Assessment in early childhood education: Commonly used curriculum models and Turkish curriculum

Assessment is an important part of early childhood education system. Changes in theoretical issues, increasing emphasis on interventions in early childhood and growing influences of parental concerns foster early childhood educators to use more trendy assessment techniques in early years (Gredler, 2000). In the current paper, assessment strategies of four early childhood education models including High Scope, Montessori, Waldorf and Project approach are reviewed. In addition to this review, Turkish Ministry of National Education (MONE) Curriculum is also examined in order to determine similarities and differences among these different curricula. A review of the different curriculum models revealed that apart from High Scope curriculum model, other three curriculum models and MONE curriculum do not provide well defined guidelines to assess development of young children.