Play-Based Assessments Essay

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Exploring Play-Based Assessments The NAEYC defines diagnostic assessments as an approach to "identify a child's specific areas of strengths and weakness" (2005a). Assessing a child allows for a better understanding to the nature of a child's problem, suggest the cause of the problem or deficiency, if possible; and make general recommendations about suitable remediation strategies. It is in the past ten years that researchers and practitioners alike, have had an increase focus towards improving their methods of assessment by observing a child's performance in a more realistic situation. Research shows that play-based assessments "allow for a true reflection of what the child is capable of doing and understanding"(NAEYC, 2005a). The tools created enables a team “to create an accurate, intricate, dynamic portrait of a child, using play as a medium for the observation and assessment of cognitive, socio-emotional, communication, language, and sensorimotor skills and performance"(Linder, 1993, p.43). Similar ideas have led to the creation of a number of play scales and the use of play as a medium in which to gauge child development. The goal of a play-based assessment is to encourage children to verbalize their thoughts, perceptions and feelings. During a play-based assessment, teams provide children with toys, ask them to describe pictures or retell stories, or otherwise express themselves freely. The result is a spontaneous language sample that allows clinicians to "analyze a child’s syntactic, semantic and discourse regulation skills" (Linder, 1993, p.44). Observing a child’s free-play interactions is unobtrusive and can help preserve natural verbal interaction, but a child’s language may vary according to the different types of toys used, making results variable. Play-based assessments do take more time and may require multiple sessions. However, Tynette
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