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VCAA Bulletin
No. 49 - June 2019
Early Years

Back to VCAA Bulletin No. 49 - June 2019

The importance of assessing children's learning and development

In the Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Framework (VEYLDF), the terms used to describe learning originate from the learning sciences. Knowledge of the learning sciences research can help practitioners to implement the VEYLDF more intentionally. It can also assist early childhood professionals to focus their intention on key aspects of children's learning.

Assessment is the practice of monitoring children's learning through systematic observation. Most early childhood professionals use many types of assessment to monitor children's learning in formal and informal ways, including learning stories, diagnostic tests, or spontaneous observations of changes in what children know and can do. Systematic observation of children is more purposeful: it begins with a clear understanding of what is being observed (the construct), and often uses a tried-and-tested tool or process that reliably captures information about that construct. Ideally, it enables early childhood professionals to see where children are on a continuum of learning, and is able to describe their progress over time.

The VCAA's new professional learning resource, Assessment of Children as Confident and Involved Learners in Early Childhood Education and Care: Literature Review, outlines the four domain-general skills that come from the learning sciences, and provide the basis for learning:

  • executive function
  • problem solving
  • social skills
  • physical development.

These skills are acquired in early childhood and continue to grow throughout the life course. Early identification of learning capabilities and challenges is essential to support children's long-term social and educational outcomes.

The literature review builds a bridge between the learning sciences and the way in which everyday learning is described in the VEYLDF (confidence, involvement and learning). Download a copy from the VCAA website, or email the Early Years Unit to order a printed copy: veyldf@edumail.vic.gov.au.