Measure selection
The following guiding principles were used in measure selection:
- Short. Since there will be a total of 60 minutes of direct assessment and 60 minutes of parent assessment, measures needed to be relatively brief and adaptable.
- Reliable. Since measurement of variability is the key goal, measures with demonstrated high test-retest reliability and/or internal consistency were prioritized.
- Valid. Since we aim to generate evidence that may have translational impact on different education sectors, measures with evidence of strong construct, predictive, and external validity were selected.
- Cross-culturally appropriate. Since measuring children’s variability across contexts is a key goal, measures with demonstrated use in a wide range of cultures and contexts, including low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) were sought.
- Broad applicability across age (2-12 years). Since measuring children’s variability and developmental growth are goals, measures that could provide continuity throughout the developmental age range of interest were selected.
- Normed. Since measuring children’s variability across ages, groups, and contexts is a key goal, pre-existing measures that are normed across our age range of interest (i.e., 2-12 years) held priority.
- Relatively language independent. Since paradigm and performance variability could arise due to language differences (e.g., syntactic or pragmatic differences), when possible relatively language independent measures requiring minimal translation were chosen. This constraint is of course most relevant for measures that do not intend to measure language competence.
- Accessible and non-commercial. In order to ensure wide-reaching accessibility, value to communities, and use of both the LEVANTE data repository and core measure set, we prioritized open-access measurement tools.
Constructs for Assessments
Direct assessment (60 minutes per child)
Our core constructs for direct assessment were selected based on an interest in key learning outcomes and their precursors in early childhood, combined with the goal of creating a holistic assessment of individual children.
- Language & Literacy
- Number & Mathematics
- Reasoning
- Executive Function
- Social Cognition
- Spatial Cognition
- Child Questionnaire
- Well-being
- Peer relationships
- Attitudes towards schooling
Caregiver report (60 minutes)
Primary caregivers provide a wealth of information about the contextual variables surrounding their children (e.g., home, school, community, family, etc.) as well as their children’s interactions within these contexts (e.g., health, well-being, emotion, etc.).
- Demographics
- Child Health and Well-Being
- Socioemotional Development
- Executive Function and Self-Regulation
- Home Environment
- Parenting
- Caregiver Well-Being
- Demographic info
Teacher report (15 minutes)
LEVANTE aims to characterize both the home environment of individual children but also other meaningful contexts, including their school. We provide measures that allow sites to collect school and classroom characteristics from children’s teachers (whenever possible based on format of administration).
- School, classroom, and teacher characteristics
Site-level reports
LEVANTE aims to characterize other meaningful contexts, including geographic (neighborhood) environments. We will use geographic databases in combination with home geolocation data to extract a key set of geographic/environmental variables, to be de-identified locally.
- Geographic/environmental variables