Improving school readiness one village at a time in Ontario, Canada: Early Years parenting centres and teacher opinion of 5 years old’s development using the Early Development Instrument (EDI)

Catharine Tozer, Data Analysis Co-ordinator

Ontario Early Years Centre, Kawartha Lakes & Haliburton

Lindsay office

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

1. What are these Early Years Centres?

2. More knowledge

3. At the neighbourhood level

4. Population measure

5. Analyzed results

6. Mapping

7. Widely distributed

8. Knowledge exchange

Direct Election Prime Minister (head of party with most seats)

Head of State Governor General

Regions Provinces – each elects Premier

Premier of Ontario & provincial parliament determine education issues

Population 32, 730, 213

12, 630, 000 Ontario pop

Density 9 people per sq km

Land area 3, 511, 003 sq mi

Official languages English, French

Cities Toronto 2.6 million

Early education preschool not in schools ($$)

kindergarten (JK & SK)

Grade 1 (6 years old)

province of

Ontario

Canada

Ontario’s Early Years Plan• Focused on children 0-6

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

Brain development research

government policy changes

government funding

Ontario Early Years Centres across the province

Synaptic Density

Rethinking the Brain, Families and Work Institute, Rima Shore, 1997.

At Birth 6 Years Old 14 Years Old

0 1 4 8 12 16

AGE

Human Brain Development –Synapse Formation

SensingPathways

(vision, hearing)

LanguageHigherCognitive Function

3 6 9-3-6

Months Years

C. Nelson, in From Neurons to Neighborhoods, 2000.

Co

nce

ptio

n

01-003

The Mismatch Between Opportunity and Investment

Age0 3 10 70

97-044

Brain's "Malleability"

Spending on Health,

Education and Welfare

What is an Early Years Centre?

•103 Ontario Early Years Centres

•‘drop in’ for early learning and parent education

•adult & child together

•free

Child Outcome Measurement

measurement of child outcomes and program effectiveness was identified as a critical activity in early years programming

If we really believe that it takes a village…

the village must learn

what the children need

do we know that? how can we find out? can we find out at the neighbourhood level? what will communities do with that information?

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Social demographics such as:

-number of children 0-6 living in each neighbourhood

- where the services are

-% of lone parents with young children

-family income of families with young children

… but what about the skills of children coming from different neighbourhoods?

“The whole community has a responsibility for these children. The school

can help out by saying these are things we find about these kids in the

EDI. We, along with other leaders in the community, have to find a way

to improve the environment for these kids in the first 5 years of life. And

I’m convinced that if you’re going to raise the life quality of children 0-5

in Canada, it won’t be done by a top down approach by the government

saying we should do this or that, it’s going to be done community by

community. And the results of the EDI can help to motivate communities

to know what to work on, and to be able to work on these issues.” Dr.

Dan Offord, McMaster University, Canada 2003

the Early Development Instrument was developed by Dr. Dan Offord & Dr. Magdelena Janus of the Centre for Children at Risk (now the Offord Centre) at McMaster University.

Readiness for school:

The child’s ability to

meet the task demands

of grade 1 (6 years old)

To sit quietly and listen to the teacher

To benefit from the educational activities that are provided by the school

To be able to co-operate

Early Development Instrument reflects preschool services offered in the child’s community

every kindergarten teacher completes an 8 page questionnaire for each of their (5 year old) students in February

five domains of children’s early development…

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

1. Physical health and well-being

2. Emotional health and maturity

3. Social knowledge and competence

4. Language development and thinking skills

5. Communication skills & general knowledge

the EDI shows what % of children in each school are doing very well and what % are not ready to learn

the EDI is designed to measure the outcomes of children’s early years, not the school’s performance

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

low scores indicate that certain neighbourhoods have needs that must be addressed

when 20-30% of the students score low on more than one scale, it is a strong indicator there are children with increased needs at that school

EDI’s subdomains

Physical health and well-being

Language and cognitive

development

Social competence

Communicationskills andgeneral

knowledge

Emotionalmaturity

1. Physical readiness for the school day2. Physical independence3. Gross and fine motor skills

1. Overall social competence2. Responsibility and respect3. Approaches to learning4. Readiness to explore new things

1. Prosocial and helping behaviour2. Anxious and fearful behaviour3. Aggressive behaviour4. Hyperactivity and inattention

1. Basic literacy2. Interest in literacy/numeracy and memory3. Advanced literacy4. Basic numeracy

Communication skills and general knowledge

Domain Subdomain

EDI provides a baseline

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

National : thousands of schools from all 10 provinces of Canada

number of children last year – 110,000

Provincial: school readiness of every 5 year old in Ontario will be measured for the second time 2007- 2009.

1 in 20 children starts school

not ready to learn

yellow – highest scores

light blue – second highest

dark blue – mid range

pink – second lowest

red – lowest scores

Geographic Information System

(GIS) used to graphically report results

Benefits of EDI

building more bridges – agencies that serve infants, toddlers & preschoolers have an enhanced opportunity to plan

planning – assists schools to look forward to adjust school programs to meet the needs of incoming students

takes a village – enables communities to look backward to adjust early childhood programs to better support early child development

emphasizes the role of the community before the child reaches school

paints a picture - EDI results yield neighbourhood profiles of early childhood for every community in the board’s district

Level of data sharing after analysis is critical Who sees the results of the EDI?

One - Tight control• School Board – head office only, Early Years Centre – Director & DAC only

Curriculum changes & internal system planning in schools and OEYCs only, EDI results treated as confidential and carefully guarded. Usually only in the School Report form from McMaster University, little further analysis.

Two - The “Usual Suspects”• School Board – principals/ head teacher but only their own school’s data, Early Years – senior

staff, agencies with close relationships with the two partners

• Principals receive just their own School Report but not any other neighbourhood. School Boards do further analysis. Early Years add social demographic contextual data and share with senior staff only, in the form of an internal report, still confidential. Senior staff at one or two other agencies obtain general EDI results on condition of confidentiality because they know someone at the Board or Early Years. Their agency uses it for internal planning.

Three - Early Years Committee or Coalition

•     School Board – all schools, Early Years centre – all staff,   agencies serving young children (health departments, childcare, children’s aid, spec ed agencies etc)

 Principals receive full report including SES patterns for the board, and are connected to agencies to consider partnerships. The School Board and Early Years present EDI results embedded in SES context to a committee of every agency serving young children. This is particularly effective if graphically depicted in maps.

Four - The Wider Community

•  School Board – all staff, parent councils, Early Years Centre – all staff, agencies,   politicians (municipal, provincial, federal)

Staff contributes ideas for partnerships with other agencies and schools such as OEYCs situating inside schools in vacant rural classrooms for parent education. Politicians learn much more about their youngest constituents, a steep learning curve for some. Changes in municipal recreation programs and parks for young families.

Five - The General Public

• School Board – all staff, parent council, school newsletters, Early Years centres –all staff, all participants

•  Agencies, Service Groups – eg Rotary Clubs, the media, general community (incl. the 80% of taxpayers without children in school)

Leads to discussion, debate, action plans, community meetings, political planning and commitment for children, fundraising and informed members of the public not normally connected to young children anymore.

In British Columbia, Canada a map of EDI results was on the front page of the Vancouver Sun which made early years the ‘talk of the town’. This led to a coalition called HELP publishing the BC Atlas of Child Development mapping the readiness of children for formal learning across the province(Kershaw et al 2005).

EDI: Proportion of children living in each neighborhood that scored in the bottom 10%

on one or more scales

If the EDI analysis is widely shared, it leads to a more diverse range of changes in the community as a result

• Implementation of inter-sectoral committee for the early years in communities

• School partnerships

• Types of programs that benefit from increased school readiness knowledge– Parenting programs– Speech & language – Non-profit recreation – Health related– Roots of Empathy in schools– Socio-emotional or behaviour related– Aboriginal– English as a second language

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

Questions?

Catharine Tozer, Ontario Early Years Centres & Early Development Instrument (EDI)

Any further questions?