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...learning standards within the past four years. Results indicate that almost all states have developed early learning standards for prekindergarten-age children, and the number of states that have developed infant-toddler early learning standards has increased markedly. States have used a variety of strategies to support teachers in their use of early learning standards, and a number of states have or are developing monitoring systems to gauge the extent to which programs are using the standards. The authors discuss the implications that trends related to the development and implementation of early learning standards have for early childhood policies and practices, and they discuss areas where further research is needed.
Introduction
The movement to improve student achievement through stronger accountability for schools is one of the most significant developments in the field of education (Kagan & Scott-Little, 2004). Within the past decade, K-12 education systems have been increasingly held accountable for making sure that students achieve at high levels. As part of this accountability movement, standards have been written to articulate what exactly students are expected to learn. Wide-scale assessments have been implemented to gauge what students have learned at specified grades, and states have put into place systems that report results from the assessments to parents and to the public. No Child Left Behind instituted federal mandates that specify consequences when schools do not show "adequate progress" on the assessments. This movement to hold education systems accountable for what students learn has had significant and pervasive impacts on K-12 education.
The field of early childhood education has not been exempt from these reforms, although the trend has largely taken place in the past five years. Federal initiatives such as Good Start, Grow Smart, revised guidance for the Child Care Development state plans, and changes within the reauthorization of Head Start in 1998 have emphasized greater accountability for child outcomes. State-level policy makers have also called for increased accountability. With this rapid advent of accountability-related policies in early care and education has come a corresponding need to understand how the policies and related practices are unfolding in programs across the country. As new accountability requirements become established in states, what do they look like? To answer this question, in June 2005, the Early Childhood Education Assessment Consortium of the Council of Chief State School Officers conducted a Web-based survey of the 50 states and the District of Columbia to collect information on existing and emerging policies and practices related to early learning standards (documents to outline what children should know and be able to do), early childhood assessments that are used to collect data from children, and early education program assessments that are used to evaluate program quality. This paper examines survey results related to the development and implementation of early learning standards.
A Historical Look at Early Learning Standards
Although the introduction of accountability-related policies is relatively new to the field of early care and education, there have been several significant trends in state activities prior to the time of this survey. We begin with a brief summary of trends noted in earlier research related to early learning standards.
Development of Early Learning Standards
Early learning standards, also known as "early learning guidelines," are documents that outline expectations for what preschool-age children should know or be able to do. Although they come in a variety of formats, the central premise is that these documents articulate what should be taught and what children should learn prior to kindergarten entry. While the field of early care and education has long had program standards to define expectations for how programs will be implemented, standards that define what children will learn are relatively new.
The Impetus for Early Learning Standards
In 1999, only 10 states had a document that outlined expectations for children's development and learning prior to kindergarten entry. By May 2002, 27 states had an early learning standards document for preschool-age children, and four states had developed a similar document to describe expectations for infants and toddlers (Scott-Little, Kagan, & Frelow, 2003a, 2003b). Several developments within the field of early care and education and within the K-12 education system have contributed to the trend to develop early learning standards, including our expanding knowledge about what children are capable of learning, efforts to improve the quality of programs, and policy developments that have called for increased accountability.
Momentum for the development and use of early learning standards comes, in part, from recent research on children's learning and development. The National Research Council's report Eager to Learn: Educating Our Preschoolers suggested that "the accumulation of convincing evidence from research [is] that young children are more capable learners than current practices reflect and that good educational experiences in the preschool years can have a positive impact on school learning" (Bowman, Donovan, & Burns, 2001, p. 2). In short, research has indicated that children are capable of learning more than many in the field might have thought previously and that children's experiences before they start school are vitally important in shaping how successful children are later. Early learning standards have been put into place, in part, to better define expectations for what children should know and be able to do prior to kindergarten in order to facilitate shared understanding of these expectations across persons caring for young children. This shared understanding, in turn, can contribute to a more coherent approach to educating our youngest citizens (Kendall, 2003; NAEYC & NAECS/SDE, 2002; Scott-Little, Kagan, & Frelow, 2006).
A second impetus for developing early learning standards has been the desire to promote high-quality early education programming for all children. In an effort to establish high-quality programs, the field has specified different types of standards to define expectations for programs--program standards to define how programs should provide services and early learning standards to define the knowledge, skills, and characteristics that programs should seek to help children develop. Standards are a starting point to promoting high-quality programming--the foundation upon which high-quality programming is built. Early learning standards, along with other types of standards, are the building blocks to ensure high-quality programming across the wide variety of programs serving children before they enter kindergarten (Ackerman & Barnett, 2006; Bodrova, Leong, & Shore, 2004; NAEYC & NAECS/SDE, 2002).
A final and perhaps overarching impetus for development of early learning standards is the desire to improve child outcomes in early care and education programs. Early in 2002, President Bush launched the Good Start, Grow Start initiative (2002), a federal initiative designed to improve the quality of early care and education programs and promote children's success in school. Good Start, Grow Smart required states to develop "voluntary early learning guidelines" to address children's language and literacy skills. The basic premise is that standards to define what children should learn can help teachers be more intentional in their teaching. Some evidence from the K-12 standards-based education reform effort suggests that standards to define what children should learn can be an effective strategy to promote positive child outcomes. Research suggests that students score higher on various measures of achievement when teachers are using standards that define what children should learn (Bodrova, Leong, & Shore, 2004). Although early learning standards have been put into place for a variety of reasons, one overarching reason is the expectations that documents that define what children should learn can help teachers be more intentional about what they teach and, in turn, help improve child outcomes (Scott-Little, Kagan, & Frelow, 2006).
Considerations Regarding Early Learning Standards
Although the reasons for developing and implementing early learning standards are varied and positive, the advent of standards-based education has not been unequivocally embraced in the field. Historically, many in the field have questioned the appropriateness of such standards and pointed out many potential dangers of such documents--children being unfairly denied placements based on what they do or do not know, programs being unfairly judged based on whether children in their care meet such standards, and the demise of a child-centered approach to curriculum development and instructional practices (Kagan & Scott-Little, 2004). In a position statement regarding the development of early learning standards, NAEYC & NAECS/SDE (2002) outlined several potential risks inherent with the development of early learning standards: that the responsibility for meeting the expectations outlined in standards "will be placed on children's shoulders" rather than on the adults who provide learning opportunities for them; that children (particularly children with disabilities and culturally and linguistically diverse children) will be labeled as failures if they do not exhibit the skills and knowledge described within the standards; and that high-quality teaching will be marginalized in the effort to have children meet the standards--that the curriculum will become rigid and that teachers will "teach to the test." Children's development and learning at this age is highly dependent on what they have experienced, and the experiences children have had vary tremendously. Is the movement to define "standard" expectations that are used across children with such diverse experiences fair, and what effect will it have on teaching? Despite these worries, the number of states that have early learning standards has increased tremendously; therefore, it is important to systematically study how early learning standards are being implemented--what states are doing to help teachers use the standards appropriately and effectively.
Implementation of Early Learning Standards
Scott-Little, Kagan, and Frelow (2003a) conducted a study during a time when states were just beginning to develop early learning standards to document the early efforts to implement the documents in the field. At the time, 27 states had published early learning standards (most within the past four years), and 12 states were in the process of developing early learning standards. To collect data on how the early learning standards documents had been developed and how states were implementing the relatively new documents, Scott-Little, Kagan, and Frelow (2003a) conducted in-depth interviews with early childhood specialists in state Departments of Education, Child Care Block Grant fund administrators, and state Association for the Education of Young Children representatives. In total, 77 respondents were interviewed in 2001 and 2002. The interviews collected data on any early learning standards documents that had been developed, who had been involved in developing the documents, and the intended purpose of the documents. Respondents were also asked to indicate what content had been included in their state's document, what programs were supposed to use the document, and what was being done (or what was being planned) to help teachers use the documents.
Respondents indicated that the early learning standards that existed at the time had primarily been developed to improve curriculum and instruction in state-funded preschool programs. Respondents from 21 states indicated that their state-funded preschool programs were the targeted users for the early learning standards, but no state had an accountability system in place to monitor the extent to which programs were using the early learning standards. Twelve states had plans for some type of monitoring/accountability system underway. In eight instances, the standards documents were considered to be voluntary and were not targeted to particular programs (Scott-Little,...
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