Progress Monitoring in Inclusive Preschools: Using Children's School Success+Curriculum Framework

Area of Science:

• Early Childhood Education
• Special Education
• Educational Psychology

Background:

• Inclusive preschools require progress monitoring for both general curriculum and individual goals (IEP).
• The CSS+ Curriculum Framework offers a structured approach to assess these diverse outcomes.
• Understanding progress across different instructional need levels is crucial for effective intervention.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of the CSS+ Curriculum Framework and progress monitoring process in inclusive preschools.
• To analyze children's progress in academic and social domains based on instructional need.
• To assess goal attainment for both individual (IEP) and general learning objectives.

Main Methods:

• Utilized the CSS+ Curriculum Framework and progress monitoring with 73 preschool children.
• Analyzed progress monitoring data grouped by instructional need (low, medium, high) in academic and social domains.
• Employed Goal Attainment Scaling to measure progress towards specific academic and social goals.

Main Results:

• Significant pre- to post-test gains were observed in most academic outcomes for all need groups.
• Social-emotional domain showed less consistent progress compared to academic areas.
• Children achieved social goals at the expected level 50-71% of the time and academic goals 54-76% of the time.

Conclusions:

• The CSS+ Curriculum Framework effectively monitors progress in inclusive settings, particularly for academic outcomes.
• Teacher implementation of the framework influenced classroom practices, suggesting a positive impact on instruction.
• Further attention may be needed to enhance social-emotional progress monitoring and intervention strategies.