatives in kindergarten bring didactic benefits to the whole class group, not only to children identified as “at risk,” not only decreasing the number of positive or negative false.
Didactic evaluation within an early identification initiative in kindergarten promotes both the observation of the whole class group, and the self-evaluation of the effectiveness of didactic strategies and activities implemented by teachers.
Furthermore, in our study didactic evaluation promotes the creation of didactic tools, strategies and activities to be carried out with children during the every-day school life. In fact, a number of didactic activities have been designed and carried out autonomously by teams of teachers involved in our research. We will present some of them.
This complex early identification initiative is designed to avoid the still existing risk of labeling and stigmatizing children with low results in tests, even more at young age in kindergarten, when false cases often occur. Aware teachers with high professional skills and resources, directly involved during many phases of the identification process, can be in a position to contextualize test performance within a more complex set of data resulting from school-life, from classmates’ performance and from previous didactic activities. They can work effectively to implement inclusive learning environments and to transmit fruitful information to primary school teachers too.
Our aim is to present this methodology of identification initiative in kindergarten as an alternative to screening process that underestimate the role of teachers and evaluation.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Zambotti F., Macchia V. (2009), Valutazione didattica e identificazione precoce nella scuola dell’infanzia come strategia per l’inclusione, in Integrazione Scolastica e Sociale, vol.8, n°5, Trento (I), Erickson.
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